Food for thought

How many Maltese families, this Christmas, will be sitting down to a hasi roasted to perfection at the local bakery with mounds of vegetables as an accompaniment? (a hasi is a capon, which is a cockerel castrated at between six and 20 weeks).

How many of these will then have enough space left for afters – the traditional qagħqa ta l-għasel (treacle ring) and imbuljuta (chestnuts stewed in cocoa with cloves, tangerine peel, and a dash of aniseed liqueur)?

In the silly pretext of being “modern” or perhaps “cosmopolitan” we have discarded the traditional timpana and patata l-forn for a mishmash of imported dishes such as turkey with chestnut stuffing and cranberry sauce, lasagna, and lemon sorbet, downed with copious amounts of imported wines.

We view ourselves as sorry clones of Nigella Lawson – slaving away to produce unfamiliar foods we may not even like... Ms Lawson’s latest Christmas cookbook includes recipes for chestnut soup with bacon crumbles, lamb and date stew (cooked in a tagine which resembles the Maltese baqra of yore), and maple cheesecake.

Ironically, however, in a recent interview, La Lawson said she would be satisfied with mere chips and curry sauce.

So much, then, for pulling out all the stops in order to impress the family and guests.

Food is very important to the Maltese psyche – a woman, alas, is sometimes judged on both the quality and the quantity of food she offers guests – anyone considering cuisine minceur is setting herself up for sottovoce back-biting involving the words sparrows and anorexics.

The whole idea behind a Christmas meal – which comes bang in the middle of the festive period, when most people are replete with the hors d’oeuvres and mince pies and rich Christmas cake offered when they drop in for drinks at someone’s house – is to enjoy other people’s company.

The meal is an incidental. And these days, with many people having – or professing they have – allergies to this, that, and the other, a cook may find herself rustling up vegetarian, gluten-free, lactose-free, low-sugar, low-salt, and low-fat servings... apart from the “usual” food.

There was a time when guests would feel they had to eat anything that was put in front of them, escape having seconds by saying they wanted to leave room for the next course.

The making and eating of food lost its fun and laughter and love connotations and became a game through which one could needle one’s hosts and act up, with spoilt brats, masquerading as guests with health issues.

Mrs Beeton’s Puddings and Pies (bought by my mother at the princely sum of 5 shillings and 6 pence before ISBN numbers even existed) lists Christmas Plum Pudding, Christmas Pudding, and Pudding Sauce as must-haves for the Yuletide sweetmeats table – today, they would go to waste for the excuses about cholesterol, fat, and sugar content.

It is high time we turned our backs on “imported” traditions and harked back to our own. After all, trends from all countries can be updated to provide healthy, nutritious fare...; not only for Christmas, but also throughout the year.

Take the homely timpana, for instance, once a staple Christmas Day and Sunday dish – and good for cold take-away snacks too. The dough was once made with lard; butter is the ideal replacement. Do not even think of replacing the lard with margarine, no matter what the labels say about its wannabe “healthy” qualities.

There is no need, either, to include organ meats and sliced boiled eggs with the minced meat – and you can cheerfully do without the 50/50 proportions of meat to pasta. And, while you’re at it, decrease the number of beaten eggs and full-fat grated cheese that go onto the mixture... and make up for this by pouring some milk onto the pasta before the dish goes into the oven.

Need you serve squash soup, just because it’s on the menu at a five-star hotel? Or bouillabaisse? Or borscht? Why not some broth (not consommé) with tiny pasta stars, as a nod to the season?

When it comes to picking a fowl – why not opt for the traditional capon? Remove the parson’s nose and the visible fat, and stuff with lean minced meat, garlic and parsley (adding rice or breadcrumbs only if you feel you must), rather than something else that has nothing to do with Maltese cuisine – chestnuts, sausage meat and apple, or... cornbread and oyster.

The vegetables you serve with this need not be exotic sweet potatoes puree or corn-on-the-cob or dried cranberries and shallot vinaigrette. Whatever happened to sliced potatoes, oven-roasted to perfection at the local bakery, and a mélange of peas and carrots and sticky onions sautéed to just this side of browning?

Why serve pitas or naan bread? Why wholemeal or pasty sliced white bread? Whatever happened to the Maltese ħobża, able to stand on its own – let alone as an accompaniment to our very own foods?

Here, of course, it is inevitable to suggest our national drink – but since not everyone likes the taste of bitter oranges, I would suggest squeezing copious amounts of Maltese oranges and lemons, semi-freezing the juice, and serving it in jugs to be diluted to one’s liking. Local wines are a must, however.

Afters ought not to be pecans or cranberry jelly; most people would find something they like from bowls brimming with roasted peanuts, cubed ġbejniet, bigilla, and ħelwa tat-Tork.

And you know that coffee with anisette tastes much better than when it is made with whiskey, brandy, or any type of liqueur.