Well I am back .. with B-A-N-A-N-A-S  !!!! 

My friend and neighbor Laura, has about 5 banana trees in her yard.  In the past month all the banana stalks were ready at the same time.  

You can only imagine how many bananas that leaves us to eat up or use for cooking.   

HUNDREDS!!! 

So me being me, started cooking away.  I made banana bread with cashews, froze some for smoothies, ate some, used some in oatmeal, made banana pancakes, ate more, and then got fancy and made a banana cream pie. 

All I gotta say is .. YUMMMM !!  

It was delicious.

And since bananas are soo cheap here, I thought I would share this one with you to impress your friends  

Banana Cream Pie Recipe:

Ingredients: 

• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 3 tablespoons of cornstarch { maizena, amido de milho}
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups milk
• 3 egg yolks, beaten
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 1/4 teaspoons vanilla extract {aroma de baunilha}
• 1 (9 inch) pie crust, baked {i made my own, recipe to follow beneath} 
• 4 bananas, sliced

Directions:

• In a saucepan, combine the sugar, cornstarch, and salt. Add milk in gradually while stirring gently. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture is bubbly. Keep stirring and cook for about 2 more minutes, and then remove from the burner.
• Stir a small quantity of the hot mixture into the beaten egg yolks, and immediately add egg yolk mixture to the rest of the hot mixture. Cook for 2 more minutes; remember to keep stirring. Remove the mixture from the stove, and add butter and vanilla. Stir until the whole thing has a smooth consistency.
• Slice bananas into the cooled baked pastry shell. Top with pudding mixture.
• Cool by an open window for 45 mins or so. 
• Chill in fridge for at least 3 hours, the longer the better.  If you can do it overnight, I highly recommend it.  
• I topped with whipped topping  {In Brazil you can purchase Chantilly Cream in a box, its basically their version of Cool Whip.  Its great.  You can either purchase it in a large box, or small.  Its a bit pricey, a large box is about R$10,00 and small being about R$4,00.  I bought the large to be sure I had enough, but a small one would’ve worked.  You can find this in the baking section of the store, on the shelf.  Upon returning home you must put it in the fridge for 8 hours or you can do it like me and put it in the freezer for 2-3 hours and then it will be ready to use.  Throw it into the blender, blend until thick and creamy, and smooth on top of your pie!}  

Chantilly Cream for topping

Directions for pie crust :

Ingredients: 

1 small package of Maziena cookies crumbled {shortbread cookies, you can either do vanilla or chocolate, I used vanilla}  

6 tablespoons of Butter melted 

1.5 teaspoon of Cinnamon {canela} 

Crumble your cookies first { I do this in a blender for a few secs.} Mix all ingredients in a bowl.  Then press into a pan or pyrex dish and bake on 200 Celsius for about 5-7 mins.  

On a side note:  this would be really nice with some melted chocolate drizzled inside the pie shell. I think I will do that next time  

Banana Cream Pie

*** Yeah I know the pie looks a bit messy in the pic, but well I was so anxious to eat it and didn’t chill it in the fridge for soo long, hence the fact it’s falling apart  But it didn’t affect the taste ONE BIT !! ***

Did you know that Coconut water is…

Malu drinking coconut water

• 99% Fat Free
• Low in sugars
• an all natural isotonic beverage to re-hydrate your body
• loaded with potassium much more than a banana
• naturally sterile- water, permeates through the filtering husk
• containing lauric acid, which is present in human mother’s milk
• less sodium than sports drinks
• very high in chloride 

It’s basically the BEST rehydrating beverage out there.  Here we consume them fresh from the coconut with a straw poked through, and very cheaply {about $1.00}

We will miss drinking coconut water on a daily basis.  Its Malu’s absolute favorite. I am aware it is available in the US, but for a hefty price tag.

Not to say I wont buy it.  

As I will.

But  it will be a treat, rather than a daily habit  

Beijos, Tanya

Yeah I know, I missed Food Friday.  So I am a day late.  Whatever.  Life happens. So I am making it up on Saturday.   Today I was eating a burger {mind you a Brazilian burger, already made as a patty in the meat factory, very thin and processed. *gag* ok, I know what you are thinking, but it was great cause I had a few beers and I was starving and there was no other food around.  My husband had no clue what I was doing the first time I made burgers from “real ground meat” .. as they typically do NOT do this in Brazil }

Anyhow, after watching for a few years how people dress their burgers here, I thought I HAD to write about it tonight.  

The typical way a Brazilian eats their burger is with the ketchup, and mayo bottles VERY close by.  Usually they do not use mustard, but I have seen it on various occasions.

The step by step “burger eating” process in Brazil … 

1.) Take a bite

2.) Squeeze a line of ketchup and mayo on your previous nicely bitten line, soon to be your next bite.

3.) Eat said line with mayo and ketchup {side note: next 2 to 3 bites, eaten in a nice vertical line across burger} 

4.) Repeat previous step, more ketchup,  more mayo, for next bites. 

5.) Continue this until said burger is finished.

{does this process make sense to you?  Or shall I take photos?} 

Now… The “burger eating” process in America….

1.) Get the burger and lift up top part of bun/bread

2.) Squeeze or slather a generous amount of ketchup/mayo/mustard {depending on person} on to the inside top of said bread/bun or burger.

3.) Put bun/bread back on burger 

4.) Eat entire burger as is !  

Now I don’t know about you, but this seems like the much more logical way to eat a burger.  Logical and easier.  No hassle of keeping the bottles close by, sharing and waiting for bottles and continuously applying new dressings!  Not to mention, it must make the restaurant owners much happier that you don’t use half of the f***kin bottle on ONE burger!  

So how do you dress you burger ?   If you live in Brazil, have you seen different?  Or can you tell me about some other wacky thing you have seen? {don’t get me started on putting mayo on pizza!  If you don’t know, I’ll save that for another post.}

Everyone that knows me personally would know that anything I do would not be complete without food involved!  And if you don’t know me personally, well…. now you know I LOVE food and everything involved with food.  I love to shop, cook, eat, find new recipes, eat, eat and. … …Well yeah … eat !!!  In fact when brainstorming ideas about my site, I considered doing just a site all about food.  Which I may still do in the future, when my daughter is a little older and I have more time on my hands!

So on behalf of my love for cooking and food, I will dedicate every Friday to FOOD!   I will cover everything from traditional Brazilian recipes, to translations of produce, herbs, and ingredients found here (for all of you that are either here on vacation, or just moved here, and have no f***ing clue what to make.  No worries, I was once there.) to interesting food facts of Brazil, to strange foods, restaurant reviews and everything in between.  If you would like to see a traditional Brazilian recipe on my blog or would like to know something food related, please leave me a comment or contact me.  I love to talk food !!

First let’s talk table talk of Brazil. Breakfast in Brazil is quite light.  Usually consisting of fruit, bread with ham, cheese and butter, cake, juice, and of course coffee.  There are always exceptions to this rule but most likely, not.  Brazilians eat their main meal of the day for lunch, followed by an hour of rest. Well at least this is true to my area.  Everything is closed, even the supermarkets, between the hours of 12 to 2 for lunch.  The first hour for preparing and eating, and the second hour for resting. I have to say this can be quite annoying sometimes.  But well, I’ve adjusted.  In the cities of Brazil, this is not always the case.  Dinner is usually something quite light .. Or leftovers from lunch.  Now, all this makes sense to me, but for some reason I still hate to cook during the hot ass days and prefer my larger meal at night.  So at our house we do what we call “Ameri-Bras” a little bit of both worlds, switching it up from day to day.

Now let’s talk etiquette .. If you are ever eating in Brazil, in a formal setting with Brazilians, there are a few things you should know.   First, ALWAYS use your silverware, no matter what you are eating .. yup that’s right, even with pizza and sandwiches.   Thank god I live in a laid back surfing village, cause I just can’t eat pizza without folding it and using my hands.  Here, no one looks twice.  But if I were in a formal setting, I would use my silverware. Second, ALWAYS go devagar, slow with the petiscos otherwise know as appetizers. Brazilians LOVE to graze on one plate of petiscos for an extended period of time.  I know it’s hard, I’ve had to hold myself back a few times.  And third, the toothpicks that come with the petiscos, they’re not for your teeth. These are intended for picking up the petiscos.. And again, if you are in a formal setting with a Brazilian, USE them !

Now let’s talk guardanapos, napkins.  You don’t even want to get me started on napkins here.  I think I would become a millionaire in Brazil if I created one good- quality, cheap, guardanapo.  Ok well maybe not a millionaire, but I would probably do well!   Most of the napkins SUCK here.  If you go to one of the various salgado stands (a savory pastry usually with meat and or cheese, fried or baked), they will always serve your salgado in a nice hard, crunchy, wax paper like, guardanapo!  When you try to wipe your mouth you never really clean the mess on your face, but move it around instead.  And you may even end up with a few scratches on your face at the end of it all.  With all that said, the nice guardanapos do exist, I guess they are just a little more expensive and everyone tries to cut costs!  Oh my, how nice it would be to have nice guardanapos everywhere I go to eat.

Yummy Salgados

That’s all my rants and raves for today. Brazil has some wonderful food and recipes.  And I can’t wait to write all about my food euphoria’s.  So if you like food, be sure to check my blog every Friday for great recipes and fun ideas.  I am already so excited about next week.  I will share a delicious recipe with all my readers .. so stay posted!