The Irish New Year's Tradition That Involves Throwing Bread At A Door

For the Irish, New Year's Eve has amassed a range of traditions that carry cultural, mystical, and superstitious undertones. Ancient Celts viewed the end of a year as a kind of gateway into the realm of spirits and fairies and looked for ways to recognize and respect the occasion. A series of traditions lodged into the modern psyche, and what was once performed to ward off bad omens and welcome good luck have become playful nods to the past while simultaneously marking good wishes for what is yet to come. Many families would smash bread against the walls of their home to scare off bad luck and evil intentions as a new year began. 

The practice, variably called "the banging of the bread," "barmbrack," or "the Day of Buttered Bread," was thought to usher in fortune and well-meaning spirits as one year ended and a new one started. A more religious-themed practice is said to honor the Holy Trinity, and the father figure of a home would take three bites from bread before throwing it against the front door. This demonstration would occur while the others in the house prayed. After this symbolic bread-slinging took place, the broken pieces would be collected from the ground and shared to eat. While such practices often fall under the umbrella of New Year's food traditions that we no longer celebrate, the customs still live on in some form.

Smashing doors and walls with Christmas bread may sound like a mess to clean up, but the practice was thought to encourage abundance and good health for the year to come — and make use of any stale bread still in the home. Though Irish celebrations for New Year's Eve — also called Oíche Chinn Bliana, Oíche na Coda Móire, or Oíche Chaille — may not always include this bread-throwing activity, rest assured there is still plenty of revelry that takes place throughout the country.

Just in case superstitions get the best of your imagination, you may not want to toss out any old pieces of bread you have in your kitchen when the end of the year grows near. Whether or not you choose to partake in this bread-chucking practice, however, baking a fresh loaf of Irish brown soda bread or honey oatmeal soda bread certainly couldn't hurt New Year's Eve festivities. Should you want to welcome in the luck of the Irish into your own home sans bread crumbs and loaf-tossing behavior, pour yourself a cold pint of Guinness or make an Irish coffee to toast to the new year, instead.