Three Kings Day bread-making was a competitive event on Monday in the Yucatán city of Tizimín, which broke the Guinness World Record for the longest Kings Day bread in the world.

The rosca de reyes, as it’s called, measured 3,009 meters and making it required two tonnes of flour, 13,000 eggs and 19,000 tiny baby Jesus figurines. Mexican Three Kings Day tradition dictates that anyone who finds a baby Jesus must make tamales for friends and family on Candlemas Day, February 2.

Tizimín took the record from Saltillo, Coahuila, which baked a 2.65-kilometer rosca last year.

The measuring process took over five hours on Monday, with the result that some of the people who went to witness the record-breaking event lost interest and left. But hundreds remained when the time came to serve the bread, a requirement for winning the record.

Guinness World Records certification official Carlos Reyes Tapia said that each individual piece of the rosca must not exceed 50 centimeters in length, that they must be perfectly joined and that the bread be cooked according to the traditional recipe.

The various pieces that made up the record-breaking bread were cooked in four different bakeries in Tizimín, which is renowned for its Three Kings Day celebrations.

Over 1,000 people worked all through the weekend to help bake the rosca.

In addition to the flour and eggs, the recipe also called for 50 kilograms of yeast, 50 kilograms of salt, 625 kilograms of sugar, 625 liters of milk and 1,500 pieces of candied fruit.

Source: El Universal (sp)