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Vasilopita

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Vasilopita© Renee Anjanette Photography

Best served at a big family breakfast, this coffee cake rings in the first morning of the new year in Greece. You can easily recognize the cake by its tiered shape, with a small round cake set on top of a large round cake. It is usually flavored with anise seed or mahlab (the ground pit of a Mediterranean wild cherry). The Greek tradition is to serve the cake to the youngest first, then the next to youngest, and so on, working up in age, and the person who finds the hidden coin or trinkets will have good luck for the year.

Variations:

Hazelnut-Anise-Chocolate Chip Vasilopita
Replace the almonds with chopped hazelnuts and the mahlab with anise seed. Add 1/2 cup chocolate chips to the nut mixture.

Raspberry-Yogurt Vasilopita
Replace the milk with yogurt. Add 1 cup fresh raspberries to the center of the cakes, along with the almond mixture and coin, during the baking.

Seed Wedding Cake
In Greece everyone is required to eat sees at weddings to wish the happy couple a fertile life. Replace the nuts with 3/4 cup sunflower seeds or poppyseeds and serve the cake at a wedding brunch.

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