Mojito recipe.

                                     
                                                                            Mojito.


In summer I enjoy preparing this drink, it is the most refreshing drink for a hot day.



Several sprigs fresh mint
Juice of 1 lime
1 teaspoon sugar
½ cup crushed ice
2 ounces Bacardi light rum
Sparkling mineral water to taste

In a mortar, crush the mint leaves.

Combine the leaves and the remaining ingredients, except the mineral water.
Pour into a tall glass, and top with sparkling mineral water.
Garnish with sprig of mint leaves.

Makes 1 drink.

Memories of a Cuban Kitchen: More Than 200 Classic Recipes

Sugar, the former pride of Cuba.

                                          

                                                               Cuban rum.

                                                                    

Sugar cane is being transported to the sugar cane mill.

Cubans drink rum, they consume it neat from the bottle. They also enjoy the luxury of a cold beer rarely when they can afford it. The younger generation mixes their rum with cola soft drink.

My preference is the Mojito drink, a favorite of the American writer Hemingway, or rum and sugar cane juice, known as guarapo. Most Cubans do not know these drinks, which are very popular at the tourist hotels in Havana.

The most popular rum between Cuban locals is the white rum, its colour means how young it is, about 3 years old, the darker varieties are more expensive, a real luxury few Cubans have the opportunity to taste, this rum is called anejo because it is aged.

 

Rum is a product from sugar and Cuba was at one point one of the main sugar exporters in the world. Now all of that is former glory because we actually import sugar from Brazil as we produce very little now.

It is very sad now to see the sugar factories in ruins, where before there was so much life, joy and pride. I remember when I would go to my primary school where near by the sugar factory was the center of the community or batey. Those towns now are like ghost towns.

Some of my friends happened to be children of the sugar factory maestros, their parents were very important, intelligent, appreciated persons in the community. Then what you achieved with your effort and study was valued, and now these men are a heartbreaking testimony to the failure of Cuba’s economic model.



They had many Soviet books at home and they learnt some Russian words. Now they do not know what to do with their lives, some hide anger in their talk, because the difference between their former recognition and their forgotten present is very sharp.

Funeral

One thing I found very strange in Australian culture is the way they say their last goodbye to their loved ones.

To me it was shocking to find people celebrating with drinks, music of any type and jokes. The funeral is easy to attend here. It all seemed to be a party to me, compared to Cuban traditions, a celebration of something. And last how the body is left to rest forever in the same plot in the ground.

In Cuba I imagine it has to do with the centuries old Spanish tradition of long mourning and respect, together with the lack of religious beliefs (lost with socialisms push for lay beliefs in a vast number of the Cuban population and many hold the belief that death like in animals is the end for a person) this has shaped the traditions in Cuba to be that of suffering.

If it is possible you spend the night before the funeral trying to sleep as you can in a chair while you pay respects and guard the casket, which is a dreadful experience, and do not dare to play music for a month in your house.

I understand we do not have a reliable transport system in Cuba and it is important to wait for family members traveling long distances to get to say their last good byes. This could be the explanation for the long night around the casket in a room without air-conditioning or food the day before the funeral.

In Cuba some months or a year later the family will go back to the cemetery to take the remains and put them in a small box so someone else can use the plot. Lucky Australia is a big country and you do not need to recycle the cemetery.

I prefer the Australian way now, I understand they celebrate a life that we were lucky to share and it is possible the deceased is in a good place now, in a natural phase of life. It is an easier way to deal with a funeral.



Different cultures. / Diferentes culturas.

Remedios, Cuba.

Gold Coast, Australia.

                                                         

Australians travel the world, something that my husband and I enjoy too. In a recent trip we went to Miami, Florida hoping to meet some Cubans now living there.

I was surprised how different my way of thinking is with these Cubans. I thought they lived a relatively similar life to mine, living out of Cuba in America, a country very similar to Australia. But soon I noticed they have not assimilated to the new culture, they talk like they are still in Cuba, and they have not changed their way of thinking. It is hard to comprehend how they do not speak English, living and working in a English speaking nation.

It’s interesting, because my way of thinking has changed so much in Australia, I feel like a new person from what I was before, I feel a happier and more confident person that has left behind a world of low self-esteem and inferiority complex very often seen in Cuba. I have achieved this through reflection, reading and my willingness to be a better person.

I arrived very young to Australia and I had an identity crisis in a new place with new people, different traditions and interests. In order to survive I had to adapt to the new circumstances. It was hard and painful at first but I am very happy now when I see where would I be as a person if I did not change.

Raspberries with rose water syrup.

This is a beautifull looking dish with bright coloring of pink and red that goes wonderfully with white Vanilla lemon yogurt panna cotta.

Raspberries with rose water syrup.

2 cups water
1 cup caster sugar
2 teaspoons rose water
1 vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped.
500 g raspberries (fresh or frozen)

*Place the water, sugar, rosewater, and vanilla bean and seeds in a saucepan over high heat and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 4 minutes.
*Remove from the heat and add the raspberries and set aside to cool.
*Serve with Vanilla and lemon yogurt panna cotta or with vanilla ice cream.

Spring Desserts.

I have been cooking very nice desserts lately. Cooking or baking makes me feel calm, in control and disperses any negative thoughts that may fly through my head. Plus I love it, getting all the ideas of how it is going to work, if there is anything I can substitute and how others and I will enjoy the final product by seeing and savouring it.

I had made this panna cotta recipe from Donna Hay a few times and decided to add more yogurt plus vanilla and the end result tastes wonderfull.

Vanilla and lemon yogurt panna cotta.

200 ml pouring cream
½ cup milk
½ cup icing sugar
2 teaspoons powdered gelatine
2 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon grated lemon rind
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
1 cup plus 1 tablespoon thick natural yogurt


· Place cream and milk in a saucepan over low medium heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

· Combine gelatine and water and set aside for 5 minutes.
· Remove the cream mixture from the heat, add the icing sugar and stir until dissolved.
· Add the gelatin mixture, vanilla, lemon juice, lemon rind and stir until combined.
· Whisk in the yogurt
· Pour into a mould and refrigerate for 4 hours or until firm.

Why return ? / Por que regresar?

                                                            Students hitch hiking.

Cuban scenary.

Sometimes Cubans wonder why exiles and Cubans who have immigrated to another country, do return to visit. The people whose biggest ambition was to leave Cuba as soon as possible and now wish to revisit as much as possible.

It is very different to revisit Cuba and travel in an air conditioning rent a car compared to trying to hitch hike in the boiling sun for hours on end, the Cuban way. Looking out the landscape from a comfortable air conditioning car you see the beauty of the countryside and it is sharp colors like a postcard, as you have never seen it before.

Local Cubans wonder if Cuba has something special. I guess you have to be an emigrated to know this. That only when you leave that land is that you start loving it a little. That for us the magic is that back there are the places that are especial for us in our minds, our first school, the language, the neighbors, our first teacher, the road where we learnt to ride our first bike.

It is like going through a photo album of our lives (especially in Cuba where not much change) it is the place where we did belong, it is our past and that is the reason why we love to comeback.

Sometimes we are too busy with our present and in not mood to go there but we arrive and we fall in love with that place again.

Pulses or grains. / Granos o legumbres.

We Cubans live on a diet predominately based on legumes, so it is not a surprise I often cook black beans. Introduced to Cuba by the Spaniards, grains are very nutritious, they are an excellent source of iron, potassium, vitamin B6 and folic acid.

I was surprised to find they are one of the cheapest foods here in Australia.
Pulses and Grains were known as the food for the poor but nowadays everybody recognizes their value as a healthy meal and more westerners are moving away from a predominantly meat form of diet.

I prefer to buy canned cannellini beans, lentils, and chickpeas as in their dry form they may require to be soaked previously and I like cooking to be easy.
Lately I have developed my own recipe to get the best out of what the can provides, my favorite is lentils soup.

Lentils soup

(Same recipe for cannellini beans)

½ Spanish chorizo cut in coin size
2 shallots or 2 green onions (or 1 brown onion)
1 garlic clove minced
½ teaspoon of cumin

1 tomato
1 bay leave
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
thyme
1 can of lentils
1cup chicken stock

Put the chorizo in a hot saucepan and cook for a few minutes until you get their orange oil; put the chorizo away on a plate until later.
Use this oil to cook the shallots and garlic for 3 minutes.
Add cumin and stir for 1 minute.

And then add the lentils (without rinsing) stock, chorizo, red wine vinegar, tomato, bay leave, thyme; let it boil and simmer gently for 10 minutes or so.
You can serve this soup with a lime wedge.