No one really knows where the cascarón came from or who started the tradition of smashing colorful eggs stuffed with confetti on the heads of unsuspecting victims. Some historians trace its origins to China, reporting that it was explorer Marco Polo who introduced it — not to mention gunpowder, spaghetti, and paper money — to the West.
Who knows for sure? But back in the 1840s — that brief glimmer of time when California had cast itself happily adrift from the colonial tethers of Spain and Mexico and had yet to be swallowed up by the Yankee invasion — the cascarón was an instrument of divine flirtation in Santa Barbara. Back then, it was part of every major celebration, especially during Carnival and at all the big weddings. Young men and women armed themselves with painted eggshells filled with confetti, cologne, water, or in some instances, finely cut gold leaf. Sneaking up on their “favored one,” they’d lightly break an egg — just one — over his or her head. The effect, according to letters written at the time, was breathtaking. “As the ladies generally wore their hair floating unconfined,” wrote one observer, “the spangled glittering among their raven tresses as they swept through the dance had a very pretty effect.”
Indeed.