Growing up my family didn’t have an Easter tradition. Instead, we either found ourselves in Mexico or the Caribbean or maybe even in Florida for Holy Week. When we didn’t have a Spring Break vacation planned, we drove to visit my father’s family 2 hours away and went out to dinner for a meal that was less than desirable. The kitchen staff obviously resented the fact that they had to work on a holiday and their dishes reflected this lack of enthusiasm. We did not pass an Easter meal tradition down through the generations like on Christmas or New Year’s Day.
This Easter I think back to a traditional Holy Week meal I did have the opportunity to enjoy twelve years ago while I was studying abroad in Cuenca, Ecuador – fanesca. Fanesca is consumed only on Good Friday with any leftovers being served the next day. Cuenca happens to be the center of this tradition as they are with most Ecuadorian traditions. Cuencans are more conservative in religion and thought than other parts of the country, and time-honored traditions tend to live on unadulterated. Plus, many of the ingredients are not found in other parts of Ecuador.
This was my first holiday away from home so the homesick emotions were running high. I was comforted by the fact that my host family carried on the Ecuadorian tradition of fanesca and allowed me to share in their local soul food custom. The base of any good fanesca is salted cod in milk. Added to the cod are 12 different grains to represent the 12 apostles. Not all families use the same grains so this is where recipes can vary slightly but a list of the typical inclusions is corn, lima beans, red kidney beans, white beans, green peas, lupini beans, lentils, peanuts, mellocos (a small Ecuadorian potato), and varieties of squashes, many not found outside of the region. The porridge is normally topped with a hardboiled egg; although, I am sure my family also had mote (boiled kernels of corn) available. The dish is void of any meat to keep from breaking strict Catholic rules of abstaining from meat during Lent. I remember the soup being very unique with no one particular flavor overpowering the other. The corn, beans, squash, and fish all played nicely together and created a simply delicious meal.
This was just one of many special memories I collected on my foreign exchange trip to Ecuador. I was an experience that I will never forget. I was blessed with a host family that accepted my as part of the family. I blended in with the seven children and countless grandchildren as if I was there from the very beginning. I hope that they stumble upon this blog on Facebook and know how intricate they were to making my trip special and how much I cherish the memories they helped to create. Feliz Pascua!
