Juan of Words

Mi Posada: ¡Un Deseo Navideño!

My Posada: A Christmas Wish

Las Posadas

And the list of my requests is really quite simple.  It doesn’t involve a lot of fancy name brands, electronics, gadgets, mobile goodies, or anything else material for that matter.  Although, don’t get me wrong, any and all of those things would be very nice to receive (hint, hint) – especially since I’ve been eyeing several of the latest and greatest new gadgets and gizmo’s for us adults to play with.

But after starting and ending this year in the same exact way – a 13 hour drive to, and a 13 hour drive back, from Mexico, for two different funerals in my familia, I can’t help but to sit down and think about the things that really matter in life.  They’re not the material things.  Nope.  Not even if they are nice and shiny and can make us feel happy for a short while…even a long while sometimes.  They’re not a fancy job and a respectable social economic status, though blinding those things can be.  Not even the many moments of  crazy passion and torrid love affairs  matter when we are at the end of our road facing the recollections of those who cared about us in life.

So what is the point?  Is there one?   And what do I wish for then?

Only for peace in my mind, love in my heart,  and the same exact thing for those around me who I care about…hell, even the ones I don’t care that much for.  Because life is way too damn short to waste even an instant taking it for granted. 

¡La vida no es fácil y se pasa volando, aunque uno no quiera!

Sí.  Ahora lo empiezo a entender…

Choco-Flan And Other Delicious Concoctions, Mixteadas

Choco-flan, choco-flan, so delicious...

Mixteadas / Combined, in the sense that two individually delectable explosions can be fused into one utterly, undeniably, delicious, hyper-concoction that all at once can elate every single one of the senses.   Well maybe that’s a little bit of a stretch, but it’s honestly what comes to mind when I think about the choco-flan cake we had for my wife’s birthday this weekend.

Yes, you guessed right: chocolate bread crust, about an inch and a half high, topped with about three more inches of almost velvety smooth flan.

Don’t ask me how they did it…I haven’t a clue, but since the first time my sister in law introduced me to this delicious hybrid of Latino dessert cuisine all I could think wasman tres leches ain’t got nothing on this! And so as soon as we decided we we’re getting a cake I knew exactly what we were getting…she wanted it too of course, I think.  Which made me start thinking about all the other crazy food combinations we come up with.

In our house, the fact that we ate what we had growing up, or we weren’t really hungry as my parents would say, made the whole mixing and matching of flavors much more normal.  That, and the simple truth we are mexicanos de rancho, campesinos really…even ifde estelado.

So let’s see, there is the fruta con chile, roasted corn with mayonnaise and the works, snow cones with syrup and chamoy, popcorn with Tabasco, and Tabasco with everything else (a personal favorite of mine sometimes substituted with Cholula, Valentina, or Louisiana salsas), hamburgers with actual ham and cheese inside them, along with avocado strips, jalapeños and pickled carrots, tortillas with pretty much anything imaginable inside them – tortilla dogs, need I say more – and so many other appetizing combinations that I could go on and on about, including my personal invention: the regular old run of the mill deli meat sandwich, complete with crumpled up layers of chips inside to give it that extra crunch and kick that tastes oh so very delicious!

No, it’s really not just a Mexican or Latino thing…eatable hyper-concoctions are universal, and they almost always taste delightful.  ¡Provecho!

Took Me A Minute, But Here Is The Recipe

The credit for how to make this tasty treat goes all to mi querida amiga de Facebook, Juanita Cruz, who took it upon herself to share this recipe.  Gracias!  And now, without further ado…la receta she sent me:  

I use a box cake for the chocolate cake portion…sorry but it tastes just as good as one from scratch and less work ) So just prepare the cake off the box and set aside.  I use a bundt cake pan for this. For the flan put all ingredients into a blender except the evaporated milk. Use the empty can of condensed milk and pour the contents of the evaporated milk into the empty can and use only that portion and add to blender. You will have a little extra evaported milk. Blend in the blender and set aside. Usually i heat up sugar in the baking pan I’m going to cook the flan in but since I use a bundt pan for this cake its harder to do so I just buy that leche quemada in a squeeze bottle and pour on the bottom of the pan.  Next you add the cake batter into the pan. Once the cake batter is completely in the pan you add the flan mixture on top of the cake. It’s going to sink and you are going to think it’s not going to come out right but I promise you it will.  You will need a larger roasting pan and fill it with water halfway so that when you place the bundt pan in it the water will come up halfway to the bundt pan. Cover the top of the bundt pan with foil paper and put in the roasting pan with water in a 350 degree oven for about 45 minutes.  Hope it comes out well for you ;o)

Nada Más Que Amor

Nothing More Than Love

Be still oh betrayful heart...

Is what one can offer sometimes to the ones we love.  It may not be what’s desired or accepted at any said particular moment, but it is what, at least my heart, can always offer beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Y es que es verdad. As they sayel corazón es traicionero. It can twist and turn at any given moment, regardless of the orders/demands of our mind.

Once that connection is made on a human level, the most basic of our instincts kick in.  We can’t help but to pull for the underdog, to hope for the less fortunate, to pray for the weak, and even cry with the lost and forgotten.  Even when our cards have all been laid out on the table and we’ve made our convictions, we just can’t help wanting to do something for someone who’s struggling…no matter how much we may dislike them.  And yeah, maybe not everyone has this particular problem – whether fortunate or not, for some remaining callous despite the tugging of the heart remains no major obstacle.

There’s a song that says teach me how to fake it and give a passionate kiss without causing my heart pain, and in a way it makes perfect sense.  How easy would it not be to put our emotional selves out there completely…to be vulnerable without the threat of any heartache, and to be able to do so as many times as we wanted to…just because we could?

In real life though, the one where we have to learn all our own lessons at our own pace, this reality is really quite impossible to achieve.

For some reason, the older we get the harder it is to sweat the small stuff, to blatantly ignore our true feelings, and yes even to keep up our I don’t give a crap about anything mentality.

Maybe, just maybe, because the closer we get to the realization of our own mortality, the harder it is to deny that there are plenty of things out there way bigger than ourselves…