Kazakh cuisine caem from their nomadic origins – strong on horse, dried meats and soured milk. The most popular (equine) dish, ‘five fingers’, is so called because that’s how it’s eaten – your size of portion traditionally equating to your status as a guest. In Xinjiang, the food reflects the Islamic majority of the population – particularly the ‘Eastern Turks’, or Uyghurs – and is thus halal; signature stuff includes kebab and roast mutton, roast fish and rice, but also stretches to camel. Uttar Pradesh also peddles kebabs and mutton, but is most famous for many of more locally-familiar snacks and meals – pakora, samosa and biryani.

This future

Please keep Friday 9 March free for a special Latitudinal event at Alex and Sinead’s. To celebrate International Women’s Day and Sinead’s launch of the Sky High Challenge on Facebook, Sinead will be hosting a dinner focusing on food from developing countries where women and girls are oppressed with the aim to build awareness. Bring a dish, a story, and a small donation which will go direct to a women’s organisation.

More details next week but mark it in your diary! Men, women and children welcome.

Sinead
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Massive apologies for this only being the 1st official mailer of the year; work has been overwhelmingly busy. Any of you on Facebook, we post info on our events on our group page (https://www.facebook.com/groups/latitudinalcuisine/) when we haven’t had time to write these mailers.

The year’s been good with gorgeous events in London, Lisbon – & even Maputo!

We feasted late into the night at Kasia & Davor’s and luxuriated amidst chinoiserie at Ed’s for Chinese/Lunar/Spring Festival New Year.

Last week we continued what’s fast becoming a Valentine’s tradition as we feasted on aphrodisiacs and foods of love at Kat & Geoff’s.

This week

We have decided to leave Latitudinal dinners for the rest of the year.

Thanks to everyone for their feedback, suggestions and warm thoughts on where to journey next.

This week

Join us on in Shoreditch on Friday 2nd December to celebrate the birthdays of a cluster of Saggitarean Latitudinals – Alex, Sinead, Stefan and Emma.

The theme is Masked Beasts: think fur & feathers and fleshy protuberances; wings & tails & hooves & horns & grotesque creatures of the night – all masked, of course

There’ll be DJs (including the great Conrad Ollende and the brilliant Paula Coughlan) & dancing and monstrous debauchery.

No entry without a mask and a beastly body part (it’s easier than cooking;))

RSVPs essential for door entry guestlist: http://maskedbeasts.eventbrite.co.uk

Our Last Supper of 2011

Nothing.

We stayed at home, or in our hood, or to ourselves, or something like that; in other words, we had no Latitude  : (

Nadia had to cancel; no one RSVPed. This was not only weird but a huge shame- especially if you’re lucky enough to be familiar with Nadia’s cooking.

This week

We have left the coast of south American and head into our most challenging week – bang in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

But, ahoy! Land ahead! Come sail with us to the Portuguese Azores, the Repulic of Cape Verde – or Reykjavik in Iceland, the world’s northenmost capital.

The Archipelago of the Azores is composed of nine volcanic islands situated in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean, and is located about 1,500 km (930 mi) west from Lisbon. Traditional cuisine of these islands include Alcatra, beef marinated in red wine and garlic and then roasted, a tradition of Terceira Island in the archipelago. The islands also feature a type of cheese made with cow’s milk with a spicy taste (Queijo de São Jorge. Jewish influence may have been a determining factor in some other practices in food preparation and eating habits. Different kinds of unleavened bread and cakes, such as the arrufadas de Coimbra, are baked throughout Continental Portugal and the Azores. In the islands, meat is often repeatedly rinsed in water to clean it of any trace of blood.

The Cape Verde diet is mostly based on fish and staple foods like corn and rice. Fruits such as banana and papayas are available year-round, while others like mangos and avocados are seasonal. A popular dish served in Cape Verde is Cachupa, a slow cooked stew of corn (hominy), beans, and fish or meat.

And Reykjavik citizens are known for their love of the drink.

So come join us this Saturday and raise a glass to our Icelandic friends.

We pondered the presence of absence and the long-lost Lord Lucan. Alicia had raised the bar and asked guests to cook a meal of disappearance – and make vanishing edible, dishing the invisible. Tricky.

Stefan – like Lucan – stashed nannies in sacks – lovely filo parcels, lashed with lucanism and scattered with speech bubbles of each nanny’s protestation

and Alicia served a stealth borscht – beetroot indetectable – and the most glorious pork known to human, slathered in a thick sweet sauce made from Korean blue cheese – a kind of fermented tofu – all served with noodles stewed in invisible green onions.

Alex and Alicia’s pics are here.

This week

Amazonia, Bossa Nova, Carnivale, caipirinhas, capoeira, favelas, feijoada, Lula, nuts, Portuguese, rodizio, Ronaldo, Samba, shaving, soyfields -

what does the word and country bring to mind for you?

We merged our destination with our hostess – argentina with itaian – with a luscious mound of geo-fusion.

Piers, sartorially immmaculate, carved mouthwatering chunks of ribeye, scattered with parsely and sundrieds; Tina baked cannelloni – with crepes! – splashed with chimichurri.

Veggies baked on bed of polenta aside a salad peppered with spiced parsley-provoleta parcels, and the table abounded with fine gnocchi and pasta, and paradise.

We wrapped with panettone (chocolate!) and a mango and raspberry pudding as lilia served her magic coffee, sweetened with lovingly-stirred cremina.

Alex’s pics are here.

This week

We dressed for dinner in skull makeup and scary clothes; the table was dressed as an altar to the dead; we feasted on Uruguryan Torta Pascualina and Mexican bean tacos to start.

Alex and Anthony had a fish-off comparing their Brazilian Moqueca de Peixes. Alex went for salmon, Anthony a more longitudinal correct white fish. Both were fantastic. Plantians and Candy Pumpkin from Lucy and Baz finished us off.

Dessert was a weirdly spooky banana cake from Jen and Imogen’s grandmother’s ginger wine trifle, bang on the longitude line as we travelled through the British owned Falkland islands.

Alex’s pics are here.

This week