Chapter Twenty-Two: Cookies and Flan

Food. I am such a fan for it. Especially when it comes to desserts. I not only enjoy eating desserts but also making them as well. So when teachers at school switch off every Thursday to make a dessert to bring for lunch, I of course had to join in. Awhile back, it was my turn to bring the postre. I thought and thought and thought what to bring. Then I realized the perfect American dessert: chocolate chip cookies.

The process of making the cookies in Spain made me a little nervous. Not because I didn't know the recipe. Not at all. I still remember when I would help my mom crack the eggs to add to the rest of the dough. The recipe is basically ingrained into me. Rather I was nervous because I was not sure if the ingredients from Spain would have an odd effect on the cookies. After all, I was not using true Wisconsin butter from back home and Spaniards are not known to make cookies like we do. Though, there is no need to worry as the cookies turned out a success. Even the Spaniards loved them and begged for the recipe. Considering I used Nestle's recipe, I had no special ties to holding the recipe as a secret. Unfortunately, I have no photograph to use as proof that the cookies actually turned out well.

I do, however, have something even better. After I made and brought the cookies to school, there were exactly four left over. Two, I gave to my roommate who had not tried them yet. And the last two I gave to a student and his mother when I went to their English class later that afternoon. And again, the Spaniards that I taught loved them as well. I shared the recipe with them and we found ourselves discussing desserts, sweets, chocolates, basically anything with sugar. That is how we decided to make flan for the next week in class.

You already know that I am trying to cook more Spanish dishes so when the family offered to meet a little earlier to teach me how to make flan, I immediately said yes. Last Tuesday, the mother and her son and I met up in their kitchen and together we made the typical Spanish postre of flan.

The texture and flavor is quite unlike most things that you will probably have tried in America. The texture is similar to jello but not exact. It's a bit firmer. The flavor is mostly caramel but there's more to it that is hard to explain. If you're interested in the ingredients, it is quite easy. Just repeat after me: 3,2,1.

This is how the mother taught me. 3,2,1. Three eggs. Two cups of milk. One can of condensed milk. Along with, you need liquid caramel. The down side is that when you make this, you need a specific container to cook the flan in that I have never seen before in America. The up side is that I will most definitely be buying one before I leave so that I can make this dessert back at home!