Episode Summary: In this episode, hosts Kristina, Jen, and Leekei, discuss the tradition of Easter chocolate eggs, its various origins, and how it has been commercialized today. 

Why do we eat chocolate for Easter around the world? At a time when the price of chocolate is increasing, it's intriguing to explore where this tradition comes from and how we can maintain the celebratory spirit without relying heavily on purchasing large quantities of chocolate. 

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Visit thecarbonalmanac.org/podcasts and send us a voice message on this episode or any other climate-related ideas and perspectives. 

Don’t Take Our Word For It, Look It Up! 

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Featuring Carbon Almanac Contributors Leekei Tang, Jenn Swanson and Kristina Horning. 

Leekei is a fashion business founder, a business coach, an international development expert and podcaster from Paris, France.  

From Langley in British Columbia, Canada, Jenn is a Minister, Coach, Writer and community Connector, helping people help themselves.  

Kristina has a background in architecture and engineering. Currently in Prague (that it is where she is originally from) and her base is US 

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The CarbonSessions Podcast is produced and edited by Leekei Tang, Steve Heatherington and Rob Slater. 

Hi, I'm Christina.

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I'm from Prague.

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Hi, I'm Jen, and I'm from Canada.

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Hi, I'm Oladunji, and I'm from Nigeria.

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Hello, I'm Liki, and I live in Paris.

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Hi, I'm Brian, and I'm from New York.

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Welcome to Carbon Sessions, a podcast with

carbon conversations for every day, with

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everyone, from everywhere in the world.

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In our conversations, we share ideas,

perspectives, questions, and things we

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can actually do to make a difference.

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So don't be shy and join our Carbon

Sessions, because it's not too late.

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Hi, I'm Liki.

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Hi, I'm Kristina.

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Hi, I'm Jen.

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I think that this episode will

be aired on, uh, January 1st.

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on Good Friday, which is a week from now.

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And Good Friday is the

Friday just before Easter.

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Actually, it's Good Friday,

part of the Easter holiday.

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I mean, it's part of

the Easter celebration.

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And one thing about Easter celebration,

I think, is that a lot of people around

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the world eat a lot of chocolate.

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Right.

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This is very common in France.

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I know it's very common in the UK.

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I don't know if it is common

in your parts of the world.

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Absolutely.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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Okay.

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So the whole world, it's a

lot of chocolates for Easter.

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I just wonder why, where is

this tradition coming from?

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Why do we eat?

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chocolate eggs for Easter.

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Do you have any idea?

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So Lent is the 40 days

traditionally, the 40 days before

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Easter, not counting Sundays.

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And in the Christian tradition, it

is and was a time of what they call

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repentance, which doesn't mean What

we think it means now, it means a

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turning back toward your source or

your holy or your God or your creator,

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whatever language you want to use.

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So it's a turning back to what's

important in life kind of thing.

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And what people used to do to symbolize

that is they used to, and some people

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still do, uh, they used to not have

things that were sweet or sugary or fat.

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So you've heard of Fat

Tuesday or Mardi Gras.

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Or, um, before Ash Wednesday, which is

the next day, which is also celebration

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the Tuesday, everyone ate pancakes.

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We call it pancake day in some

places because they were using up

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the fat and the sugar and the sweet

and getting it out of the house.

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And then the idea was that you

didn't have any of that for

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the 40 days, except on Sundays.

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And then Easter Sunday was a treat and

a celebration of new life and eggs.

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Symbolize new life, right?

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Um, and chocolate and sweets and

feasting, um, because you couldn't

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do that all of the time before.

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So that's kind of where it started,

um, as far as the chocolate.

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And then of course it got commercialized.

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So instead of just having

pancakes and things, it became

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tradition to have chocolate.

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Oh, okay.

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Because I had never version of

the story, which is not related to

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chocolate itself, but to the eggs.

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And, um, and because you know,

all the fasting, during lunch,

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uh, but chicken, not chicken

hand, keep lay, keep laying eggs.

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And, um, and because of

fasting eggs cannot be eaten.

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So what people used to do is to boil them.

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And so they end up at the.

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end of the fasting

period with lots of eggs.

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And so they need to make it,

make the eggs attractive.

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So they started painting it.

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And so the tradition started

with real eggs that have been

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accumulated during lent period.

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So that's my, my take on

this, um, on this thing.

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Yep.

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And that could be as well.

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I mean, this is all over the world.

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So it, um, it, you know, where,

where the egg itself began,

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um, the decorating of it.

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And I think that predates in some

parts of the world that completely

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predates the Christian story.

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Right.

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Yeah.

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As do many of the symbols,

many, many of the symbols.

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Borrowed, co opted, taken,

re imagined, and used.

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So what about your take

on the story, Christina?

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Yeah, I, um, I love the pagan

traditions, and I found out That

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the oldest painted egg they, um,

discovered is 2, 300 years old.

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Isn't it amazing?

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Um, so it's not only, uh, Some people

look at it that, uh, Egyptians and Romans

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had a tradition of painting eggs for,

because it was symbol of fertility, but

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also I found out Persians did that too.

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And, um, so it, uh, I'm really

excited about going back to nature.

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And thinking about it that way, in

old Slavic and Celtic times, that

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eggs had meaning of fertility.

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And so the spring, and uh,

coming to, growing everything.

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And yes, chickens are

starting to lay a lot of eggs.

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Oh, by the way, eggs last.

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without refrigeration really long time.

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I know we have chickens, so we try to

keep them out and it's over two months.

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Isn't it amazing?

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I didn't know that.

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And they really, uh, When they're not

washed, when they're capped in, uh,

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the same, not removing all the poop and

dirty things from the eggs, but they

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must have some kind of cover on the shell

that, um, is, uh, protecting the inside

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and they can last really long time.

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So, yeah.

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So I'm really excited and another

symbols because so not only they

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color the eggs different colors Like

for example, the red is colored for

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protection and also symbolizes love

but also and I think Persians did black

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eggs and Also, they write draw symbols

on it And especially in Czech Republic,

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they, uh, decorate eggs many colors

and with wax and different colors.

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And in, um, original, all the

symbols were very specific.

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And the cross is also pre Christian.

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They, it symbolized the horizontal

line, symbolized people, and the

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vertical line symbolized nature,

uh, the things unseen, spiritual.

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Part and crossing them together

meant bringing those two pieces

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together and connecting everything.

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So I thought that was really sweet.

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I like that.

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So yeah, that's, I like that.

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That's until the Romans took it over.

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Turned it into a torture instrument,

but yes, I like the Japanese

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much better, much, much better.

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Yeah, so these symbols showed up in old,

uh, digs and, uh, different, and I was

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really surprised when I found out the

oldest painted X is 2, 300 years old.

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But they say, that's amazing.

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And some of them are art.

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They're just art.

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Yeah.

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Beautiful.

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And I think I heard they're guessing

that the eldest, oldest, all this

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traditional dates, even 5, 000 years ago.

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So I'm not sure if they found specific

eggs, but they definitely found

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some, um, drawings or something.

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So the guess is it's not official,

but so I love that we're regenerating.

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We're learning so much.

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We're learning so much from you and

we're learning so much every day.

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Because all we do today is to eat

chocolate eggs because it's been widely

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commercialized now, all across the world.

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, but recently I've read that the price

of cocoa has increased, therefore

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the price of chocolate will increase.

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And all that it's because of El Nino.

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Yeah, what's going on?

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Chocolate is made of cocoa

and cocoa beans grow.

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Most of cocoa beans grow in West Africa.

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, um, because El Nino created change

of weather pattern, there's less,

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there's less rain in, um, in Western

Africa, and therefore the, there's

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less cocoa produced, basically.

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, uh, this is the reason behind, uh,

why , chocolate's price will increase.

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I wonder with eggs, uh, chocolate eggs,

that The moment people did not have

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chickens anymore, uh, at home and moved

into the cities, there were less eggs.

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So they needed, they wanted the symbol,

but they were not enough eggs, so

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I wondered that's why they replaced

the regular eggs with chocolate eggs.

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I would, yeah, I'm curious how it shifted

from regular eggs to chocolate eggs.

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And I think it's commercial as, you know,

the commercialism, I mean, it's kind of

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like how, you know, Christmas and, uh,

has just blown up into, uh, something

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much, much bigger than it used to be.

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It used to be amazing to have an orange,

because you couldn't get oranges at

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that time of year and that used to

be a treat, or a stick of candy was a

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treat, and people couldn't get those

things regularly, they couldn't afford

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them, they weren't available, etc.

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And, um, you know, the commercialization

of, of holidays, continues to happen.

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And Easter is, is.

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You know, unfortunately the same, right?

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It's, it's about gifts and

new outfits and chocolate.

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And, um, I mean, there's fun,

there's, there's wonderful activities.

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People have a lot of fun hunting for eggs

and I don't know where that tradition

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came from, but it's lots of fun.

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Um, but yeah, the chocolate and,

and often the chocolate that's

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sold isn't even good chocolate.

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Is it, it's chocolate that's, um,

Full of other things, wax and other

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things that shouldn't be in chocolate.

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Leaky, you're the connoisseur.

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What kind of chocolate eggs do you like?

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No, I eat chocolate bars.

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I don't eat chocolate.

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I mean, except when it's come

from, um, chocolatier, but, uh, I

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don't buy supermarket chocolates.

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Yeah, it is.

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I think it's, uh, really interesting

how to, I, to taste the other

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chocolates and then you, it's hard

to go back to the cheap chocolate.

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So I hope everybody will try at

least tiny, tiny, little tiny egg,

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chocolate egg or chocolate bunny from

the little store on your corner, some

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chocolatier who makes it themselves

and see the difference and support

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the local instead of the big industry.

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And fair trade as well, because

there's so much horror that goes

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on with chocolate production.

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So if it can be fair trade chocolate

that, like you say, is made in

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small amounts, when it's really good

chocolate, we all want it, right?

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Yeah.

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That's the thing about when you

said, Jen, about the, we need just a

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little bit, it is so satisfying, just

one bite of really good chocolate.

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Compare when there was some chocolate

bar with cheap chocolate, it's like,

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Oh, I want at least three more.

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Well, another thing about it is that

if you're purchasing something from

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a local chocolate maker, you are, you

are saving the carbon footprint, right?

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Because you're buying it from someone

nearby, who's making it, it's not being

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shipped or trucked from who knows where.

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And you have, uh, less of a footprint

if you're purchasing from someone

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who's actually making it right where

you're, where you are, I think I'm

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going to get my, um, uh, grandson and

whoever, whichever kid is here, some,

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little, little tiny chocolate bunnies.

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They're about this big.

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They're really tiny,

but they're really good.

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Fair trade, vegan, pure, delicious.

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Um, and it's more expensive, but

Rather than getting them a whole

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bunch of stuff, I'm just going

to get them a little chocolate.

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That's nice.

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It's a thought that counts.

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Yeah.

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And, uh, you know, don't give your

kids too much sweets and treats.

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It's, it's not healthy anyway.

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I'll give him a carrot too.

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How's that?

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He likes carrots.

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Yeah, I think it's beautiful to enjoy the

spring weather and all the flowers are

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coming out and, uh, trees are blooming

and maybe go back to, uh, the pagans

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times to look at the symbols and draw the

eggs and Now, instead of chocolate, we

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could go back to the, to my explanation

of why we eat chocolate Egg for Easter

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is to go back to the eggs to boil them

and to decorate them could be decorated

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by painting them, but boil them first

by painting them or, um, Oh, uh, call

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color them with natural dyes and um,

and you can do beautiful things with

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natural dyes, with like onion pills

with bit roots pill with lot of pills.

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So , this is what I wanted to say.

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. We used to do that and then put

them in an egg carton in the fridge.

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And then when we went to school,

we would have colorful eggs.

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. Yes.

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In our lunches.

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And so you can hide them in the garden.

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Yeah.

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And then Andre Spring

instead of buying chocolate.

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Yeah.

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Well, also, Todd, you know, raw eggs,

you can take the egg, the raw egg, and

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make little hole in the top and the

bottom, and blow the egg outside of the

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shell, and then you can decorate it, and

hang it somewhere, and have it forever.

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It's easier said than done, though.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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It's hard work.

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It is hard work.

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And they're very delicate, but it's fun.

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Beautiful.

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Well, have a wonderful weekend.

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No matter what you celebrate.

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Whether you're eating

chocolate or eggs or carrots.

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Enjoy your weekend.

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Enjoy the Easter holidays.

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