Those flavours that I miss

(En castellano)

When you emigrate the first thing you miss, and that it is a given that you’ll be missing the most, is the people you love: your family, your pets, your friends.

After a while the whole thing settles down and missing your loved ones becomes some sort of constant murmur, like a white noise that you can hardly hear but that it’s there every moment of the day and you get used to living with it…or something like that. And it’s then when you start missing things you never thought you would miss like your neighbourhood, the streets, speaking in your own language, the colours, blue skies and sunny days, smells and perfumes; in my neighbourhood back in Buenos Aires, Spring is filled with the lovely scents from the linden tree flowers, gardenias, jasmine and wisterias and in my neighbourhood in England there are no gardenias or jasmines and the linden trees from a park nearby, even when full in bloom with the little yellow flowers there’s no scent coming from them.

You also begin to miss the food, at first it’s a certain dish your Mom used to make for you or that one that was your Grandma’s best and most delicious dish in the world; and then there’s the fact that food doesn’t taste de same, neither does the water, the meat, the pizza…and it gets more complicated when, for example, you want to grab a sandwich on the go and none of the options seem tempting: cucumber, tuna or salmon with sweet corn, relish, cheese and onion where the mayonnaise they use is so heavy that gives you stomach pains, egg sandwich which sometimes includes chicken; chicken sandwiches can also be curry style, like chicken tikka; you may also find a basic tomato, mozzarella and basil sandwich; and of course, around the Northeast of England you find the classic ham and pease pudding sandwich, of course. It is a never-ending list of options and I’m here yearning for a classic ham and cheese, cheese and salami (not even the salami taste the same!) or cheese and olives sandwich either in thin white crustless bread or a pebete roll.

There’s also all those things that you cannot buy here such as queso cremoso (creamy white cheese, similar to Port Salut but softer), empanada and tart discs and dough (puff pastry tastes completely different), real fresh pasta, peceto (a type of veal cut similar to silverside/topside or eye of round) to cook our very typical Christmas dish Vitel Tone (Vitello Tonnato), and this cut is not only hard to get in the UK because the beef is cut differently but also because finding veal is almost impossible where I live. Another thing that I haven’t found is the classic brown lentils we use in Argentina for our lentil stew. Here, when looking for lentils you come across many different types and colours but I can’t seem to find the ones we use back home. What type of lentil do we eat in Argentina, does anyone know?

So then you go on the Internet searching through forums and Facebook pages for people who’s in the same situation as you are, who come from the same roots and immigrated to the same country you did.

That’s how I came to meet Gabriela, she’s an Argentinean who lives in London and is passionate about cooking. She has a blog called La Viandina and a while ago she launched her catering business called La Tetería Shop and you can order whatever your heart desires from Torta Pascualina (spinach and ricotta pie), sandwiches in pita bread, pebete or rustic bread; all kinds of cakes such as Rogel, Pastafrola made with dulce de leche, sweet potato or quince jam/paste, brownies, cupcakes, scones, bread, mini palmiers, savoury biscuits, quince or raspberry jamthumbprint cookies, classic alfajores with dulce de leche and croissants (both all butter and the ones made with lard instead of butter or margarine). 

She has a delivery service and not just if you live around London! I’m in Newcastle Upon Tyne and I’ve just received my order via Post Office: quince thumbprint cookies and a dozen croissants de grasa which are both sweet and savoury and are my favourite and you can’t get them anywhere because the classic French all butter croissant is more popular round here. Oh, also, when you order 12 croissants they send you 15!

They arrived perfectly fresh, safe and sound, cosily wrapped up and in one piece. What do they taste like? They are delicious! The cookies melt in your mouth and the croissants are amazing! I didn’t know how much I was missing this flavour and not just because they are really yummy but also because to me croissants are a synonym of a Sunday morning when you feel like indulging yourself and buy some facturas (pastries) and you have a lovely croissant with a café con leche (Latte, café au lait or half milk, half coffee) for breakfast or when you drop by a friend or a relative’s house and bring some facturas for tea time.

Today I'm happy. 

Here are some photos of my banquet, and if they whet you appetite and you are in the UK go ahead and order some!

This is how they arrived in the parcel

All wrapped nicely and in one piece

 Ready to enjoy them with a cup of coffee!