Jolabokaflod: the book flood cometh
and I say, let it pour
However you found your way here, welcome!
The joyful Icelandic tradition of Jólabókaflóðið celebrates giving books as gifts and reading them with chocolate. No need to be Icelandic, or even to celebrate Christmas to partake.
As a chocolate maker and book lover, I’m all in.
During the festive season, gifts are opened on 24 December and, by tradition, everyone reads the books they have been given straight away, often while drinking hot chocolate or alcohol-free Christmas ale.
Here’s a bit of history, found via the website, Jolabokaflod:
Jólabókaflóðið in English means the Christmas book flood, which began during World War II after Iceland became independent from Denmark in 1944. Because paper was one of the few commodities not rationed during the war, Icelanders shared their love of books as other types of gifts were in short supply. Every year since 1944, the Icelandic book trade has published a catalogue called Bókatíðindi (Book Bulletin in English) sent to every household in mid-November during the Reykjavik Book Fair. Icelanders use the catalogue to order books to give friends and family for Christmas.
The point is chocolate + life = joy, and my “why” for writing Spoon & Pod even though I write two other Substack publications: the Next Batch is a resource hub for my chocolate school:
And wild rivers is where I wander the map of a life that’s migrated a few very different directions, including a very water-splattered 19-year chapter as a Grand Canyon river guide.
Though I’m math-challenged, the equation (chocolate + life = joy) is true, the way math is true. Honestly, if they taught math with chocolate, we’d all be happier in school; as a chocolate maker I use math daily for calculating %-based chocolate recipes, called formulations. When I want to make, say, a 74% ingredient dark chocolate, the 74% refers to the total ratio of cacao (cocoa nibs and, if I want to add any, cocoa butter) in relation to the amount of sugar (26%). I need to know how much weight of each ingredient I’ll need to keep the ratio intact, and to create the batch size I want to make.
For folks just craving a bar, the % the chocolate maker has listed on the wrapper or packaging lets us know “how much” cacao flavor is in the bar. The higher the %, the more cacao used. The lower, the more assertively any other ingredients will come to the flavor forefront (sugar, milk powder, or if plant-based, whatever alt-milk was used, etc). This is why darker chocolate seems less sweet. More on that down the road, because not all cacao origins taste the same—the beautifully mind-blowing notion that drew me into becoming a bean to bar chocolate maker.
Since I was first introduced to Jolabokaflod, by the same friend who introduced me to the wondrous Nancy Pearl’s Book List, my small family’s yearly choosing of the books we’re gifting to each other, and the chocolate we’ll enjoy while reading excerpts aloud, has become a beloved tradition. After I push send on this post, we’re headed to our local book shop.
About that friend: when we first met she not only asked if I liked to read, but when I said yes, she generously invited me to join her to hear Nancy Pearl speak live at her annual Book List talk on Whidbey Island. I was knew to Whidbey, and while moving our family to an island during the 2009 global economic meltdown seemed like a good idea at the time, the $12 single roll of TP was an eye-opener, as was the dampness (continual drizzle). I’d volunteered to help cut boughs and decorate for a September outdoor school festival, and amidst the heavy downpour wondered aloud if the potluck and bonfire would be cancelled. Another parent chided me saying, welcome to the Pacific Northwest where we don’t cancel for a little dampness.
My book-reading friend helped smooth the bumpiness of being the new parent in a tight community, teaching me a lesson in the kindness of making someone feel welcome through the effortless grace of simply reaching out and asking. When she asked if I had any interest in the new book club she was organizing, I said thank you, and yes.
Years later when she texted and asked, are you Jolabokafloding yet? I had no clue what she meant, but after I googled it, and the book with the chocolate bar she’d sent me arrived, the answer has been yes yes yes.
If you’re just learning about book flood, it’s not too late! and it doesn’t need to be costly. I’ve wrapped and gifted favorite books to my family that I’ve owned (and already read and enjoyed), books I’ve found at the thrift store, books I was ecstatic to discover on chance.
Last year I gifted my partner a bumble bee field guide I discovered through a post by
Also last year, for my son, a history buff who minored in Japanese, a vintage book written by two Japanese historians that I found at a local professor’s estate sale.
Now, the chocolate.
A confession: I don’t gift/pair the chocolate I personally make every year with my family’s books, though I often aim to. Sometimes in the hoopla it has felt simple and fine to sit down to unwrap the books with mugs of hot chocolate. Other times the chocolate has been in cookie form, and once it was a Buche de Noel (log cake rolled and filled with buttercream). It’s been Baci (those kisses with a whole hazelnut inside) and it’s been s’mores (we were desperate and tried Triscuits. The saltiness was actually great with the chocolate). Some years I’ve gifted chocolate from my fellow makers, which my family sees as a true treat because they know I hoard it (if you write it’s akin to savoring someone else’s writing).
It can be a bar everyone shares, or a small treat tied with ribbon to the book.
Last year for the boys it was bars that I made to look like slabs of tree bark. To go with the Midway book, an almond plant-based white chocolate with sakura white (sakura is pickled and dried cherry blossom that has this fun bubble-gum pink hue and a distinct cherry blossom aroma), with raspberries and hojicha leaves (smoked matcha tea; where matcha is, literally green and tastes of green, hojicha is warmer and roasty):
And to nibble with the field guide, a friendly chocolate malted oat milk bar which has crispy rice stirred in. After hiking or fishing near Sisters, Oregon we always stop at the Snow Cap drive-in for chocolate malted milk shakes, so I thought this bar would be a fun reminder of warmer days, and bumblebee sightings to come.
I have no idea what book they’ll gift to me, and since they subscribe here I’m not spilling the (cacao :0 beans on what I’m giving them, though I did re-gift the Jolabokaflod gift last year from that dear friend on Whidbey; a novel of friendship, food, and love I decided to share with a family member new to this tradition.
Another equation that seems to sum it all up perfectly.
Happy reading, and happy chocolate,
Mackenzie