Gabriele travelled around the world and, next to thousands of other adventures, turned into a curious and hungry grandson for the grannies of all the countries he visited. Appealing to their natural cooking care and their inevitable pride in their best recipe, common factors to all grandmothers in the world, Gabriele persuaded them to do their best in the kitchen.
Hui Guo Rou (twice-cooked pork with vegetables).
Vegetarian Tamal.
Chicken vindaloo.
Sinigang (tamarind soup with pork and vegetables).
Chocolate Toffee Trifle.
Lambi in creole sauce.
Finkubala (Caterpillar in tomato sauce).
Queso Humacha (vegetables and fresh cheese soup).
Fejoada light.
Chicken and vegetables CuosCous.
Wali, mchuzina mbogamboga (rice, fish and vegetables in green mango sauce).
Mjadara (rice and lentils cream).
Swiss chard and ricotta Ravioli with meat sauce.
Inkokt Lax (poached cold salmon and vegetables).
Kjotsùpa (lamb and vegetables soup).
Silke (herring with potatoes and cottage cheese).
Aside from the fact that this series is limited to the families who can afford to host a traveler. And with the awareness that what host families feed their guests isn’t always what they actually eat every day.* I really like these. A very simple idea but one which I think works really well here.
*My wife and sister both have travel stories about how relieved their hosts were to find out they were vegetarian and didn’t impress their guests with meat. At the same time, there’s also something nice about seeing pictures of food which directly contradicts the stereotypes we have of these places in the west.
I always like watching experts work on things that they can do in their sleep but which they take immense pride in doing well. This is especially true of tasks which are often overlooked or taken for granted. Food preparation is one such task. It’s clear looking at these photos that every woman here is pleased to be recognized for this skill and proud of her creation.*
*One of the things that’s bothered me about the celebrity chef stuff (and a lot of foodie culture in general) is how male-dominated it is since, rightly or wrongly, domestic food prep is usually performed by women. Only glorifying the male celebrity version of cooking gets the essence of food wrong as well in addition to suggesting that the everyday essential food prep that women worldwide are doing isn’t worth celebrating.
There’s also something nice about how so many of the meals seem to match the rooms and the way the women are dressed. I’m curious whether this is intentional or if it’s an organic function of putting together a household and letting everything sort of grow together so nothing feels out of place.
Lastly, I really really appreciate how global this series is. Are there missing areas? Of course. But when picking the images for this post I found myself noticing that there are plenty of examples from all continents to the point where I don’t feel like anyplace is really being slighted. And that’s a rare thing nowadays.
