Fall Equinox & World Peace Cookies

Twice a year, the hours of night and day are equal. These two events are called the Fall and Spring Equinoxes. (as opposed to the Winter and Summer Solstices where the hours of night and day are the longest respectively). The Latin word equinox translates into English as “equal night” and refers to how, due to the Earth’s tilt on its axis, both the northern and Southern Hemispheres receive an equal amount of daylight and darkness twice a year. The Fall Equinox takes place around September 21 while the Spring Equinox occurs on March 21. After the Fall Equinox, the days will get shorter in the Northern Hemisphere and longer in the Southern Hemisphere.

For centuries, from Ancient Greece to today’s Bavaria, this time of year has been devoted to harvest festivals where we give thanks for the abundance of food that will get us through the long winter months. While the world no longer worries about having no access to food during the winter months (war and poverty notwithstanding), that is a fairly new occurrence. This is proven by the fact that despite the globalization of the food chain, we seem to be hardwired to celebrate this season.

Initially, Thanksgiving Day was celebrated on October 3rd which makes sense since most of the fields are harvested by then. For many reasons, Abraham Lincoln, with his “Thanksgiving Proclamation”, changed the date of Thanksgiving to the last Thursday in November. Then, in 1939, FDR changed the date to the fourth Thursday in November. But the first idea for Thanksgiving–dating back to the Wampanoag Native American tribe that lived near Plymouth, MA and the surrounding areas–took place about two weeks past the Fall Equinox. The celebrations always happened after the hard work of bringing in the crops was finished.

This time of year, besides pumpkin patches, harvest festivals, and bonfires, there are many myths and legends that tell stories of life, death, and rebirth. Not surprising since the Fall Equinox is the time of year when the earth goes fallow in anticipation of winter coming. One of the best known of the harvest legends comes from the ancient Greek myth of the goddess Demeter and her daughter Persephone. Demeter, the goddess of grain and the harvest, adored her daughter Persephone. But one day the god of the underworld, Hades, abducted Persephone and took her back to his kingdom. Demeter’s grief caused all of the world’s crops to die, getting the attention of Zeus (the father of all the gods). Demeter told Zeus what had happened. Zeus went to Hades and ordered him to return Persephone, as long as she’d not eaten or drunk anything while in the underworld. Unfortunately, Persephone had eaten six pomegranate seeds. This meant that Persephone was doomed to spend six months of year underground with Hades. Demeter was so upset she decided that during those six months of year nothing would grow on Earth. Now, the beginning of this six months of fallow land begins on the Fall Equinox.

But the Fall Equinox is not just about pumpkins and scarecrows. In 1981, the UN declared September 21st as World Peace Day. A few decades later, a famous French chef in Paris made a dark chocolate cookie that was so good, critics declared that if everyone ate a cookie a day, peace would take over the world. So, besides all the pumpkin spice lattes and s’mores that we eat this time of year, there’s also a decadent, dark chocolate cooked appropriately named World Peace Cookie. (there are many variations to this story about a humble cookie, but I like this one. :))

While this cookie (recipe below) is amazing, it’s so chocolatey (they are like chewy, chocolate shortbreads) that I can only eat it once a year. So I always bake them to celebrate the Fall Equinox.

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