Cena a la Pauli

As I have mentioned, Flory is an AMAZING baker. The day I got to their house after the long flight and customs processes, I was exhausted and hungry. I didn't know which was a stronger feeling. Flory pulled out some of her bread, and it was PERFECT. Sweet, but not too sweet, and light, so light. And there was a seed in it, but it wasn't overwhelming and it really added to the taste. I nearly fell out of my seat when they told me it was Anise. I HATE licorice tasting anything, and there I was ENJOYING anise! (Flory even cooked a zucchini dish I liked, though eggplant and tomato is still a no go.)

From the moment I ate that bread, I knew I wanted to show Flory Challah. I just really wanted to bake with her. BUT with the classes in the afternoons, and my travelling on weekends, it was very hard to find a few hours needed to bake. Enter the Annexion de Nicoya. July 25th is a holiday in Costa Rica celebrating when the people took a vote and joined Costa Rica. AND there was no school that afternoon, so I could make bread.

And IF I was making bread, I thought hey, why not make Brisket and make this a "Jewish Food" night.  I found the butcher and ordered the brisket (pecho de res and falda de res, both names for Brisket). The plan was to make a dinner for the three usual dinner companions: Flory, Jose Luis, and me. Challah, Brisket, mashed potatoes and roasted vegetable of some kind. There were two issues with this plan. 1- No way was it ever only going to be the 3 of us (in the end, we were 9), and 2- I found Matzoh and Matzoh Mel at the store in the Jewish Center.

It was ON!

Sunday, when I called the butcher to deliver the brisket, I added a chicken to the mix. I wanted a quarter or half, but they only had full. Ok, fine. A whole chicken for chicken soup. Then Dinia, Carolina and I hit the stores to find ingredients with Marino as our chauffer. I had created a google sheet with every ingredient in the rows and dishes in the columns so that I would know how many eggs I needed, etc.

We started with the brisket. Bubbe's recipe calls for LOTS of garlic (duh) turned into a paste with other spices. When I asked for a garlic press, I found an outlet for stress.

Eventually, I gave up and used a blender. That blender would be used MANY times before this dinner was done :)

Once the brisket was doing it's thing, it was time to make the soup. Flory convinced me to use the slow cooker (I have never used one before. It freaked me out just as much as having a gas stove would freak Flory out. We both thought the other was too dangerous.) So, we put the whole chicken in with a bunch of vegetables, some traditional to ashkenazi chicken soup, others, definitely not. Dinia is an EXPERT chopper, so she handled the veggies while Caro and I got to work on the kharoysis. Yeah, I was staring at the box of Matzoh and decided why not, and made some. We couldn't find horseradish ANYWHERE, but thank goodness for the international love of sushu, we COULD find Wasabi. Caro had a BLAST using the blender as a food processor for the apples and walnuts, and Dinia helped out with the wine (I had the chance to get sweet Jewish wine at the Jewish Center, but couldn't do it.)

When the brisket was ready, I put the meat in the fridge and set up with the pot, a strainer and a spoon. And developed an IMPRESSIVLY huge blister on the side of my finger from mushing the onion into the liquid, but OH was it worth it. SO good.

Monday morning I got up early to make the Homentashn dough that I was too tired to make the night before. I had promised Caro that I wouldn't actually make the hamantaschen until they were there, so Flory and I started up on the Challah. She watched the whole process, but, when it came to kneading (I usually use the dough hook on my mixer) she swept in and zip zap zop the sticky sticky why won't you come off my fingers dough looked like perfect bread dough. A miracle worker, that Flory. While letting the dough rise, I holed up in my room and finished the presents I was making for folks in the family. FAR too quickly, it was time to get back to cooking. First up, braiding the Challah. I had made a double batch, so I did one full loaf of a 6 braided challah, a half loaf of a flat(ter) 4 braided challah, and a 4 strand circular Challah. Flory and I had a blast making them. Caro came back from work and our hamantaschen factory was in business. We had strawberry and blackberry jelly from the regular supermarket, but two special fillings as well. For me, it was the jam Flory made in my second week out of Cas. The whole house smelled like Cas for 2 days, my nose was in heaven! The other special was a special for my host family. I found Bonne Maman at the "American" Supermarket. It was the first time my host family had tried it, and they were as obsessed as I am.

And a HUGE shout out to Jose Luis who made freshly squeezed orange juice for the hamantaschen. It made ALL the difference.

Flory took me to the back of the house, one part lines for drying clothing when it is raining out, one part bakery and showed me her ovens.

So much yummy!

They came out WONDERFULLY! As did the Hamantaschen.

I made the matzohballs for the soup, and they ACTUALLY HELD SHAPE when I dropped them into the soup. Flory whipped up the eggwhite, and she must have done some kind of magic. It's the only explanation.

In the end, it was Challah, Matzoh, Kharoyis, Matzohball soup, brisket, and Hamantaschen, and Dinia made VERY yummy cheesy mashed potatoes and vegetables. Only Flory and Jose Luis's youngest and his family wasn't there. It was a FANTASTIC night to get to share my culture with this family who has been SO sharing of theirs.

I get it Bubbe, when you spend 2 days cooking for family, the sound of them happily eating is one of the best sounds in the world.