Tales from the Table

Tales from the

Table A collection of food based memories and stories from around the world

Edited by Josslyn McAuley and Andy Reeves

Tales from the

Table A collection of food based memories and stories from around the world

Edited by Josslyn McAuley and Andy Reeves

Š All rights Reserved Credits: Design and layout - Keith Turner - www.mooli.com Illustrations - Sam McAuley - sam_mcauley@hotmail.co.uk

Introduction Welcome to ‘Tales from the Table’. This book is made up of a collection of tales, poems and memories from local parents and children. Collected over the summer of 2015, the stories in the book celebrate the colourful tapestry of ordinary family life with all its ups and downs, and the memories that we can all share with our families and friends with a smile or a tear.

The families and stories feature many different parts and foods of the world, reflecting the fantastic diversity of life in Leicester today. Whoever you are, whatever your journey, read, enjoy, maybe try out a recipe... most importantly though, we hope you’ll be inspired to share your story with your children, husband, grandchild, friend…

This book is the creation of families who attend St Matthews, Highfields, Mayfield and North Evington Children, Young People and Family Centres; St Matthews Library; and the Contact Project.

It was put together as a joint project between The Children, Young People and Family Centres (CYPFC) and the Spark Arts for Children.

Josslyn McAuley

Andy Reeves

Children’s Centre Teacher Highfields Children, Young People and Family Centre St Matthews Children, Young People and Family Centre

The Spark Artist in Residence St Matthews Library

5

Contents Celebrations

7 - 16

Trickier Days

17 - 20

Families /Memories 21 - 39

6

Zong Zi for Qu Yuan Many traditional Chinese foods are intended to honour either the gods or divine persons in history.

Zong Zi, a glutinous rice food wrapped in bamboo or reed leaves, is no exception. It’s meant to honour Qu Yuan, the pioneer poet of ancient China.

Qu Yuan was a famous poet who was also concerned about the fate of his country. Unfortunately, his stature aroused the jealousy of the king, who banished him to a remote area. The poet despaired of the government and its policies. When the state’s capital was captured by enemies he committed suicide by

drowning himself in the Milou River. The Chinese people felt this loss deeply, as he was a much beloved poet. Local folk searched for him in the river, at the same time dropping food of glutinous rice wrapped in bamboo or reed leaves into the river in order to keep the fishes from attacking Qu Yuan’s body.

Since that time, it has been customary on this day to enjoy Zong Zi as a memorial to the patriotic poet.

Domnie Zheng.

7

How to Make Easter Cake

Eid Biscuits

4 eggs, large, milk, vanilla (keeps the food tasting nice), flour, sugar. Then mix it more. Then pour it into where it belongs. Then put into the oven. Wait.

Then the cake is ready. Then decorate it, a rabbit hole inside and write “Happy Easter” with the icing.

Sprinkle different coloured sprinkles on the icing.

Then eat it!

My memory goes back to when I was 6 years old, and we used to visit my grandparent’s home the day before Eid. My grandmother would say ‘we can make biscuits later’. I remember bothering my Grandmother by asking her- ‘when we are going to make the biscuits?’ I would keep asking that question all day until we started making the biscuits.

Farida, 5

My son who is 5 reminds me of myself, because he does the same when I say we are going to make biscuits today. ‘When are we going to make the biscuits?’

North Evington CYPFC

8

That’s Who I Am

Guggrah for Diwali

Remember the name Sonia Cos that’s who I am

When I was a child, every Diwali my mum would make a special sweet called Guggrah. Guggrah is pastry with a sweet filling of dried fruits, raw sugar and spices such as cinnamon or saffron. My favourite filling was grated coconut and sugar. When I was small, I would sit and watch my mum as she made it, my mouth watering in anticipation of eating!

It’s all about chocolate And sweet things like jam I even like carrots But not broccoli

North Evington CYPFC

My Mummy is special and takes care of me

Playdough Poem

She makes me the food I like in My tummy!

My Mummy makes Yummy yummy Cakes!

Sonia Aydros, 9

(Child playing with Playdough)

9

Oliebollen from Holland My story is about oliebollen. Oliebollen is a Dutch delicacy eaten at new years. Oliebollen has different varieties depending on the region you are from. The basic recipe is a batter with currants and little pieces of apple: 1 tsp sugar 2 small packets of (instant) dry yeast 4 cups flour (400 g) 1/4 cup sugar (50 g) 2 eggs 2 cups milk (475 ml) 1 tsp salt 8 cups vegetable/sunflower oil (2 litres) – for frying Powdered sugar Ground cinnamon (optional) Currants, raisins and Apple

Stir yeast into warm milk and let it dissolve. Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl. Stir the yeast mixture and egg into the flour and mix into a smooth batter. Stir in the currants, raisins and apple, and cinnamon if you like.

Cover the bowl, and leave the batter in a warm place to rise until double in size. This will take about 1 hour.

Heat the oil in a deep-fryer, or heavy deep pan to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Use two spoons to shape scoops of dough into balls, and drop them carefully into the hot oil.

Fry the balls until golden brown- about 8 minutes. The doughnuts should be soft and not greasy. Drain finished doughnuts on paper towels and dust with confectioners' sugar. Serve them piled on a dish with more confectioners' sugar dusted over them. Eat them hot!

St Matthews CYPFC

10

A Soup for Christmas Day This is about a special soup we share among our families. It is from Portuguese cuisine. This is usually made during Christmas day. It contains a variety of vegetables and meat.

Turmeric whole, finely chopped ginger whole, finely chopped garlic whole peppercorns cinnamon cloves cauliflower cabbage green peas carrots coriander leaves chicken pieces lamb pieces

Method: In a small cloth, crush cinnamon, pepper and cloves and tie it in the form of a pouch.

Add chicken and lamb pieces in a big pan with some water until it is a bit tender.

Add the vegetables and the pouch (containing the crushed spices), and chopped ginger and turmeric.

The soup is done once the meat and vegetables are cooked.

Garnish it with coriander leaves - and enjoy!

Michelle Noronha

11

Bacalhau a Bras This Portuguese dish is traditionally eaten at Christmas.

Soak the salt cod. Then remove the skin and bones, and flake it apart.

Ingredients:

Meanwhile, cut the potatoes into matchsticks and the onion into fine rings. Fry the potatoes in a pan and set them to one side, to dry on kitchen paper.

At the same time, in a deep pan sweat the onions, and garlic until golden, then add the pieces of cod and cook for a few minutes til the oil is soaked up.

At this stage, add the potatoes and stir while adding the lightly beaten eggs with salt and pepper.

Stir for a few minutes, turning off the heat before the eggs solidify- you’re not making an omelette.

The Bacalhau a bras has to be served hot, with parsley and black olives.

Salt cod, 400g Potato, 500g 1 large Onion 1 head of Garlic 6 eggs Pepper to taste Parsley, oil, salt, black olives - to taste

Parveen Akther

12

Eid Cake Hunt

Ramadan Breakfast

Nadia’s mum used to make cakes for Eid that were so delicious the children would want to eat them as soon as they were cooked. Nadia’s mum would have to find places around the house to hide the cakes, on top of the wardrobe or other places out of the reach of small children. Nadia’s brother would go around the house, sniffing out the cakes until he had found them. The cakes were so delicious that if he found them he would eat them even though he knew he would be in big trouble!

During Ramadan in Bangladesh, Jhunnat would boil milk for breakfast until it was thick. Add white rice, fresh mango pulp and sometimes a banana.

Squeeze it into balls with your hands, and eat before fasting for the day, it will fill you up and soothe your tummy while you fast. Jhunnat and some of her grown up children still make this breakfast during Ramadan.

Jhunnat

Nadia

13

A Mouthful of Heaven It was the morning of Eid day. I must have been four years old, and this was my first memory of celebrating the Islamic festival of Eid. I couldn’t tell the time, but by the sight of early dawn, I knew it was pretty early. I could smell the delicious smell of meat cooking in the house, the chaos of Dad getting ready for Eid prayers, and the sound of the pots and pans clinking in the kitchen. Feeling excited, I jumped on my brother’s bed.”Wake up, it’s Eid!” and we both ran downstairs. “Mum can I have cornflakes?” I asked - my stomach was rumbling, yesterday’s dal didn’t go down a treat. Mum sat us both down and explained how for many years they had been having the traditional Eid breakfast, and that we would be eating that as soon as Dad came home from prayers. The door opened as my dad walked in with a big smile on his face.

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For the next few moments everyone was hugging and kissing and greeting each other with ‘Eid Mubarak!’.

Finally it was time for breakfast! I couldn’t wait to try the steam-oven baked meat, it smelled delicious, and the meat looked brown and tender. I took a mouthful and felt like I was in Heaven, it was the most delicious food I’d ever eaten.

I recall having that dish every year on Eid day since that day, except for one year my Mum went on pilgrimage and I stayed at my Uncle’s. I didn’t wake up to the smell of meat cooking, or the sound of the pressure cooker going off, or the hustle and bustle of my Dad and brother getting ready. I didn’t feel the joy of Eid that day, and though my Uncle tried his best to make me feel at home, it wasn’t the same.

24 years later we still carry on the tradition of Eid breakfast, except now we have extra additions to the family. My Mum has four grandchildren, now I wake up to my kids jumping on me on Eid day and wailing and pleading to go downstairs. One thing that hasn’t changed, is the aroma of my Mum cooking the meat downstairs‌

Recipe: I kg boneless lamb, mutton or beef 1 tbs salt 1.5 tbs ginger and garlic paste 3-4 green chillies 1 tbs oil 1 tbs yoghurt 2 tbs cumin and coriander powder 1 tsp turmeric 1 tsp chilli powder/paprika Juice of a lemon (optional) Marinate all the ingredients together and leave overnight Steam in a pressure cooker or roast in oven.

Waseela Khalifa

15

Moon Cake: Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival In mid autumn, around September, Chinese people celebrate the full moon. We will eat moon cake as a desert after the family gather for dinner. We also bake moon cake as a present for friends and family.

Domnie Zheng

Lots of Soup and Random Stu My family is from Iraq.

Eating together is our family tradition.

We don’t speak English in the house.

We sit on the floor to eat Rice everyday...

And lots of soup and random stuff, Jelly, Turkish delights.

We like noodles too; But my favourite food is...

Burger and chips!

Shun Ali, 10

16

1 a.m. Spaghetti I am from Somalia, although I have Dutch nationality now. It was 1991. I came as an asylum seeker to Holland. First I went to a Police station in Amsterdam. They gave us a ticket and all the papers and they asked us to go to this little, little place, and there were so many asylum seekers there. It was a long journey. I took a train, I waited for a bus, and then I came to the asylum centre. It was night, very dark- the place was beautiful in the daylight, but... the night was so dark. Everywhere there were bushes and trees. So my friend and me came to the reception. They told us to go to one of the bungalows. There was a Somali man there. He told us “Oh, it’s not safe for you to sleep in that bungalow. You can come with me, and sleep in the bungalow that we are living in.” We went with him, we were so tired, so hungry, so thirsty, you can imagine. We had not eaten for two days. We slept, he showed us the beds and we slept.

1am in the morning he woke us, he said “Come eat, I was cooking for you!” He had started to cook for us, but we were so tired, and we slept. We woke up and he gave us spaghetti, with tuna. I never tasted spaghetti so delicious, so well cooked, before or after! Every time I see spaghetti I remember that night, how I was so tired, so hungry. Spaghetti with tuna!

Maryan Anshur

17

Practice Makes Perfect

Don’t Feed the Cat

Before getting married I was very lazy, I never went to the kitchen to help my mum make the food. After I got married and I came to England, my husband bought lots of food and asked me to cook. So I had lots of difficulty, but I never said to my husband that I don’t know how to cook! I always tried my best, day after day, to cook. I looked for different styles of food on the internet and now I am nearly a chef! My husband’s family and friends love my food!

On a visit home to Morroco, when Nadia’s daughter Iness was small, the family went to eat at a restaurant near the beach. As they ate, a scrawny black and white cat begged around the tables for food. Iness was afraid of the cat and kept trying to run away from it, and her dinner! Nadia had the idea of throwing tiny bits of food onto the beach, away from the table, so that the cat would move away from them to eat. This worked, except that the cat then kept coming back to beg for more! Iness still doesn’t like cats, or eating near the beach!

St Matthews CYPFC

Nadia

18

Spam Behind the Wardrobe When I was a small child of about three, after World war Two, there was a lot of food rationing. Meat was rationed with coupons from a little book for each family. My dad would sometimes bring home a wild rabbit or a pheasant that had been hit by a car and mum would cook it for dinner. We didn’t have bananas or much fresh fruit, children didn’t know what a banana looked like! Children would get an orange in their Christmas sock because they were so difficult to get and so expensive.

I remember going with my mum to a house round the corner. Mum would go into a room with the lady and I had to stay in the hall. My

mum always said “Don’t tell anyone where we’ve been or what we did.” I can’t remember how I made the connection between these mysterious visits and butter, as well as the tins of fruit and spam which were kept in the recess behind the big wardrobe...

When family visited or it was a birthday, mum or dad would move the wardrobe slightly and I would crawl in and get the tins out.

When I had my own three children, they would argue about how many peas they each had on their plate, or how big their slice of cake was. I used to think they didn’t know what it was like just after the war!

Kate 19

When She Eats, I Feel Like I Have Eaten...

So where to start? Three years of feeding my daughter has been a big, actually a massive challenge. She was great at drinking milk, as soon as we started weaning her and introducing food the games began.

My daughter was, and still is, a very fussy eater. Swallowing soft foods that she didn’t have to chew was easy for about six months. Solids? Oh my! An absolute nightmare! We went through spitting, throwing, gagging, vomiting and all sorts.

Three years down the line and eating is still a huge challenge. When Zahra eats, I feel satisfied, I feel like I have eaten, and when she doesn’t eat, I want to cry.

Today she decided to have a few spoons of rice then spit it out of her mouth into her hand and threw it all over me and the carpet. I asked her “why?” No answer. I asked her to say sorry. No answer. I asked her to tidy it up. No answer. Eventually, after saying “No Stay and Play” and half an hour going by, Zahra apologised, tidied up and started being helpful. Oh my, what a day it’s been!

Halima Bhula

20

This is Why my Grandad Won’t Touch Curry!

Brothers, Eh?

He was in China, in the 50’s, in the army. He became wounded when he was out there, and he had to go to hospital. Upon arriving at the hospital, he was admitted into a ward, and was overwhelmed by this smell of food being prepared for tea… he asked what it was, and as soon as he found out what it was - curry - it put him off, and he never tried it, then or since. Even the smell of it- he associates with the hospital, and being wounded, and he’s still not touched curry, even now!

Once my brother put a banana skin on the floor to see if he could slip on it, he did!

North Evington CYPFC

Rachael Hillsdon-Hughes

21

Curry by the Sea

Fishcakes and Strawberries

My favourite dish is my Mum’s chicken curry. I remember eating this dish as a child in Africa, near the sea. It was a great time in my life. I think of it even now when I eat the dish. But funnily enough, I’ve never said this to my Mum...

When we were children we used to go to our Grandma’s and have fish cakes. My Mum and Grandma would make lots and we would fill our bellies. We only had fish cakes when we went to our Grandma’s, it felt nice and homely.

Umesh Patel

Also, Grandma had a strawberry patch and when I have strawberries it reminds me of Grandma. It’s something I have thought of doing with my own children.

Highfields CYPFC

22

A Crunchy Lunch Crunchy Healthy Once a year treat Salsa Green, Yellow, Red Spicy and sweet Cheese Nice Mum make them Please -

Pancakes from Pakistan When it rains I always think of home: Pakistan. We would all get together, friends and family, and cook pancakes. We would all help to make them. This would be a treat, and everyone would be excited. As everyone helped they would get more excited. The pancake would fill the pan and only mum would be able to turn it over.

It rained all day yesterday and my sister sent me photos from Pakistan. Guess what? They were cooking pancakes!

Highfields CYPFC

TACOS! Mair Liggins, 12

23

First Chappatis

Mummy Cooks, I Eat

A memory of when I was younger, I would watch my mum cooking when I was around 7 or 8. I was really hungry so decided to make sweet chappati.

My mum wasn’t around so from my memory of watching my mum I made them and we still remember and talk about it.

I like eating biryani but I don’t make it.

Highfields CYPFC

24

Once, I made a really small roti that mummy cooked - and then I ate it!

Zainab, 6

Friday Fish and Chips for Fatima

Tamarind Stone Game

My favourite food is fish and chips because my mum makes it every Friday and it’s very tasty. We also eat it as a family.

When Salha was a child in Tanzania, she and her friends used to pick and eat tamarind fruits. They would keep the stones and play games, flicking the stones at each other to win them. Start with twelve stones in a circle, flick one at another and if you hit the other stone you win both stones!

Fatima Mohamed, 10

Salha

25

Mandazi-African Doughnuts An old childhood memory of mine was preparing and making a sweet snack with my mother. This was an African type of doughnut known as Mandazi. I remember making the dough by mixing a range of ingredients together and when I was very young (3 or 4 perhaps) my mum would give me some of the dough to play with. This reminds me of the playdough we see in many nurseries today!

Mandazi is traditionally served with Chai (tea) and is enjoyed by many in my family. The recipe has been handed down to me and now, as a mother, I like to relive those moments playing with the dough and making shapes with my now one year old daughter.

Recipe: 1 egg, beaten 1/2 cup sugar 1/2 cup milk 2 tbsp. butter, melted 2 cups white flour 2 tsp. baking powder Bring all ingredients to room temperature before mixing them together. Mix all the ingredients together, adding more flour if necessary. The dough should be soft, but not sticky. Roll the dough on a lightly floured board until it is about 1/4 inch think.

Cut into triangles and fry in hot oil. Fry until both sides are golden brown. Remove Mandazi from oil and drain on paper towels or newspaper. Mandazi are best served warm.

Nazma Khan

26

Beans Means Together

Fruit - or Vegetables!

Muniben grew up in a small village in India where families from the village grew beans in the surrounding fields. After school, the children would go and pick beans from the fields and take them home to cook. All of the families would come together to eat in the evening, having cooked the beans that they had picked together earlier.

My favourite food is vegetable pie... because it’s got so many apples.

Safia, 5

Muniben

27

Peggy-Ann’s Coleslaw

Easy to Make, Yummy to Eat!

My late Mother-in-law used to always make her homemade coleslaw for birthday parties, weddings, and any family get-togethers. Parties were not the same without her homemade coleslaw!

Back in India, whenever we went for a picnic with friends and family, we would take raw food with us to cook at the picnic spot. We would make our own cooker with stones and light a fire with sticks. We usually cooked simple food like black lentils or rice.

The smell of the fire and the daal cooking still amazes me. We would make pakora (fritters) for starters which tasted amazing on paper plates with tamarind chutney; easy to make, yummy to eat!

Then for desert we normally cooked kheer which is made of rice and milk, sugar and nuts. My mouth is watering just thinking about those days!

1 large white onion, chopped half thin sliced white cabbage 3 cloves of fresh garlic, grated 4 fresh carrots, grated salt and pepper mayo and chopped spring onion Elizabeth Hunter

28

Simrat Lehal

A Tagine and a Taste of Home When Nadia first came to England eight years ago, her mum brought her a small tagine to bring with her. Nadia cooks with this tagine as often as possible, at least once a week.

Other tagines have come and gone since she has lived in the UK, but her mum’s tagine has lasted where others have failed. One side of the tagine became cracked, and Nadia was worried that it might break the next time she used it, but it is still going strong without even a small leak.

When Nadia cooks with the tagine, it literally gives her a taste of home, a taste of the souk (market) and its spices, sold in huge high piles which smell delicious as you walk past.

It keeps her going until her next visit to Morocco where she can fill up on sun and food.

Nadia

29

Travel by the Taste of Talapia

Dolma from Kurdistan

My favourite fish from Malawi, where I’m from, is Chambo. I never found it here- but then someone told me it was the same fish as Talapia!

In Hawler, a region of Kurdistan, we have a dish which is special to our family and to the region, Dolma. Dolma is made of rice, meat or chicken, and vegetables.

The taste reminds me of home. A plane ticket to Malawi costs nearly a thousand pounds, but the Talapia at least is cheaper...

Fatima Nakhuda

30

Onions aubergine courgette chicken/meat cabbage (white or red) fresh grape leaves rice tomato paste salt spices fresh and dried herbs freshly grated garlic oil

Cut the onions, eggplants, and squash into large chunks or in half, and hollow them out. Cut meat into smallish chunks. Remove the stem/core from the cabbage(s). Wash all the leafy greens (grape leave, cabbage, etc.)

The filling consists of uncooked rice, chopped onions, herbs, spices, tomato paste, cubes of meat and fat, salt and hot oil. Wash the rice. Add herbs, spices, and tomato paste. Heat the oil, and pour it into the rice mixture. Add more tomato paste, to taste. Fill the vegetables with the filling, the cabbage and grape leaves are rolled and tucked, to make little pocket-shaped packets.

After everything is stuffed, the top of the pot is covered with more grape leaves and salt. Then they add some boiling water and cook it over a low flame.

Place a weighted plate on top of the stuffed vegetables to keep them all compact while cooking.

Cook from about a half hour to over an hour depending on the size of the pot.

When the Dolma is finished, it is served on a big tray.

North Evington CYPFC

31

South African Sweet Corn Squares

Milking the Buffalo

My friend from South Africa taught me this. Now I make it for friends and family. It’s quick and delicious!

I remember when I was young my Dad’s job was to milk the buffaloes. Us children would line up for the milk and make whey which we enjoyed making and eating. My Mum made tomato sabji which was amazing. Mum would steam tomatoes and dry them with garlic, gram flour and garlic chutney. We would put tadka on it and eat it with barley flour chappati.

3 medium eggs 1 cup fresh milk half cup corn flour half cup plain flour 3 tbsp ghee 2 tea spoons baking powder 1 tin drained sweetcorn 1 tea spoon salt Crushed green chilli Fresh coriander Preheat oven to 180 degrees c. Beat the eggs well, then add all the other ingredients. Mix together well, then put in the tray to bake for 35 to 40 minutes. Cut into small squares and serve.

Kulsoom Mussa 32

Bhanu

A Crumble with Eva...

When we go to Eva’s Great Grandad’s house during the summer and autumn months, we go into the garden and pick peas, green beans, tomatoes and lots of other veg. We also pick apples from his tree for a crumble.

During the summer holidays, me and Eva went blackberry picking. She helped me pick the berries, wash them and put them in a blackberry and apple crumble. Eva loves making crumble in her own bowl when I make crumble. She mixes flour, butter and sugar all together for the topping.

...and a Chappati with Krishna Krishna loves to get involved with me while making the chappatis. She uses her small rolling pin and flour to make dough. She also uses her playdough cutters to make different shapes of chappatis. Then we have fun cooking the chappatis and eating them together.

Mital Gangani

Rachel Hillsdon-Hughes

33

Grandma’s Magic

Couscous from Libya

My family came from Jamaica in the 50’s and 60’s… the thing I most remember is my Grandma’s cake.

She’d mix it on the floor… get this big plastic bowl and she’d put it on the floor, and she’d just throw all these different types of ingredients in, and it just looked ‘yeeuucchh!’, it just looked absolutely awful, it would be grey. But when she put it in the oven - it would come out and it would taste absolutely fantastic. You just couldn’t figure out how she managed to put all these different ingredients together and come out with this cake!

My friend and I were both born in Libya, and our traditional dish is Couscous. So when we meet each other, we share memories about couscous! We meet together and we make a big dish of couscous. In my country we do it on Friday, because it’s a special day, Jumar, when all the men pray. After the Jumar, all the men come back – almost all people in Libya do this on Friday- we do it in one dish, in one place and we eat together, around a big dish of couscous, one for the men and one for the women.

It’s easy to find couscous here- then it’s meat, sauce, onion, a little spices. It’s a red dish with a lot of sauce. We try to do the same things here, so our children know the traditional things about Libya.

Claudette Robinson

Ghada Elezabi

34

Anjera from Somalia

Ugali from Kenya

This dish is very popular in Ethiopia and Sudan as well as Somalia.

I was born in Kenya. I was brought up on Cassava and Talapia fish. Everyone in East Africa eats Talapia. My favourite is Ugali- polenta. Dip it into spinach and eat. I eat this every Saturday. Here you can get any food you want!

Make a batter- take self-raising flour, a handful of ground maize, a pinch of yeast, mix with warm water and leave to steep overnight. Pan fry, with a lid- don’t flip! When the surface of the Anjera begins to bubble, it’s ready. Take it out of the pan and make another!

Nazir Khalifa

You can have Anjera with ghee, sugar and black tea for breakfast- or with meat and sauce for lunch.

Sometimes people make a massive one, and put different toppings on it. Everyone sits round and eats from the bit they like!

In Somalia only the women cook- but here, everyone cooks!

Salado

35

Dad’s Chappatis This story comes from my childhood and reminds me of the special moments I have spent with my Dad playing, arguing, having fun...

The most colourful memory I have is learning to cook, especially making chappatis with my Dad. If I think about it now I do miss him; it reminds me of the way he taught me. I couldn’t ever get it right; every time something went wrong, either the dough or getting the shape of the chappati perfectly round.

I finally got to the stage where I was quite fed up and was about to give up. He taught me in a way that I still remember and now these soft, sweet memories I am passing on to my daughter.

His way of teaching me making chappatis was unforgettable right from making the dough to rolling it and roasting it.

36

Recipe 2-3 tsp of cooking oil Salt if needed according to taste 2-3 cups of wheat flour Rolling pin, roasting pan, chapatti rolling base Butter

Dad taught me by mixing half the amount of oil to the flour. I used to hate mixing it with my hands and getting messy so he gave me the option of using a spoon which was his first step in getting me interested in doing it. Then, the kneading - he said imagine you are making a clay pot! Then came the shape, I can still remember this bit which I thought was the hardest. I said ‘Dad, there is no way I can get it round’ but he reassured me I definitely would.

He asked me to get rolling, and walked off. He came back with a steel round plate. He put it on my funny, awkwardly shaped chappati and then it was round!

That put the greatest smile on my face and I can still remember running around with a round chappati

and showing it to everyone! Then, he brought me a special dish he said there you go dear, this is for you to get your last fear out of getting burnt, and from that day it made me get so interested in cooking and exploring different varieties, and I loved and enjoyed every part of cooking.

Now at this moment my little daughter is 3 ½ and loves making chappatis with me, and I teach her exactly how my Dad taught me and I love that, bringing special memories to the present so that my daughter can have great memories to remember too.

Mittal Gangani

37

Dad’s Pot Dishes

It’s True You Know...

My Dad would cook in a big, heavy pot. I remember he made scotch broth- that was lentils, pulses those kinds of things, and ham hock- all made in this big pot, because there was a lot of children to feed. The other recipe I remember him doing was a kind of stew minced beef, sausages, onions, potatoes, carrots, stock cube, salt and pepper. All in a big heavy pot. We’d eat it for three days til it was gone - and it tasted a bit better every day!

My mum said if I eat too much passion fruit I will turn into one!

Elizabeth Hunter

38

North Evington CYPFC

My Big Belly I love food, it’s as lovely as can be, From tarts to fruits, then spaghetti.

Different types from different countries, Mostly made from fruit from the trees.

Sushi, Pizza Chips for my feast-a!

Victoria Sponge and strawberry jelly, doughnuts and salty peanuts All in my belly.

Ohh, I feel sick!

What about this little drink?

Drinks? Oh no!

Apple with a pine All seems very fine Strawberry and blueberry Gives me goosebumpsberry!

Oh, and there’s tropical round the bend...

I think it’s time for THE END!

Soumeya Elmi, 11

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16 12 Leicester

1

2

14 3

11

13

4

7 6

8 5 Tales from the Table from around the world

40

1.

Portugal

7.

Kurdistan

13.

Iraq

2.

Syria

8.

India

14.

Morocco

3.

Libya

9.

Tanzania

15.

Somalia

4.

China

10.

Bangladesh

16.

UK

5.

Africa

11.

Jamaica

6.

Pakistan

12.

Holland

15 9

10

Tales from the Table Have you ever tried Ollie Bollen, Anjera, or Ugali?

Did your Dad make Chappati?

Have you eaten chicken curry by the sea?

What about Moon Cake or Zong Zi? Ever made Guggrah for Diwali, Or tasted 1a.m. spaghetti..?