In Mexico they have a wonderful holiday tradition called Posada, which commemorates the journey that Mary and Joseph took to Bethlehem where Jesus was born. Each home in a neighborhood will have a Nativity or manger scene in their house. The local church will choose three homes to represent innkeepers in Bethlehem and four teen-aged children in the parish are given the honor to represent Mary and Joseph. These children will carry small statues of Joseph leading a donkey upon which Mary is riding side-saddle. On the chosen night, usually during novena or nine days before the 24th, a candle-lit procession consisting of adults and children called Peregrinos, lead by a person carrying a small paper lantern called a farlito, will wind through the neighborhood visiting each of the three houses in turn. The teens carrying the statues and the participants in the procession visit each house singing a simple chant each time, but it is only the third house that takes Mary and Joseph in. At this point all of the peregrinos enter the house and kneel before the crèche to pray the Rosary. The Rosary is a traditional Catholic prayer cycle said at important times during the religious year. Traditional Christmas hymns are also sung including in particular, O Holy Night. Once the Rosary is said, and songs sung, it is time for the children amongst the peregrinos to celebrate Jesus’ birth with a joyful party, which includes food, more music and a piñata.

I’ve always loved the story of Joseph and Mary’s great journey and over the years I’ve seen it as a metaphor for many things in my life. When things have been dark I’ve remembered the posada and its example of just how far determination and faith can move a person in this world. It’s certainly gotten me a long way, that’s for sure. And at the risk of spinning a silly, inappropriately parallel comparison, I sometimes see myself as being a tiny bit like that sole innkeeper who gave shelter to a desperate, fearful couple in the middle of the night two thousand years ago. That innkeeper is the hero in the Greatest Hospitality Story Ever Told. If we in this industry knew that person’s name, it would over-shadow every famous name in our business like the moon eclipsing the sun.

The story of Jesus’ birth resonates for all people around the globe, and I have always particularly liked the innkeeper part, because in my small way, I have at times been in that guy’s position. And I like to think that like him, I have made the right decisions and helped make someone’s life a little easier, a little brighter and maybe even, memorable. Of course – in that old innkeeper’s case – he done good. Really, really good. However, the one thing I’ve never liked about the story of the innkeeper is how the Bible says he took pity upon Mary and Joseph. Now I’m no theologian and I hesitate to contradict biblical teaching, but I know a thing or two about hospitality management and I prefer to think that that innkeeper of Bethlehem wasn’t giving them shelter out of pity, but out of a hospitality veteran’s deep sense of duty to help customers in need. Call me crazy, call me a heretic, call me just plain dumb, but I feel I can spot a finesse move by a hospitality professional a mile away and that innkeeper made a move that shrinks all the moves Michael Jordan ever made to a point smaller than the period at the end of this ridiculously, over-blown literary allusion.

Something else I’ve always wondered about the night Jesus was born was if Mary or Joseph had anything to eat or drink while awaiting their Son’s birth. Surely, the innkeeper would have offered them something, however meager it may have been. I like to imagine, since they were in the Middle East, that they might have kept the food light with some nice pita with baba ganoush. And I imagine a little more and in keeping with traditional fare served during the time of Posada in Mexico, maybe Joseph and Mary wolfed down a tamale. Then again, probably not. Sometimes I imagine too far and Mary was after all, in labor and not into eating anything. And as all fathers know, a woman in labor is a force of nature not to be trifled with, so it’s very likely that Joseph didn’t eat either. Anyway, regardless of my over heated imaginings, in celebration of the season, here are two recipes I’ve picked up along the way traveling through life on my own personal posada, Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas….

Baba Ganoush

Baba Ganoush

2 medium eggplants, about 1-1/2 pounds total
1/4 cup fresh-squeezed lemon juice
1/4 cup tahini
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
3 Tablespoons olive oil
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
3 olives for garnish
Warmed chunks of pita bread for serving

Preheat oven to 450° F.  Prick eggplants with a fork. Arrange on non-stick cooking sheet and bake until tender and collapsed, 30 to 40 minutes. Allow to cool for 10 minutes. Cut each eggplant in half lengthwise and scoop out the flesh. Place flesh in a food processor with a metal blade and process until smooth. If you prefer to mash by hand, use a fork or potato masher.  Add lemon juice, tahini, garlic and salt and pepper to taste and process (or mash) until well blended. Slowly add 3 tablespoons olive oil until mixture is creamy.  Chill for at least two hours.  Serve in a shallow bowl. Drizzle olive oil over top, sprinkle with parsley and garnish with olives.

Tamale

Jesus’ (really) 60 Minute Chicken Tamales

Ingredients

6 cups Maseca Corn Masa mix for tamales
6 cups Chicken broth
1 cup corn or other vegetable oil (corn will enhance the flavor)
2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 large rotisserie chicken
2 1/2 12 oz jars green tomatillo sauce
1 bag corn husks

Instructions

Soak the corn husks in warm water until soft.

Using an electric mixer, blend the masa flour (Maseca for Tamales), corn oil, salt, baking powder and the chicken broth to obtain a consistent mixture.

Shred the chicken and marinate in the green salsa or tomatillo sauce.

Spread masa evenly over corn husks, and spread a spoonful of marinated chicken on top of the masa.

Fold the sides of the corn husk to center over the masa so that they overlap to make along package.Fold the empty part of the husk under so that it rest against the side of the tamale with a seam.

Place the tamales in a steamer and cook tamales for 35-40 minutes. Check every 20 minutes.The tamale is cooked when it separates easily from the corn husk

Chef Tom Hoover in Japan as a young child

Thanksgiving is celebrated in two ways. The family gathers together and the family eats…and eats…then sleeps a little…then eats some more. Most folks will include the usual suspects in the Thanksgiving feasting – turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, and dressing. From this point each individual family plugs in the family favorites, which could be anything from yams and marshmallows to venison salami . My family is no different. Although, I will say our Thanksgiving table can get a little more eclectic than most. My father was a career military man having served nearly 30 years as an intelligence officer in the Army. Hence we lived all over the world spending the bulk of our time in Japan and South Korea. Along the way my mother and sisters picked up an array of recipes and techniques which they folded into their repertoire of cooking. This repertoire was already bulging with cooking knowledge that included a heavy amount of down home Hoosier cooking from Indiana, some staples of Pennsylvania Dutch cuisine and a smattering of Amish and Mennonite recipes from the northern Indiana Michiana country which includes the area around Goshen, Sterling and Elkhart where my dad and his parents lived. Also, my father had a passing knowledge of Tex-Mex cooking from his teen-aged years living in Deming, New Mexico during the depression. It was here that he learned crazy good pie making skills from my great-aunts who were legendary bakers in those parts. My dad’s mom was also a great baker and was a key to their survival during the Depression. My grandma would do odd-jobs for sugar and flour to make cookies that my dad and his brother could sell door to door or on the train platforms to make enough money to buy food to feed the family. The sweets were never kept for the house, but were sold to survive. Even so, my father’s family had to split up in order to ease the financial burden and insure their future together. My father was sent from Indiana to live with family in New Mexico for a few years, eventually re-uniting but not until after my father had learned a few things about making pies from his aunties and hunting javelinas and rabbits from his uncle.

It was my mother, though, who actually used this amalgamation of recipes and skills on a daily basis. The main way she took care of her family was by preparing meals. My mother was truly one of the first practitioners of fusion cuisine, and wherever we were she always managed to meld local cuisine with our American favorites. I remember things like Turkey Sukiyaki, Chili with Nori crumbled in it, and Korean Chop Chae made with home made Amish egg noodles instead of traditional Korean cellophane noodles. My mother had a bit of the French in her as well, having the habit of finishing nearly every dish with a dollop of butter. To this day, if I eat Campbell’s chicken noodle soup it just doesn’t taste right without a little butter.

As the years went on and my mother fell gravely ill, it was my sisters who picked up the culinary mantle in the household. As my father’s career wound down and we spent more time stateside my sisters picked up Italian recipes from our time being stationed in Baltimore in the heart of that great city’s Italian neighborhood. Then we spent time in Aberdeen, Maryland on the coast of Chesapeake Bay and my sisters learned about cooking crab, frying oysters and all manner of fish. Our last stop was Fort Bragg, North Carolina where we had grits nearly every meal even though my dad hated it. We all loved it, along with the tart, vinegary BBQ that is unique to that part of the country.

When my father retired he took us all back to Indiana where his roots were as well as my mother’s, and with us came all of those wonderful recipes that had been gathered along the way. Recipes that are now usually reserved for when our far-flung family gathers together to re-connect and find comfort and joy in each other’s company. Our Holiday table does indeed tell the tale of our family’s history, for along with the turkey and trimmings you are liable to see a lasagna made the way my mother’s friends did back in the Dundalk section of Balmer. You will see pickled beets and eggs.

Pickled Beetds and Eggs

You will see home-made chicken and noodles my step-mom makes from a recipe held in the family for nearly a hundred years. There will be Chesapeake oyster dressing. There will be sweet corn casserole from my Grandma Hoover’s recipe box that she put together over the course of her lifetime starting when she was a little girl in Pennsylvania Dutch country. And maybe, if he’s in the mood, my father will make an apple pie from scratch with no recipe and he will carve a picture of an apple in the top crust to let you know what deliciousness awaits inside. And always, always there will be the one dish my mother and sister made for me constantly when I was little because I loved it so, and now all these years later my daughter and her cousins all clamor for it too. It’s an incredibly simple, but fantastically satisfying comfort food recipe from Japan called Yakemeshi, and it’s the Japanese take on fried rice. Although we in our family are crazy about noodles and we love our chicken and noodles; it is this simple rice dish that must be served at some point in time when we are all together. This one dish, with its very short list of ingredients, its ease of execution and mysterious power to always leave you wanting more even when its gone, is a symbol of how we are when we gather together. We are all very different, and we don’t share each other’s views on many things, and yet, when we are together we cherish our short time with each other and when we have to part and go our separate ways, we always want a little bit more and look forward to the next time when we gather together at the table to revel in each other’s company and bask in our shared history.

Chef Hoover’s recipe for Yakemeshi

Serves 6-8

1/4 cup Light Vegetable Oil (Safflower is good)

5 cups Cooked Rice

2 cups hamburger

1/2 cup Diced Onion

1/2 cup Diced Celery

1/4 cup Diced carrots

1 teaspoon Minced Garlic

2 Well-Beaten Eggs

1tablespoon Soy Sauce