Food and drink

There are 566 replies in this Thread which has previously been viewed 25,976 times. The latest Post () was by aficionado.

    Quote from Rice

    Before Christmas fades into memory, please tell what your Christmas Eve or Christmas Day dinner was? (If it was Vitel Toné, please — no details!)

    As it was easier to take the food rather than bring her here we ate both meals at the MIL's...hence it was kept simple. Christmas Eve meal consisted of thick cut slices of chicken matambre which had been pre-ordered from the shop of a family friend who makes it. We had it with potato salad followed by three different varieties of excellent ice cream from Asti.

    Yesterday it was carre de cerdo which was collected from a local restaurant the day before and heated up. Again followed by ice cream. The MIL loved both meals which was all that really mattered. I enjoyed the chicken matambre more than the carre d cerdo.

    • Official Post

    Adri cooked carre de cerdo, soaked it in brown sugar and mustard the day before and we had it cold on Xmas Eve along with all the other usual offerings including Vital Tony, eggs stuffed with anchovies, Pionono roll, matambre roll, salads and chicken in various cold cuts. It was all very tasty and I brought along the trifle laced with brandy which was met with curious eyes.

    Quote from richietog

    I think I bought too many snacks. I may have to give some away

    You’re in luck, SpaceNut - - Boxing Day is perfect for sharing your snacks with homeless people.


    Quote from daniel

    . I also celebrated my 74th BD on the 23rd. Yea!!!!!!!

    Belated Happy Birthday, daniel ! How nice to have a 3-day celebration every year. Your parents were brilliant!


    Re: Christmas meals - omicron and distance kept us from being with family again this year, but we enjoyed a sunny, warm Christmas Eve and Day with meals on the balcony. Christmas Eve dinner was gumbo and champagne. For Christmas breakfast, we had sausage grits with toast; later in the day, we ate Mississippi sweet potatoes (in Argentina, “batatas Beauregard?”) with beef and salad.


    Today? Leftovers!

    I was always told that I was a mistake that should never have happened, really made me feel wanted!!!! We consumed the last of our leftovers today!!!!!

    Was up checking the roof gutters this morning as a hefty thunderstorm might arrive later. After coming down I fancied something unhealthy for lunch. A streaky bacon butty with soft fried egg to dip into fulfilled my need perfectly. Plus a big mug of tea to wash it down with.

    For the coffee drinkers out there. I find most supermarket bought coffee both ground and instant crap for the prices you have to pay compared to the UK. Nescafe instant is okay as long as you buy the Government subsidised pouch version rather than the overpriced jar.

    I've been buying Dia branded instant coffee...the ones from Brazil and Colombia with the latter just pipping the Brasilian one in strength and flavour. If you like coffee I'd give both a go. The Colombian one is currently on offer at 299 pesos. :thumbup:


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    Mardi Gras season in New Orleans and in various European cities officially opened on Thursday, Jan 6, which was Twelfth Night. Some of you have enjoyed king cakes made by serafina at our off-season Mardi Gras In November parties. I thought you might enjoy this light article which gives a brief history and imparts some of the atmosphere of fun that accompanies the season. Happy Mardi Gras!

    In New Orleans, King Cake Is a Way to Make Joy

    The colorful cake is more than a dessert — it’s the flavor of the city. And a diverse community of bakers is adapting the Carnival specialty to their own tastes.

    Jan. 4, 2022

    This king cake, from the chef Dominick Lee, has a caramelized apple filling. This king cake, from the chef Dominick Lee, has a caramelized apple filling.

    NEW ORLEANS — When Dominick Lee was in elementary school in the 1990s, every year for Twelfth Night, the teacher would bring a king cake for the class to share. He and his classmates would wait for their slices — decorated with purple, gold and green sugars — eager to see which piece had a tiny plastic baby hidden inside. Whoever found it was responsible for bringing another king cake to school the next week, and the cycle would continue through Carnival season, right up until Mardi Gras.

    “It was a really wonderful childhood memory, and it’s stuck with me to this day,” said Mr. Lee, a chef born and raised in New Orleans.

    Nearly every New Orleanian has a similar story. King cake is a treasured sweet, and a beloved Carnival tradition.

    And in New Orleans, where Catholicism is still the predominant religion, Twelfth Night, celebrated here on Jan. 6, holds deep significance. The date — also known around the world as Epiphany or Three Kings Day — marks the moment when the three Magi, or kings, reached the baby Jesus in Bethlehem. Celebrations vary, but in New Orleans, Twelfth Night is also the start of the pre-Lenten Carnival season, a cycle of baking and eating king cakes, with the arrival of many plastic babies.

    Carnival season kicks off on Jan. 6 in New Orleans. Members of the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club celebrate the beginning of the season at a 2021 event with the city’s mayor, LaToya Cantrell. Carnival season kicks off on Jan. 6 in New Orleans. Members of the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club celebrate the beginning of the season at a 2021 event with the city’s mayor, LaToya Cantrell.Max Becherer/The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate, via Associated Press

    Poppy Tooker, an author in New Orleans, said king cake dates back to Ancient Rome and the Saturnalia Festival, a celebration of the god Saturn.

    “The tradition goes, they bake the bean into the cake, which really makes it sound like a king cake,” Ms. Tooker said. “When Rome collapsed, like so much in the Catholic Church in Europe, they took these pagan customs and adapted them.”

    King cakes are revered in New Orleans, so much so that it’s considered sacrilegious to eat one before Jan. 6. Until the 18th century, king cake was largely eaten only on that day, to signal the end of the Christmas season. In the early 1900s however, some Carnival krewes (as parade organizers are known) like the Twelfth Night Revelers began to host balls, where they served king cake, selecting the “king” or “queen” based on which guest found the small trinket, or fève, hidden in the cake.

    The New Orleans version of the cake, which Ms. Tooker said was most likely developed by 18th-century French and Spanish colonists, initially followed a basic structure: The oval-shaped pastries consisted of a brioche dough with hints of vanilla, and were covered with colorful sugary crystals and stuffed with the fève, initially a bean. In the 19th century, porcelain dolls were the fève of choice; in the 20th century, McKenzie’s Pastry Shoppes, a local chain that closed in 2001, became among the first commercial bakeries to use a plastic baby, and others soon followed. Cakes also became sweeter and more Danish-like as king cakes became commercially popular.

    “It is the emblematic dessert of the time,” the food historian Lolis Eric Elie said.

    Today, the pastry has taken on a life of its own in New Orleans. Gambino’s serves a Bavarian cream king cake and a praline-and-cream-cheese king cake, among other varieties. Bywater Bakery has experimented with savory flavors, offering cakes stuffed with boudin, crawfish or spinach-and-artichoke dip. Haydel’s Bakery’s classic version is a popular favorite. And several bakeries, like La Boulangerie and Croissant D’or, serve galettes des rois.

    “King cake season is this really communal experience that I think defines Mardi Gras New Orleans in general,” said Matt Haines, the author of “The Big Book of King Cake,” an archive of some of the city’s tastiest cakes. At Dong Phuong Bakery in New Orleans East, the king cakes have a generous layer of icing.L. Kasimu Harris for The New York Times

    Dong Phuong Bakery, in New Orleans East, has embraced this idea. The Vietnamese bakery first started making the pastry in 2008, selling about 100 cakes for the entire season. Now, it averages about 50,000.

    “We wanted to create an offering to the community,” said Linh Garza, the bakery’s president. “But we wanted to adapt it to our community, and our tastes.”

    Ms. Garza’s family opened the bakery in 1982 after immigrating as refugees to New Orleans. Dong Phuong became a culinary respite for the area’s Vietnamese community. And Ms. Garza’s mother, Huong Tran, eventually became the mastermind behind the bakery’s king cake. The recipe opts for cream cheese icing and uses a flaky, brioche dough, offering more moisture than other versions, and a remarkably fluffy bite. Ms. Tran, who previously worked as a seamstress, added deep slashes to her cakes. At Norma’s Sweets Bakery in Mid-City, José Castillo sells king cakes that speak to his Honduran background.L. Kasimu Harris for The New York Times

    José Castillo was 5 years old when his family arrived in New Orleans from Villanueva, Honduras in 1981. After seeing the Three Kings Day tradition at school, he came home and begged his mother, Norma Castillo, to buy him a king cake.

    “She was like, ‘Really? We just arrived in this country!’”

    At Norma’s Sweets Bakery in the Mid-City — Mr. Castillo manages this second location of his mother’s bakery — king cake has become an essential item. Filled with guava and cream cheese and covered in a light layer of icing, Norma’s cake plays with the power of subtle sweetness, providing a crisp, fruity bite for all who indulge.

    “We wanted to give the community a little taste of the Latin product,” Mr. Castillo said of their use of guava filling. “Guava is our strawberry in Honduras, and we wanted to make something that allowed us to be part of the community, but that reflected where we’re from, too.” Guava and cream cheese fillings are a specialty at Norma’s.L. Kasimu Harris for The New York Times

    In the French Quarter, Brennan’s has found a pleasant intersection between simplicity and innovation. The storied restaurant started selling king cakes nationally in 2021, including a traditional take with notes of cinnamon and butter in every bite.

    “It’s really just a fun time for the city,” said Ralph Brennan, an owner. “We all have these incredible memories of eating our favorite king cake and participating in the parade, and we want to be part of those memories for the next generation.”

    In 2019, Will and Jennifer Samuels founded King Cake Hub to centralize the array of king cake options for locals. The couple partnered with local bakeries and restaurants during Carnival season, eventually selling nearly 1,000 king cakes per day from pickup locations within New Orleans. Though Mr. Samuels died in September, Ms. Samuels said she will maintain the hub, which many locals consider a godsend.

    “I’ve had so much fun with this, so there was really not much thought of dropping it,” Ms. Samuels said. “The feedback I got from the bakeries was about how much they had appreciated being a part of the hub, especially in the past year. For some of them, things were looking kind of shaky and we kind of helped put them on solid ground with those guaranteed sales every day.

    “That’s just honestly the spirit of the city,” she added. “New Orleans is just a place where people find a way to make joy.”


    New York Times, 4 January 2022