January 30, 2022 - National Hot Tea Month | National Croissant Day

Welcome to January 30th, 2022 on the National Day Calendar. Today we celebrate influential tea totalers and fancy crescent rolls. The English love tea. In fact they built a global trade empire around it. But the beverage was actually introduced to the country by someone from Portugal. Tea had already been brought from China to Europe, but the Brits didn’t really care for it—they were using it as medicine. Then Catherine of Braganza of Portugal married England’s Charles II and moved to the British Isles. She drank tea every day, something that soon caught on with the rest of the nobility. Word spread about the queen’s habits and soon drinking tea became all the rage with the people of England. How is that for an influencer?! January is National Hot Tea Month, a great time to warm up with a delicious hot cuppa. You probably think croissants were invented by a Frenchman, but surprisingly the baker who came up with these light, buttery rolls was an Austrian in Paris. In the early 1800s August Zang took an existing bread recipe and added layers of butter to the dough through a process called lamination. This involves folding and pressing butter into the dough over and over again and the crisp, flaky results are well worth it! His Viennese bakery put the crescent shaped pastry on the map. On National Croissant Day, celebrate by visiting your own local bake shop and be sure to thank them by exclaiming, “Viva la croissant!” I’m Anna Devere and I’m Marlo Anderson. Thanks for joining us as we Celebrate Every Day! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices