the spring brings alcachofas to Catalunya (and to my belly!)

 
Oh yes! Some of us wait for this moment all year long! It’s springtime in Catalunya! This means that the harvest season has begun. First it’s the artichokes and the asparagus, then come the strawberries, then so much more! 

 

This week I bought artichokes for 80 cents a kilo. Today my jaw dropped when I saw alcachofas being sold at 2 kilos for 1 euro at the Boquería market behind my house. I felt like a queen walking home with a bag filled with these things that usually cost so much. What luxury my friends, to delight myself on these beauties while sitting at the terrace watching the birds go by. This is the life, I tell you! I believe no fancy restaurant could beat the lunch I had at my house today.

This is how I prepare artichokes:

I cut the stems to make the artichoke stand on its own. Then I open the flower, where I add some sea salt and olive oil. Then I steam them for about 30 minutes. After that, it’s all about delight, one leaf (petal I believe) at a time. In contrast to some culinary habits, I refrain from dipping these lovely things on anything. The olive oil and salt in which they were cooked are delicate enough to allow the full taste to reign free. Hum hum hum… oh, there goes another seagull…

my first kitchen

My grandmother has two kitchens. There is the “normal” kitchen, which is beside the dining room and is adorned with a gas stove, a refrigerator and a freezer. Then there is the “downstairs kitchen,” which is behind the house, passing the old chicken coup, a hundred plants, and the laundry area. This kitchen has a wood-burning stove. It is a beautiful thing.

About three times a week there is an old man who comes with his donkey loaded with small pieces of wood he collects several kilometers away in the Sertão - the arid landscape down the mountain. This man is the husband of the lady who used to do the laundry at my grandmother’s house for 30 years. She is now retired. Her husband and his donkey have been fueling the yellow stove since my mother was a teenager.

The yellow stove and the wood are together partially responsible for the amazing taste of all my grandmother’s food. Her cooking has been spoken about by many people. It has been written about in several newspapers. People come from far away for the peculiar, and incredibly simple, cooking created in the yellow “downstairs” kitchen.

I was raised by grandmother. I spent my first years playing in this lively kitchen, watching the processes that happened daily - people that came in and out, different dishes being prepared, laughter, coffee being roasted, clothes being ironed... It is a multi-faceted space with lots of history and lots of light. For me, being there is like walking into another time. The images are blurred and out of focus. The smells and the sounds are the same as decades ago. In an era when we are ever more disconnected from any place to which we can attach our history, I feel so very lucky to be a part of this magical space.

I shall never spend another penny on store-bought milk-like things

Oooh! I really dislike talking about products. But I am so happy with this experiment that I must do justice to my Blentec total blender. Yes, I also think it’s cheesy to talk about brands as if they were one’s close friends (the world is full of mac-lovers already). But let me get to the experiment and you shall understand my excitement.

The Blentec came with a recipe book, which went straight into a drawer. I have never laid eyes upon the book, imagining that it would be filled with cookie-cutter recipes that include ingredients like frozen fruit concentrate and canned pineapple (and in fact, that’s the case!). But when faced with a bad cold which made me house-bound for three days, I decided to put off the yogurt because I had read lactose is not a good friend of those filled with mucus. Instead of yogurt with fruit and nuts in the morning, I needed some milk-like thing.

chocolate + coconut = lusciousness

The chocolate-coconut cake is one of the items I have available in Barcelona, made to order by private parties, cafés, and restaurants.  I have been experimenting with this recipe for a while. It’s such a pleasure to try ingredients. Today I experimented with rice flour for the first time. I had read online that it tends to make baked goods flakier, and that is true. I substituted one third of the flour for rice flour and added some more liquid (homemade almond milk - we shall get to that soon). Besides the rice flour, there is whole wheat flour and grounded oats. I also added flax seeds (a must have in pretty much everything I bake), full chuncks of dark chocolate and pure cocoa powder. Oh, and let's not forget the coconut! The chocolate-coconut cake turned out to be flaky, crunchy goodness...humm...

welcome!

I have wanted to start a food-related blog for a long time, and just didn't seem to find the time for it.

(Isn't it interesting that we refer to time in such terms? Find, make, save, spend, waste... Isn't time one of those unquestionable elements, like life and death? How absurd that we have developed such vocabulary to speak about time, no?)

Anyway, back from that sidenote, I am very pleased to have finally started this blog. The original idea is to use this space to share some of my experiences in creating and enjoying food. Much of what I have learned has come from what others have shared with me, so perhaps doing the same adds to the general pot of food knowledge.

We find ourselves pushing against and even larger wall called food industry. This beast controls most of what is eaten by the great majority of people in the world. Unfortunately, its influence also drips down, affecting culture and values. But there is a largely increasing group of us who choose to resist this massive force, paying close attention to what we consider eatible. I hope you find yourself belong to this group.

Dona Alzira's kitchen

Dona Alzira is the lady who washed the laundry at my granmother's pousada (a brasilian version of the bed and breakfast, I suppose) by hand for over 30 years. She is married to Seu Nonô, the man who, with the help of his donkey, brings the wood that fuels the wood-burning stove at my grandmother’s kitchen. He has been doing this three times a week for over 35 years. They live in Viçosa do Ceará, my family’s birthgrounds, located on the top of the Ibiapaba mountain range, a 5-hour drive from Fortaleza (the capital of our state of Ceará). Their home is beautiful, colorful, and full of light.

The kitchen is hands down the most lovely part of the house. It’s welcoming and bright; there is always something on the stove and freshly brewed coffee for the visits (in the northeast of Brasil we must always feed our guests). Paying a visit to them is a must every time I am in Viçosa. They have known me from the time I was born, and their unconditional love carries through in the food and drink they offer me with bliss.

the open market in Viçosa do Ceará

One of the greatest (and simplest) pleasures from when I was a child, was to burry my hands down the dried beans at the market. They are so smooth...

Siriguela: the fruit with a large seed and a tiny bit of sweet (and often times sour) flesh.

Visa and Mastercard at the open market in Viçosa? Is the whole world corrupted by corporations?