Tag Archives: Recipes

Swedish Coffee Cake

Nationality: United States of America
Age: 79
Occupation: Retired
Residence: Fullerton, California
Performance Date: April 20th, 2019
Primary Language: English

Main Piece
Swedish Coffee Cake – its very good. Its key ingredient is cardamom, which is a spice. You make the whole thing from scratch, so after you make the dough, you braid, you roll it out, and then depending on what you want in it, its usually sugar, cinnamon, and raisins, some people like raisins, some don’t, and then nuts, and then you roll it up, and then when you’re making Swedish Coffee Cake, you make it in a circle. And then you take scissors and then cut it all the way around so you can flip the sides. We made this all the time really – it was so good, the kids loved it, so it wasn’t really for a specific occasion, its just what you did. I stopped making it because kneading dough is really hard and tough on the hands and arms, unless you were going to buy the dough, but I always made it. It is hard though, you have to bake the dough, punch it down, and then it rises again, and you have to punch it back down, it’s a lot of work.

Background
The informant of this piece was born in America, yet her family comes from Sweden. She was taught this traditional recipe from her mother, and would make it very often for her children. Her children affirmed loving it and having it all the time, and mentioned they wish they still made it.

Context
The informant of this piece is a 79-year-old women, born in America to the family of Swedish immigrants. The information was collected outside a home in Palm Springs, California on April 20th, 2019.

Analysis
I wish that this traditional recipe had been passed down and used in my family! I would love to be able to celebrate my historical culture, even if through specific, traditional recipes! I find it really interesting that I have never tried it – even with the informant helping make important meals shared by the whole family, it has not been made, to my knowledge. I think it really interesting that specifically Swedish coffee cake is said to be made in a circle – I feel like most cakes are circular, although the use of scissors to flip the dough is interesting. It makes sense that it became harder and harder to make as the informant got older, but a big part of me wishes that wasn’t the case.

Haitian Halloween

Nationality: Haitian-American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Southern California
Performance Date: April 24, 2018
Primary Language: English

Originally from Florida, this friend of mine grew up around a wide range of cultures and traditions. Raised by Haitian and Colombian immigrants, she speaks Haitian-Creole, French, English, and a little bit of Spanish. We share a love of food, and spend a lot of time talking about food and different recipes and whatnot, so when this project came down the pipeline, I knew I had to ask her about some unique, family recipes.

The following was recorded during a group interview with 4 other of our friends in the common area of a 6-person USC Village apartment.

“Um, so like Christmas dinners – my whole family would come into like – we would rotate which house we would go to. And then everyone was – not really assigned – but everyone knew what like, what dish to bring. Cause like, that’s the only thing you’re good for, so just bring that. I was desserts. My mom was – there’s this thing called Soufflé Maïs, so. It was so good. It’s like sweet corn and cheese. And then – it was soufflé because it’s cooked in the oven. And then my mom also makes – I call it egg salad because I like the eggs more than the potatoes. With spam and hotdogs or either like mayo or mustard. It’s so good, it’s so delicious. It’s not a Haitian dish, it’s just a dish. And then uh, ah, Diri Djon Djon. So it’s like black rice basically. It’s soooo good. It’s like rice – of rice, and then the type of mushroom you put in with the rice. Cause it blackens the rice. And then you put peas in it.”

She later told me that these same dishes would be served around Halloween, as her family created a tradition of having a Halloween dinner every year. The Diri Djon Djon was particularly popular then, as the black color lends itself perfectly to the spookiness of Halloween-time. It was cool to hear about how her family mixed American dishes with Haitian dishes, at times using each culture as a sort of springboard into unexplored food territory. Before I finished the interview, I made her promise to bring me some Souffle Maïs next time her mom made it.

Homebrewing

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: April 3, 2018
Primary Language: English

The folk practice of homebrewing was described to me by a friend as we ate lunch in a dining hall. There is no official recipe for this practice, and my friend’s homebrewing was influenced by many sources, both official and unofficial. ‘A’ refers to my friend, and ‘B’ refers to me.

A: What I do is I make homemade uh, hard ginger ale. So, um, it’s a pretty interesting process that…I mean like, I kind of crafted this recipe from a bunch of different recipes. Um, I have no clue where these recipes came from, but…

B: Where did you find them?

A: Uh, online, word of mouth, uh, I have some homebrewing friends who sent me, you know, their family recipes and stuff. Uh, and so, yeah, I started taking bits and pieces from uh, those recipes and…made uh… It’s become, it’s become a hobby, you know? Like, like, I mean on one end, you know, it’s cool ‘cause, like, you get, you know, a good beverage. But on the other hand, it’s like, it’s this…thing that you piece together, uh, from multiple different sources and craft it into your own thing. And you get your own sort of take on all these other forms of this…the same drink, just different, you know, recipes.

 

A Poor Chinese Communist’s Guide to Cooking

Nationality: Chinese-American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: La Crescenta, CA
Performance Date: 3/13/17
Primary Language: English

Context: I collected this from a high school friend when we were on a camping trip together over Spring Break.

Background: My friend is Chinese on his mother’s side, and she grew up in a poorer part of Communist China.

The Cooking Method: Because of the lack of proper food that poor Chinese people had to eat, they adopted a method of cooking that involved simply throwing whatever was edible and available together “in ways that made it taste good.” Over time the method became just the natural way of cooking to the people, even once regular food and ingredients became available.

Analysis: I like that the originator of this method of cooking is merely the will to survive, rather than simply a single person who decided to start cooking things a certain way. It’s also interesting to point out that these are folk recipes that emerged from a certain socioeconomic climate, a product of a generally difficult time period for the proletariat Chinese. More ties to folklore and the history of a culture.

Bolas/Empanadas de Verde

Nationality: Ecuadorian
Age: 19
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4/1/16
Primary Language: Spanish
Language: English

“Okay, so basically, ummm, una bola de verde is a platano ball, but you will put meat or vegetables or chicken or whatever you want inside of it. Ummm you can put, you can make it in like bola form which is, like, you put it in soup, ummmm, or you can, like, fry it, and it’s an empanada de verde. So good. So good.”

This traditional Ecuadorian meal is quite mouthwatering. It translates directly into “Ball of Green” or “Empanada of Green” depending on which form you use. For the bola or ball form, you take a green plantain or platano, as it’s called in Spanish, chop it up, and flatten the pieces. Once they’ve been flattened, you take ground meat or vegetables, put it on top of the flattened plantains, and wrap the plantains around the filling, rolling it into a ball. Then, you deep fry the filled plantain balls until crispy. The other method is to flatten the whole plantain, put the filling on top, and then fold the plantain over itself, creating a whole moon shape. Then, you put this in the oven and bake it, turning it into an empanada.

Plantains are an Ecuadorian staple. Because they grow so easily in Ecuador’s climate, the country has an abundance of them, and they make hundreds of recipes using plantains. However, most people use them when their still green. The greener the plantain, the less sweet. Sometimes, if people want the dish to be sweeter, they’ll wait for the plantain to ripen longer, and they’ll use it once it’s yellow or blackening.