I started this blog in order to keep track of all the delicious foods that I enjoy making, and also to inspire anyone out there who would like to add a little bit of Cuban flavor to their repertoire.
Desert has always been my downfall, since I was a kid growing up in Cuba I remember being obsessed with all things sweet.
My earliest memory of my maternal grandmother, is of her making the most delicious sweet concoction when ever we would visit her, the best way I can describe it is as a sesame seed brittle, but not so hard it was more on the chewy side, she called it "dulce de ajonjoli".
My mom used to make the most amazing torrejas, arros con leche, dulce de leche, pudin de pan and natilla. Her meals weren't always the best (sorry mom, lol), but when it came to desert she was at the top of her game, bless her heart.
My aunt use to make the best merengues, everytime I had to take something in for school she would come to the rescue with one of her amazing merenguitos. Her other specialties were dulce de naranja, dulce de coco, cascos de guayaba, toronja en almibar, melocotones en almibar, and roasted sugared peanuts. No Kitchenaid or fancy equipment either, it was all a true labor of love.
Growing up in Cuba during the seventies there weren't many extras, I remember going to a place by my house every Saturday to buy pasteles de guayaba, this was the only time they were available. The other desert I remember was the ice cream at Coppelia, there we could buy, if available, a whole tub of the most wonderful chocolate ice cream I've ever had.
You see I grew up in a time of food rationing, in Cuba everything was by the libreta, a little book where the bodega employees would mark your monthly allotment of food stuff. You still had to pay for it though, and there was no guarantee that anything would be available, lol. The usual greeting on the barrio was "what's at the bodega?"
Of course if you had relatives in the country like we did you were able to acquire extras, like bananas and root vegetables, sometimes even a live chicken.. but that was considered highly illegal activity.
Anyway those are the memories that ingrained in me a love for all things sweet.
I'm no longer in Cuba, **thank God** lol, I'm in Miami which feels just like my island in many ways.. now I am free to buy whatever foods I want already made, but somehow I'm nostalgic for the simpler recipes of my childhood you know the type of things that require lots of kitchen prep, lol.
I hope you will follow me on this culinary journey, who knows I might throw in a Nicaraguan desert recipe or two.. love me some pio quinto and tres leches. I'll even take you on a pictorial of El Palacio De Los Jugos, one of the best fruit stands in town, although my favorite thing there is their chicharrones, they are out of this world, lol!
Ay Dios Mio!
