Fanouropita is a traditional sweet fasting pie of Greek cuisine. It is offered on the memory day of St. Fanourios on August 27, when the pie is given to believers as a blessing. It is based on oils and does not contain any butter or eggs. Believers seek to offer the cake and get "revelation" of objects or people in general, or to find something they are looking for.
Worshiping Saint Fanourios while adopting the tradition of fanouropita origins either around 1500 AD or 1355-1369 AD, when the icon of Saint Fanourios was discovered, untouched, between ruins, in Rhodes or Cyprus. Saint Fanourios, in local tradition of Orthodox people, is since then the revealer of lost objects.
Description
Fanouropita is usually round with diameter of about 25-30 cm. It is puffy, oily, aromatic and sometimes powdered with sifted white sugar.
Ingredients
Ingredients are numbered traditionally to be a single number, seven, nine or eleven materials, the number varying by region. In its simplest version, fanouropita has only 7 materials, as many as the mysteries of the Orthodox Church. The ingredients must be all intact, so it does not contain olive oil but vegetable oil. The basic / most common ingredients are: flour, vegetable oil, sugar, orange juice, baking powder, nuts, raisins. Other materials may include cinnamon, cloves, soda and water.
Preparation
The solid ingredients are mixed together. The liquid ingredients are also mixed together, separately form the solid ones. Afterwards the two mixes are mixed together in a round baking pan, which is put in the oven, at about 170-180 Celsious, for about an hour. After it is out of the oven it is left to cool down and then it is powdered with sifted sugar.
Tradition
Fanouropita is blessed in church and its pieces are offered to people. According to tradition, it is offered for the forgiveness of the Saint Fanourios' mother, who was a sinful woman behaving very cruely to the poor.
In various areas of Greece and Cyprus the tradition of the custom of the cace is followed by some Orthodox Christians to ask Saint Fanourios "reveal" a job to unemployed or an item that was lost or a lost case, to give health and find a groom for unmarried girls.
