Cuisine ~ Culture

Happy Holidays Everyone!

We have been exploring New Caledonia with a bit of camping and looking for work, but as it is the holidays some of the latter has been put on hold. New Caledonia looks a lot like the pictures of New South Wales, Australia with the red earth, hot & dry climate, and flora are very similar. The fauna is the greatest difference. It would be nice to have kangaroos and koala, but we are quite pleased to not have the populations of alligators, snakes, and spiders which Australia boasts.

Beginning on Christmas things are looking a bit more promising on the job front, so hopefully in a few weeks we can post some good news.

In the meantime we are getting to know our neighbors who seem to mostly German. Maybe my German will improve more than my French. I invited one couple over for Hanukkah. I think we were both a little surprised about the similarity of cultures foods. I served them latkes, and they said, “oh our grandparents used to make this for us all the time”. I had invited them over for traditional German food from circa WWII. It makes sense as so many Jews lived in Germany and Yiddish has so much German in it. Then we were invited over for Christmas Eve on another boat, where I have yet to find a practicing Christian. They served what I would consider traditional Jewish food of fresh smoked fish and horseradish for the appetizer. It was lovely to have freshly smoked mackerel caught by the hosts themselves!

Last night I expanded my culinary horizons by learning how to make bananas flambé, from our neighbor Olivier, who happily declares himself an expert. What I can say for my skills at the moment is, while the carmel was pleasing to the palette, the flambé effect needs further practice in order to achieve the appropriate amount of the “ahh” factor by the dinners.

So I guess I will have to practice and make others "suffer" to help me perfect my flambé skills. Olivier and Carol is his wife are happy to oblige.