Diverse and indigenous cuisine brought by the many ethnic people to St. Maarten from all over the world piques our interest. To this end, we are on a quest to find where it comes from, if it is used for celebrations, if it is exotic to some but normal food to others. Anything to do with keeping the body and soul nourished with what is produced from good old terra firma is what makes the world go around.
Compliments of the season to you all!
In the UK, the main Christmas Meal is usually eaten at lunchtime or early afternoon on Christmas Day. It’s normally roast turkey, roast vegetables and “all the trimmings,” which means vegetables like carrots, peas, Brussels sprouts and bread stuffing that goes inside the turkey, which is sometimes covered in bacon and delicious pork sausages.
The turkey is pretty well always served with cranberry sauce and bread sauce! Traditionally, roast beef or goose were the main dish served at the Christmas meal, but then turkeys became more easily available.
Dessert is traditional Christmas Pudding, mince pies (these are fruit) and lots of chocolates a selection of chocolates. Trifle is a popular dessert, especially if it is laden with alcohol. Actually, every dish sweet and savoury is good when it is laden with alcohol!
Traditionally the Christmas table is decorated with a Christmas theme, red white and green being the predominant colours. One thing that is different to many other countries is the Christmas Cracker that is placed on the table (you can buy these at Good Cards by the way!)
A cracker per person and a couple extra. Pull the crackers and laugh at silly jokes and don the silly paper hat – these silly traditions warm the cockles of your heart! Christmas has the deep meaning of religion, giving, good food and wine and silliness. Everyone needs a bit of silliness in their lives.
One of the traditional English foods at this time of year is Christmas Cake. This heavy fruit cake is made months before, as are the Christmas puddings. The fruit mix is heavily laced with brandy and after some time (weeks) the cake is covered in a marzipan layer, this is then covered in royal icing (also known as hard icing) and then decorated with a Christmas theme.
The Christmas cake is much the same as the traditional wedding cake. It is rich, a decadent cake (and not to our liking really, but many love this kind of cake.)
Christmas music plays (as it does in supermarkets here) but the religious carols feature very prominently in the UK. Carol-singers wander around in the evenings, or set up a spot in the many squares in the various villages, here they sing the carols and Christmas hymns and a few other seasonally themed songs.
Last Christmas season the Passionate Foodie was in the south of England and thoroughly enjoyed a little Caribbean flavour when out for a chilly walk to stock up on some Christmas foods.
We came across a wonderful steelpan band playing Christmas carols. Most of the members of this steelpan group were older women, with just a couple of men and a few younger girls and boys. The pans lend themselves to many of the religious tunes.
There was a hot-toddy stand nearby as well as a few food stalls. It was freezing cold, snow had fallen a few miles away; we took a drive through the village there. Everything sparkled in the sunlight, the air was still and the ground and roof tops bright white. It was beautiful.
Last week I gave a recipe for a turkey stock. Use that to make your gravy from your roast turkey. If you made loads of stock, use some of it to make soup for Boxing Day – the day after Christmas. Broccoli, Turkey and Swiss Cheese soup - nothing says Christmas season more than this soup!
Recipes
Shortbread – What is Christmas time without some tasty sweet bites in the cookie jar. These are a popular sugared cookie from Scotland.
Ingredients
8oz plain flour
4oz rice flour (or cornflour)
4oz caster sugar
Pinch salt
8oz butter
Method
Preheated oven 300℉
Sift flour and rice flour together
Stir in sugar and salt
Butter needs to be slightly chilled - rub it into the dry ingredients with your fingers
Gather the dough together as it starts to bind and knead until smooth on a floured board
Grease a baking sheet
Press out the dough into a neat rectangle about a ¼” thick
Carefully slice into squares
Prick right through to the baking sheet with a fork in a neat pattern
Chill for at least one hour before baking to firm it up.
Bake in the centre of the oven for 45 minutes to one hour
The colour should be a pale biscuit colour but still soft
Remove from the oven and leave to cool, dust lightly with caster sugar
Store in an airtight tin
Hot Toddy - Unlike mulled wine, wassail or warm cider, hot toddies are light and hydrating rather than overwhelmingly sweet.
Ingredients
1 1/2 parts Dewar’s White Label Whisky
1/3-part Honey syrup
3 parts hot water
3 dried cloves, per glass
Freshly squeezed lemon juice, plus a slice of lemon to garnish each glass
Cinnamon sticks, to garnish each glass
Method
Combine whisky, honey syrup, hot water and cloves in a toddy glass and stir gently until completely combined.
Squeeze in lemon juice, to taste.
Remove cloves, garnish with a slice of lemon and cinnamon stick
Mulled Wine
Ingredients
1 bottle dry red wine
2 cinnamon sticks
1 dessertspoon whole cloves
1 dessertspoon whole allspice
1 large piece orange rind (not the white part)
1 large piece lemon rind (not the white part)
4 TBL sugar
Method
Combine red wine, cinnamon, cloves, allspice, lemon rind and orange rind
Heat gently, don’t bring to the boil
Stir in 2 TBL sugar, once dissolved, taste to see if you’d like to add more
Keep hot on medium to low heat for 20 minutes to let the flavours infuse the wine
Serve mulled wine hot in glasses or mugs
Christmas English Trifle – Unashamedly this recipe comes from the English icon Delia Smith.
Trifle can be made with a layer of sponge cake (sometimes at a push you can make trifle with sponge fingers called Boudoir Fingers.) Sometimes a fruit-flavoured jelly is also used. (Set the jelly (jell-o) and spoon it in along with the custard.) The dish is then topped with a layer of custard, whipped cream, chocolate and nuts. In Scotland there’s a variation called “Tipsy Laird” which uses whiskey to soak the sponge.
Ingredients
Custard
425ml double cream
4 large egg yolks
25g golden caster sugar
1 level dessertspoon cornflour
1 tsp vanilla extract
Filling
5 trifle sponges – these are bought in the UK, you can substitute with slices of sponge cake one can buy here in blocks – it is called pound cake.
150ml (Madeira) dry sherry
2 TBL seedless raspberry jam
275g frozen raspberries
2 medium sized bananas
Topping
275ml double cream
50g toasted flaked almonds
Method
A glass high-sided bowl is good for making trifles
Slice the sponge cakes about ¼ inch thick
Spread with jam and top with a slice so you have a sandwich
Cut each sandwich into three
Place these sideways up in the bowl in a complete circle around the bowl and on the base of the bowl
Carefully, slowly pour the Madeira sherry over all of them
Set aside so the sponges absorb the liquid
Place the cream in a saucepan over a gentle heat, heat it to just below simmering point, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon
While the cream is heating, use a balloon whisk to whisk together the egg yolks, sugar, cornflour and vanilla – do this in a fair-sized bowl
Then, whisking the egg mixture all the time with one hand, gradually pour the hot cream into the bowl
Immediately return the whole lot back to the saucepan using a rubber spatula
Place the pot back on a gentle heat, continue whisking until the custard is thick and smooth
Be careful NOT to overheat it BUT if it looks grainy, don’t worry, just transfer it to a jug or bowl and continue to whisk until it becomes smooth again.
Pour the custard into a jug or bowl, cover the surface with clingfilm and leave to cool
To assemble the trifle
Peel and slice the bananas
Scatter raspberries over the sponges and press them down with a fork to release their juices then scatter the bananas over the raspberries
Now pour the custard all over
Finally whip the cream till thick, spoon it over and spread it around, and scatter the almonds over it all
Cover the bowl with clingfilm and chill until needed.
