My first essay

Albondigas with a twist of pineapple

It was a typical winter day in Seattle, looking out to the horizon. I can admire the different colors on the sky. As I am sitting looking directly above the sky I can see very dark clouds, as dark as if I was staring at the smoke of a burning tire, not letting a sing of light go thru the heavy clouds. I can feel the cold wind coming thru the small window. I can tell the wind comes accompany with big drops of cold water, taking anything that stands on its way. However looking closer to the horizon the sun is burning almost as if it was trying to win a war against the heavy dark clouds. Making the sky look like somebody smear the rainbow, the burning sun painted the sky with warm colors ranging from strong oranges, to yellow, red, and pink colors. The sun did not win that winter day just like many days in Seattle. Living under a permanent cloud of soggy grey chill, I often long for huge platters of golden fried chicken and creamy garlic mashed potatoes, smothered in gravy and glazed doughnuts. My hibernal body wants them. My sun-starved soul needs them. Gastronomy is absolutely about climatology. I was inspired to cook by a beautiful yet dark and cold sky.
Something warm, soupy, with lots of different colors and flavors like all the colors on the sky. I decided to make a traditional Mexican meal “Albondigas”. Albondigas is a traditional Mexican meatball soup (“Albondigas” means “meatballs” in Spanish) that my mother and grandmother have cooked for our family since I can recall. It is our version of comfort food. I knew that it is an easy soup to make. I read the recipe on a magazine full of other Mexican recipes. I was a bit scare, and at the same time excited to realize that this recipe called for very different ingredients than I have seen my mother and grandmother used in their kitchen. The traditional Albondigas made with tomato soup, ground pork and a variation of vegetables, depending on what you have on hand and what is in season. The new recipe call for things like pineapple and dried cranberries. Again very different from what I had seen my mother and grandmother do. I was excited to make it because I thought this was going to be a modern version of my grandmother’s Albondigas.
We first started to mix the ground turkey with flour and the cranberries. The ground turkey was a bit frozen. When I was mixing it my fingers got a red color and where tingling from the cold meat, so cold that it hurt. I started to mix the cilantro with the pineapple. My first thought was Tacos al Pastor. One of my favorite tacos, (“shepherd style”) likely originated from Lebanese immigrants who made their way to Mexico. Like any food that emigrates from one place to another, changes are made to include locally available ingredients and to suit local palettes. In this case, the meats were flavored with various chilis and then topped with a pineapple while roasting. The smell and bitter sweet yet tangy flavor of the pineapple mix with the cilantro took me back to Mexico and the many times I ate the tacos with friends and family. I can’t recall any other recipe in the Mexican cuisine that requires pineapple. I knew then that this modern version of the Albondigas was going to be a sensational meal.
We had made other meals from recipes that have reviews and when you read the reviews, you have an idea of what the end result will be like. However, when you make a meal without reviews is almost like cooking in the dark. The dish takes a life of its own and all you can do is add the other ingredient and see what happens next. The house smell delicious and felt warmer. The Albondigas had been cooking for about three hours and I could not think of anything else but what this dish would taste like. Was I going to regret altering my grandmother’s recipe or was I going to love it?
The table was set for two with steaming plates full of soup. You could barely see something sticking out of the plate, brown small meatballs, along with corn kernels, and green pepper. The first spoon full that I had was a testimony that is it possible to change ingredients to include locally available ingredients to a traditional dish. This modern version of the Albondigas had a smell and flavor that I had never experience before. It was delicious! It did not taste like my grandmother’s but I thought about grandmother guiding me all the way.