Or as it is known in my family – ¨Postre de Boris¨ (Boris’ dessert)

Boris was once the boyfriend of my fantastic cousin Ximena, who has always been a trailblazer and is a fixture on my list of girls to follow. Not only is she an expert bamboo taxonomist, a flower connoisseur and the head of a newly converted organic coffee farm but she is also a student of life and a beautiful strong soul. Boris, other than giving the name to this dish and who continues to visit my aunt (Ximena’s mum) from time to time, counts as his main feat the ability to cook. Back then, in the rickety kitchen of a 200 year-old farm of the coffee region of Colombia where the Pava women grew up shovel-in-hand, that was indeed, a big deal. Boris was a good looking young chap with his little trim beard and his big fat book collection. More importantly, he could stand his ground in a kitchen full of women. I loved observing the entire process, and considering that what qualifies as a typical dessert was half a tangerine under the iron rule of my grandmother, this dessert was a real treat indeed.

As with a few of my childhood memories, where things feature larger, shinier and fancier, revisiting this dessert made me realise that it’s not the hugely decadent delight I remembered but a rather humble sweet thing.

Running out of time and already in a frenzy to prepare a complex meal, and looking for just the right dessert? No need to worry! This little gem will save you in no time. In this case it highlights one of the most complex citrus tastes – passion fruit –  but may also be prepared with any other citrusy juice, be it lemon, orange, blackberry, mango or grapefruit, which means that if you have a well-stocked pantry you should be able to resort to this when everything else fails.

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If you read The Kitchen Nomads’ blog you will have heard us praising the wide, fantastic variety of food in Hong Kong markets and how this allows us nomads to get an international feast in our tables any day of the week. Well, in all my undying love for the gai see* there is a small thorn that never stops pricking; the lack of real plantain. That glorious plantain like the one that grows by the tons in Colombia and represents not only the base of our cuisine but also a big part of the agriculture that feeds endless families, makes no appearance in the Hong Kong wet markets. I’m puzzled as to why this happens as it grows in the Phillipines and Indonesia the same way it grows in South America and most of Africa.

Shiny, large, emerald green and savory, plantain is the wilder cousin of banana and is eaten in an array of ways in Caribbean cuisine, from when it is very green to when ripe and sweet.  Each Latin American country has it’s own recipes with esoteric names such as fufu, mangu, mofongo and the like, which only goes to reinforce my believe in it’s almost magic properties, of which colombian Patacon is no exception. Most of our typical dishes would be alone in absence of it and although it’s not a dish in itself, smear it with some hogao, put some stringy beef stew on it or dip it in your black bean stew and you will realize why this crunchy, savory, delight is so much better than bread. There is even a song about it that used to make us crack up as children, it’s called Patacon Pisao which literally means Plantein Steped-on and as with so  many things in latino culture it’s full of nuances as sung by the very handsome Johnny Ventura.

To my relief I have found a sort of replacement to feed my plantain hankering in the shape of the small green banana that grows wild in Hong Kong and that ladies in the New Territories seem to use to feed their animals. It’s called Dai Jiu, it’s scientific name is Musa Paradisiaca, a very fitting name if you ask me, and it can be found at most wet markets. My only complain is that it must be bought very green and prepared almost immediately as they seem to ripen quite quickly.

This recipe like many Colombian delights requires double frying, which I’m fully conscious is not healthy but since it’s a time consuming recipe just don’t make it an everyday pleasure only a once-in-a-while indulgence.

*gaai see: what wet market are called in Cantonese

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My French family is full of ancestral tradition, and when I visit they always seem to pull out an old recipe that to them seems the epitome of simplicity, and to me seems exquisite and mysterious. The Broyé du Poitou – an old, old recipe for a buttery biscuit coming from the Poitou region of western France – is one such little treasure.

Originally used during mass, communions, weddings and other big religious gatherings where large groups of people needed to be fed, the broyé takes it name from the word that means “to crush” – it is traditionally broken into little pieces to share by giving one big punch to the middle of it. The hard biscuit then breaks into chunky shards. Very Christian and all that.

The main beauty of this biscuit though is that it is rather easy to make, and you don’t even need a special tin – my aunt just uses the “lèche-frites” (I love this word – literally the “chip-licker” which is the standard tray that most ovens come with) and then we all share the biscuits pieces with a bowl of crème au chocolat, or just coffee. It’s one of the most convivial, sociable sweets I know.

To make it even more sociable (wink wink), you can add a few drops of eau-de-vie (again, a great name: it means “water of life”, but it’s actually just brandy), but I like to share this one with my kids so I leave that part out. Your call. As long as you remember the sharing part!

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When I was pregnant, people were constantly asking me to imagine what kind of child I was going to have. “What if he doesn’t have all of his limbs?” my fellow pregnant friends would worry. “What if he is ugly?” others would wonder. But for me, the most troublesome and scary thought of all was: “what if he doesn’t like food?!”

That dreadful idea was banished from my mind as soon as my son started eating solids – not only was he not refusing anything outright, he was a voracious and adventurous little palate to cook for. And I am more than aware of how lucky I am to have a child who actually cries because he wants to eat vegetables!

The same was not entirely true when it came to our finned friends however – for some reason, my son who is at least a quarter from the French island Ile de Ré, was not really into fish. That is, not until I realised that a lot of it was down to the presentation of the food. After a few different attempts at disguising the fish in sauces or mixing it up with veggies, I realised that minimal tampering with the fish worked best in terms of enticing him to eat it. The tampering is basically restricted to cooking it until it was cooked and soft enough for him to eat it with his fingers. Pairing it with just the right amount of colour and mash vegetables on the side also made a huge difference.

Now that my second son is here, I am back to making all sorts of purees and mashed up combinations to develop his own tastebuds and palate, and this little recipe works every time. My elder son is now 2½ years old and will gladly gobble this, with the fish chopped into larger chunks; and my younger at 9-months old happily munches up every mashed up spoonful I give him.

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Ask any foreigner what the best place to visit in France is, and you’ll get a long and varied list peppered with sighs and “oh, but it’s impossible to choose”. Ask a French person what the best place to visit in France is, and you’ll only get one answer – the region that they are from. We are proud, chauvinistic creatures…

I am no different of course. If you ask me what the most amazing place on the planet is, I have only one answer – the Ile de Ré. That’s why I talk about it so much on The Kitchen Nomads. I mean the place has its own, trademarked brand of gem-like new potatoes, for crying out loud!

A curved bridge away from the west coast of mainland France, this long and thin island of beauty has been a favourite holiday destination among those looking for something a little more wild and authentic for years, and it’s easy to see why: surrounded by sandy beaches, oyster beds and salt marshes, each of the island’s seemingly secluded villages has both breathtaking scenery and quaint local charm. Not to mention incredible food.

There’s nothing easier than jumping on your bicycle (which the Ile de Ré has plenty of, on account of it being so flat and easy to ride on) and riding to a favourite spot to spend an afternoon sipping on a glass of rosé wine (the island has its own vines – you can’t get much more local than drinking wine made from the grapes behind your table…) and nibbling on a plate of freshly caught seafood to the sound of rocking boat masts. Strolling along the harbour front of one of the little clusters of white-washed houses and alleys of hollyhock, it’s hard to know what time of day or year it is. It’s hard to even care.

The ubiquitous bicycles are often the only way to get in touch with the island’s heart and soul – a quick ride will take you through salt marshes that cars cannot access. The island is one of France’s favourite producers of salt, including the unique and popular fleur de sel, a delicacy that uses only the finest salt that floats up to the surface during the production of the coarse stuff we use more liberally.

Which brings me to my recipe, bar en croûte de sel. It’s simple yet full of flavour, and with its salty crust that you break away at the dining table, it adds a bit of drama to your average Sunday lunch. In fact it makes you look like a total kitchen pro, when all you have done is made the most of the fresh produce at the local fish market.

Of course, if you can’t get a hold of salt from the Ile de Ré, just use any other gros sel (the coarse, unprocessed stuff). But don’t let me catch you trying to trick me with it – despite my husband’s incredulity, I actually CAN tell the difference!

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Soooo, here we go! This is our first post and we are elated to bring our nomad suitcases full of recipes to the Chubby Hubby e-abode. We can’t think of a better way to start than to bring you along on our summer adventures, which for your enjoyment (and ours, quite evidently) will take place in our home countries. Call it “The Kitchen Nomads go back home” if you will!  I (Paola) will be introducing you to the concept of double deep-frying and the variety of Colombian cuisine, while Jessica will entice you with the beauty of using more butter than you need to and the freshness of summer fruit in France.

Let’s start with a hearty coconut rice, a fantastic side dish that will be the envy of the main dish, thus allowing you to prepare something very simple for the rest of the meal.

I grew up far from the sea, so as a kid nothing felt more like holiday than a long enamel tray with a big fat fish fried whole glistening on it, a cup-shaped helping of toasty, salty, sweet, coconut rice, a couple of halved limes and some wedges of tomato. It’s a typical dish from the coastal areas of Colombia and a fisherman’s staple, using what’s most freshly available for the day. Fortunately, all these ingredients are also readily available in Hong Kong, my current city of residence–so I can go on a mini-vacation on any busy weekday!

One of my earliest memories is one of sitting in a beach in Cartagena (or was it somewhere in the Pacific? Mom?), feet in sand in a makeshift shack with driftwood tables, next to an equally makeshift gas kitchen tended by a robust lady with one of those accents where the S  disappears at the end of words, manning a wok of fiercely sizzling oil. She would throw in the whole fish and some patacones (patacones are crushed green plantains–another recipe we’ll be sharing soon) and all the deep fried goodness would come to join the cupped little mountain of speckled coconut rice.

I must confess, I only truly came to like fish a little later in life, to the point that nowadays I’ll fight with my Chinese table mates about who gets to eat the eye and can dissect a whole fish with chopsticks without leaving behind a strand of meat. But–the coconut rice! I loved it from the get-go and it was the perfect excuse to make me eat more fish.

A couple of weeks ago, I decided to revisit this recipe and the delicious results sparked the idea of doing a whole bunch of Colombian recipes for this blog as well as looking into what’s happening food-wise when I’m there next month. We hope you enjoy it and find everything súper delicioso!

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