Caribbean Christmas

This is the first year that I will not be going home to my little island in the sun for Christmas. This year will be new and different and exciting all the same. But there are a few things that I'm certainly going to miss from home. Most of them are food... surprise, surprise. These are the things that define Christmas at home for me.

Ponche Crema

Mmm... Ponche Crema! This is a little bit like American Eggnog, but very very alcoholic and infinitely more delicious. It is rich and creamy, and with a perfect sprinkling of nutmeg it just tastes like Christmas! You can find a recipe here. I must stress that it wont be any good unless you use a proper West Indian dark rum, preferably Cockspur. Don't even try to use Bacardi! Throw that shit down the drain!

Pastelles

Mmm... Pastelles! So this is a Trini/Venezuelan dish. There is a similar Bajan version called Conkie that you can read about here. Really I prefer the Trini version (and this is the only time you will ever see me admit to anything from Trinidad being better than Barbados). The filling is a mix of meats, heavily spiced and finely minced. It's then covered in a cornmeal casing and wrapped in a Banana leaf. From mid-December to mid-January my family eats these for breakfast at least twice a week. Pastelles really make me feel Christmassy!

Parang Music

So I really love traditional Christmas songs- Jingle Bells and Let it Snow and all the usuals. But these songs don't really tend to be party songs. No one ever jumped up to the dance floor for Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer. At home we need something to dance to! We always need party music and Parang fills this space for the Christmas season. Most Parang songs, just like Calypso, are filled with suggestion and innuendo. Parang is funny, fun, festive... oh I just love it! 

Breakfast

Ok, so Cadbury biscuits obviously are not West Indian. Or even very Christmassy for that matter. But this very tin of biscuits means Christmas to me. You see, my family is a bit obsessive about presents. We're all pretty much grown, but still are up before 7 on Christmas morning to see what's under the tree. This means that there is no time at all to make or eat breakfast. Instead, a nice big tin of Cadbury Biscuits gets opened and we all gorge ourselves on chocolate while wrapping paper and ribbon gets torn to shreds!  

Christmas Ham

Mmm... Ham! Turkey is not the holiday meal of choice at home. It's ham. A nice big pig leg, honey glazed, covered in cloves... my mouth is watering just thinking of it. My Dad has one of these electric carving knives that whirs and buzzes as he carves our ham. The noise of the knife plus the smell of the ham is like a magnetic pull to the kitchen. We often eat it faster than he can carve!

 

SORREL!

Of all the things that mean Christmas to me, of all the delicious things that I love, none compares to my absolute obsession with sorrel. I LOVE sorrel! This beautifully red, fragrant juice is the most wonderful thing that December has to offer. A glass of sorrel with my pastelle in the morning, a vodka-sorrel to match my party dress in the evenings, sorrel-tinis getting mixed up on Christmas Eve... oh my oh my oh my. Many of you know what I'm talking about, but for those of you who have never had the pleasure of this beautiful drink, I cannot even describe to you how nice it is! It's like nothing else I've ever tasted. And if anyone reading this can tell me where I can get sorrel in London you will be my new best friend! Seriously, I'll bake you something delicious. 

If you're looking for more delicious Caribbean eats, head over to Skip to Malou* today for some more perennial dishes!

Chocolate Salami

This is one hell of a way to get your chocolate fix!

I've been wanting to try out this dessert for ages and finally gave it a go last week. Unfortunately, I completely forgot to take any photos of my own. So I've stolen some from here. Truly it was incredibly easy to make and is perfect for dinner parties as you can prepare it well in advance and it keeps really well, as long as it's cold.

I got the recipe here, which you'll find is in Italian but Google Translate does the job. All the recipes I found for this suggested "Oro Saiwa" biscuits. I'm assuming these are a typically Italian kind of biscuit as I've never heard of them and couldn't find anything with that name in the supermarket here. I used malted milk biscuits and they worked very well (That's Shirley biscuits for those in B'dos). I also used rum for flavour instead of coffee. I think that it requires a hell of a lot of rum though, as I was quite generous and you couldn't taste it at all in the end product.

I would highly recommend this dessert. It's easy, beautiful, and absolutely delicious! It is the perfect thing for all those hundreds of holiday parties coming up.

Onion and Courgette not-so-pie-like Pie

Well I'm posting on Saturday this week instead of Friday. Mostly because I've been battling a silly Autumn-cold for a while now and yesterday I just felt totally rubbish! I woke up with the worst headache in the world, which is never a good start to the day, spent the morning coughing up my lungs, and then decided I couldn't stand it any more and drugged myself up with all the flu-related medication I had at hand. This consequently sent me into a zombie-like state of something between consciousness and an acid trip. And I was still in a bad mood. So truly, had I chosen yesterday to tell you about my kitchen adventures, all you would have got was an incoherent stream of negativity (more so than usual). 

But today I am feeling much better! So here is my "pie":

So this is the Bajan version of pie that is explained here. So no pastry in this one. But looks good, eh? That is bubbling, crispy, delicious cheese on the top there. Mmm!

Actually, this really didn't come out how I wanted it to, but it was tasty anyway. Here is a semblance of a recipe.

One courgette, grated

One and a half large onions, roughly chopped

A big knob of butter

Equal amount of flour

Milk

Lots of grated cheese

An egg

Salt

Pepper

Garlic powder/salt

Cayenne

The first thing to do is grate the courgette. I use the medium size holes on the box grater but its really up to you what size you want it to be. Once it is grated, put it into a colander and cover it generously with salt. Let that sit for about half an hour and then press out any extra water you can by pressing down on it with a kitchen towel. This is to help draw out the water. Courgette will spring a lot of liquid in the oven and that would make the pie really runny, which is not a good thing. 

Then chop up your onions. Again, size isn't important. Cook these on a low heat with a bit of butter just until they are soft and white. You don't want them caramelised, and remember they will cook more in the oven. 

Now you have to make a roux. This is actually a lot easier than it is often made out to be. Melt a big knob of butter on the hob at medium heat. Then add an equal volume of flour to butter. Stir this in until the flour is dissolved in the butter and you've got a paste. Then turn the heat to low and add some milk. Stir continuously making sure that the paste is combined completely with the milk. When it starts to bubble, turn the heat off. Keep stirring until the sauce thickens. This can take a while but I promise it will thicken so just be patient. At this point add a bit of black pepper, garlic powder, and cayenne pepper. You can add a bit more salt but be stingy because remember the courgette is already doused in it.

Beat an egg and add a drop of milk just to make the texture a bit smoother. Make sure the white sauce has cooled a bit, to almost room temperature. If it's too hot it will scramble the egg and that's just gross. Stir in the beaten egg, and half of the cheese. Seriously, put as much cheese as you want. Put a lot if you like cheese, and whole lot if you love cheese. If you don't like cheese at all, see a therapist. 

Then dump in the courgette and onion and give it a mix. Pour the whole mixture into a buttered baking dish and cover with lots more grated cheese. Again, the more the merrier. 

Put this is an oven at about 180C or 350F for around 15 mins or until all the cheese on top is melted. Then put it under the grill/ broiler for 5 more mins to crisp up that topping!

This is how mine came out:

Yeah, doesn't look so appetising, does it? But it was YUM, I promise. Really my problem was that my ratio of sauce to veg was wrong. I needed more veg, less sauce, for it to be a bit sturdier. The egg helps with getting a good texture, too. 

Cultural Conundrum of Pie

Pie = Delicious, Right? I love pie. And I love to say that I love pie because it could mean totally different things depending on what country I'm in. 

When the Brits say pie this is what they're talking about:

Hairy Bikers' Steak and Ale Pie

Or some variation on this; steak pie, pork pie, fish pie, whatever! Essentially, a yummy savoury filling covered in yummy buttery pastry. I love pie! Nom nom nom.

But ask the Americans for some pie and this is what you'll get:

Shop.Cook.Make. Apple Pie

Good Ole American Apple Pie! or Cherry Pie or Pecan Pie or Pumpkin Pie or French Silk Chocolate Pie... and now I'm drooling. So yes, the key ingredient in American pies is sugar. Drop a sweet seasonal filling on a crispy pastry crust and you've got yourself a pie. I love pie!

But should you land your two feet in Barbados, stumble into a rum shop and order some pie, this is what you'll be served:

Proper Bajan Macaroni Pie

No pastry, no crust, just mouthfuls of starchy, cheesey bliss! This is the definition of PIE in our homeland: a brick composed of some long macaroni and a mob-a-ton of cheese. There are some other ingredients too; here's a recipe. I love pie!

Macaroni Pie is indeed our holy grail of all things pie. But we also do corn pie, yam pie, sweet potato pie... A pie is anything starchy, covered in some kind of white sauce and/or cheese, and baked in the oven. These are all standard side dishes in any meal. 

My mother is naturally one of the best cooks I know (aren't all Mums?). But Macaroni Pie isn't her speciality. Instead she does an Onion Pie. This isn't really keeping in tradition with real Bajan pies as being super-starchy. But it is a hell of a lot closer to Bajan than the Brit or Yank versions. It is the same concept as a Macaroni Pie but the onions replace the pasta. I LOVE onions and I LOVE this pie. 

I've recently tried a variation on Mum's Onion Pie. Thus was born: Onion-Courgette not-so-pie-like Pie. Photos, recipe, and war-stories from the kitchen to come...

If you want recipes for the pies on this page you can find the Brit one here, the American one here, and the Bajan one here. Now you're craving pie aren't you?

Intrepid Fridge Forager

If you live in the UK and you own a TV, you've probably seen this advert a few times this year. But watch it again, you know you love it!

This tele advert is the shining star of a whole campaign put out by Lurpak: Good Food Deserves Lurpak. I LOVE this campaign. It is built on the premise that in a world where everyone is always busy and fast-food and ready-meals are quick, cheap and easy, fewer of us are making the effort to cook real food. Of course, for a company that produces and sells butter this isn't ideal. You don't need butter for your microwave dinners. So these ads are inspiring consumers to cook and eat REAL food. But the point that makes it brilliant is that most of the ads feature really simple, hearty, tasty food; you don't need to be a Master Chef to make an omelet.

from here

from here

from here

from here

These are some of my favourite of the print ads. They are plastered all over tube stations across London and I gawk at them shamelessly all the time. Though in true form, I've borrowed all these pictures from somewhere else as my own photographic skills are seriously lacking. In my search I also found that Lurpak's Flickr is a gem for food porn! Score!

There are tonnes more of these around and I'm sure many of you have seen them. What's your favourite?

Things I find on the internet

So Wednesday's post got moved to Thursday. First, because I was lazy yesterday and didn't feel like blogging. Second, because there will be no Friday post as I shall be in the air somewhere over the Atlantic. So I thought I'd give you Thursday to hold over until next week.

Same Wednesday drill though: things I've been looking at online. Think you should look at them too.

1.) Are jobs obsolete?
I like this article. Mostly because I don't have a job and it makes me feel less depressed about that. Not sure I really buy into the idea of information and creativity becoming new market goods. We're all too accustomed to getting that stuff for free now. Still, it's a bit different. Something to think about. What do you think?

2.) Sciences Still Young
My entire academic career has been devoted to the social sciences. Many of you are in the same boat too. And we continue to hear (from policy makers) that social sciences aren't useful to society and government funding will be cut in all those departments. We, those of us who do social science, know that this argument is total bollocks. This article is a really interesting rebuttal to this kind of argument. We're just on the brink of cool discoveries in a lot of social fields. Methodology is expanding and getting better. What if all interest and funding for natural sciences had been stifled just as Einstein was about to give us E=mc²?

The Mute Girl of Portici

3.) The opera Belgium can't see
This one is about a play that has been a symbol of Belgian unity since there was such an idea as Belgian unity. I'm not really sure why to be honest. It doesn't make much sense to me. Anyway, there is a big production of this play coming along soon. But they can't show it in Belgium because unity is too controversial right now. I find the irony of this situation really quite funny. But more than funny, it is a really interesting illustration of how politics influences all spheres of society. I study politics. These things entertain me.

4.) Back to the Start
Ever a sucker for good advertising, Chipotle won me over with this one. Well, kind of. I don't live in a country where I can get Chipotle so I can't give them business. But I sure would after this advert. Can I get an AMEN for sustainable farming?

Piggies found here

5.) CUBE
Ah... the mystery of design. This is a lengthy intellectual interpretation of an incredibly simple object. If the first article is right, and ideas are the new currency, then this guy ought to be a zillionaire! He got all that from a box? I mock, but really I am very impressed (and a bit jealous). You'll have to read subtitles if you don't speak German.



Happy Reading!

My Love of Food Part II: Food P**n

While I would love to spend all of spare time eating and cooking delicious things, it just isn't the best idea (see previous post as to my deserved weight). So the next best thing is staring at delicious things! I can spend hours flicking through luscious images of everything from simple fruit salads to ultra-decadent chocolate monstrosities! I always prefer the latter. Here are some of my favourite sources of sensual, cuisine imagery.

Crap I Eat (And Drink) - This is probably my favourite food blog. There is nothing simple, minimalist, or healthy about the food featured here. The name of the game is decadence. He has an attraction to exotic foods and strange flavour combination, but also a genuine love for classic comfort food. The focus is less on photography and more on descriptive (and funny) writing. Seriously, I can hardly wait for the next post!

Crap I Eat (And Drink)

Cherry Tea Cakes - Jana, from this blog, lives in DC and bakes up all kinds of tasty treats. This is my go-to blog if I'm looking for a recipe for a tasty dessert or tea-time treats. She also uses her blog to raise money for local food banks. Pretty inspirational stuff. Cherry Tea sounds like Charity.. get it?

Of course, the blog-o-sphere is not the only place for one to find food-pleasure. My addiction was probably initially sparked by the Food Network. My favourites are Iron Chef America and, of course, Ace of Cakes. Duff and his friends make AMAZING cakes! My personal preference for a celebration cake is a traditional stacked, but no one can help getting hooked on the masterpieces they make at Charm City Cakes!

Charm City Cakes. Yes that IS cake!

Unfortunately, when I moved to the UK I realised fairly quickly that Food Network is a scarcity. So I had to grow attached to some Brit-cooking-shows. My favourite is the Great British Bake Off. Every week is a whole bunch of beautiful baked goods accompanied by minimal amounts of reality-TV drama.

Of course, there is the crown of all Food Porn: foodgawker. If you don't already know and LOVE this site, prepare to be delighted! Food Bloggers extraordinaire all come together and contribute to an endless stream of mouth-watering photos of all kinds of food. I have literally spent entire days on foodgawker. It is pure bliss!

Hosts of The Great British Bake Off

My Love of Food Part I: The Beach House

What gives you pleasure? When you think about complete and utter bliss, what is it that you're doing? Well for me, the answers are FOOD and EATING. I love food. No, I luurrrvve food. Really I ought to weigh about 190 kilos and it's really only miracles (and exercise) that prevent this. I live for food. I dream about food. "Diet" is a very threatening four-letter word. The truth is that I don't eat in excessive quantities (usually), but I'll eat just about anything. In particular, new flavours make me happy. I love tasting something for the first time and deciding that I really love it. There is nothing better than learning about interesting and unique flavour combinations that work!
So this post is going to be in two parts. Part I: review of dinner last night at The Beach House, Barbados, and Part II: my top picks for Food P**n (I'm afraid of generating unwanted traffic with the p-word)

Part I: The Beach House
As a family, we like to go out for a nice meal when we're all together. Especially because we aren't all in the same place that often. Last night was my parents' 32nd Anniversary (big up) so that was our excuse this time. We went to The Beach House in Holetown. I'd never been before, and to be honest, it wouldn't have been my first choice of restaurants. But I'm really not that picky and I was happy to give it a go. Let me tell you, VERY good decision. The food was excellent!

First I ate Grilled Scallops with Pumpkin Risotto. Mmm! The scallops were big and juicy and perfectly cooked. Living in the UK, nice fresh scallops is not something I eat very often. So I was really pleased to have these. The risotto was just a tad undercooked (which is rare for risotto) but it was nicely flavoured and to be honest I was too taken with my delicious scallops to care. Other starters of note were the Crispy Pork Belly. I cannot describe it any better than that. It was crispy. It was pork. It was belly. And it make my belly very happy indeed.

For the main course I had Grilled Swordfish with Melon Salsa. The fish was delicious. Fresh, perfectly seasoned, perfectly cooked; just a perfect piece of real Bajan fish. But the star of that dish was the melon salsa. That surprised me. I'm not in general a big fan of melon. I find it a bit boring and a bit tasteless. But this was anything but tasteless. First, it was beautiful! So many different colours really made it appealing. I took my time tasting each little colour at a time to identify it. As far as I worked out, it was honeydew melon, watermelon, cantaloupe, mango, tomato, and butter-nut squash. These were all diced finely and seasoned with a mix of herbs, the dominant flavour being cilantro. It was absolutely delicious. It was surprising and refreshing and colourful. I'm definitely going to try to create my own version of this sometime. Amazing!

My family always shares desserts. In fact, we share most food, but there is an unwritten law about sharing desserts. So between us we had three: Bajan Lime Tart, Bread and Butter Pudding, and Apple and Sultana Crumble. The Lime Tart was not what I was expecting. It was a deep pastry shell that was thin and just a bit flaky. The lime filling was a mouse-like texture and barely-green colour. It was topped with a coconut meringue that smelled like bonfire-roasted-marshmallows. It was really very tasty. I like that the lime flavour was subtle yet refreshing and the thin pastry didn't make the dish too heavy. I would have preferred a bit more contrast in texture between the lime-filling and the meringue topping, but in general a very good dessert. The Bread and Butter Pudding was probably my favourite. This is unusual because this is not really my favourite dessert. This one, however, was not a heavy dessert as it often it. It was light and fluffy and had the perfect amount of cinnamon and raisins. It was also served with a really nice vanilla ice cream. The last one we had was the Apple-Sultana Crumble. This wasn't very good. It was more sultana than apple and there was too much of the crumble bit. It was the heaviest of the desserts we ordered and didn't really satisfy the sweet-requirement at the end of a meal. On the up-side, it was also served with that delicious vanilla ice cream.

My overall opinion: go eat at the Beach House! Just don't order the crumble. The food is simple but very well prepared. The menu blends West Indian and English inspirations, but I left feeling as though I had had a genuine Caribbean meal. My one critique is that the option for appetizers is not very great for a vegetarian or someone who doesn't eat seafood. Neither my mother nor my sister eats seafood and they were both quite disappointed at the options: Caesar Salad or the Pork Belly.The only vegetarian option was the soup-of-the-day (Potato and Onion), but I couldn't help but think that some days the soup might have a meat-based broth... So maybe not the best place to go if you eat veggie, but if you love a good piece of fish, a good view, and decent service, I would highly recommend The Beach House.

Sorry no pictures, I was enjoying the food way too much to get the camera out. Look at some photos on their website.

Come back Monday for Part II: Food P**n!

I'd Trade All My Tomorrows

In a few days I will be leaving Sheffield. The thing is, I’m rubbish at goodbyes. I’ve watched some really amazing people leave and I haven’t said anything more sentimental than “see you later”. It’s just really difficult to sum up the meaning someone had in your life as they are walking out the door. I’m rubbish at goodbyes. But more than that, goodbyes are just rubbish. This post is my attempt to make up for all the rubbish goodbyes so far and hopefully avoid future rubbishness. All the people that were in my life this year meant something really special to me. You made this one of the greatest years of my life. I’ll miss you all more than you really know.

Here are some reminders of what the post-grad year was all about:

Making Friends

  

Falling Out

Eating Healthy

Plenty of Exercise

Being Cool

Being Cold

Celebrating

Occasionally we did a little bit of work

Just for you, Ailin.

And everyone needed a little rest every now and then...

Don't be sad if you aren't in my photos. It's not because I don't love you.. it's because I don't have any photos of you. And to be fair, by the quality of these photos, you probably don't want to be in any! 

I love you all, and I'll miss you all! Goodbye to Sheffield! Amazing city, amazing friends, amazing year :)