Hi Everyone,

I am introducing this weeks Paula’s Picks with a bit of reflection and a history lesson:

From My Kitchen

By the time I went looking for dinner on my first evening in Cascais, Portugal, I’d crossed an ocean, spent two weeks babysitting a two-year-old in Paris and discovered that my mountain bike hadn’t survived the journey.

When I finally reached my tiny apartment in Cascais, I hauled my luggage upstairs and unpacked the bike I’d been so sure was a good idea to bring.

It was broken. I was exhausted. Repairs could wait. Dinner couldn’t.

I set off down an uneven cobblestone street with no idea where I was going. My chin was quivering and I was beginning to wonder what on earth I was doing there, I was tired and homesick.

Somewhere along those streets, I found my first plate of frango piri-piri, or piri-piri chicken. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. It was warm, a little spicy and exactly what I needed that night. As I licked the juices off my fingers, I thought I could love this almost as much as our family’s chicken curry.

Years later, listening back to my conversation with Lara Victoria, I learned that a version of the chicken I’d eaten in Portugal had found a home alongside curries in Goa, India. Who would have guessed? I certainly hadn’t. And now I wondered how it got there.

Part of the answer goes back to 1510, when Portuguese forces captured part of what is now Goa from the Sultanate of Bijapur. Goa had already been shaped by successive Indian kingdoms. Over the centuries that followed, Portuguese control expanded, and trade routes linked Goa to ports across the world. Chillies, cashews and tomatoes arrived from the Americas and found their way into everyday Goan cooking.

Recipes travelled too. The historian Fátima da Silva Gracias traces Goan chicken cafreal (Galinha à Cafreal) back to chicken piri-piri in Mozambique. The dish changed along the way, as cooks in Goa made it their own.

The trade that brought ingredients and recipes to Goa was part of a colonial empire. Those centuries were also marked by religious repression, conversion and migration. What surprised me was how recently Portuguese rule had ended.

In 1947, British rule ended and India and Pakistan became independent. My dad was about eight when his family was forced to move from India to Pakistan during Partition. I hadn’t realized that Goa would remain under Portuguese rule for another fourteen years.

I’d always thought about India through my dad’s story and Portugal through my own. Years later, learning about Goa, I realized those two places already shared a history. And when I thought back to my first night in Cascais, I remembered how good it felt to sit down to that plate of piri-piri chicken. It is a very different dish from our family’s chicken curry, but it gave me the same comfort. On a night when I was tired, hungry and far from home, it felt like a warm hug reaching across the ocean.

That’s one of the things I love about these podcast conversations. I can start with a meal I remember or a place I’ve visited, and someone else’s story can change what I see in it.

In this week’s Paula’s Picks, I’m returning to my conversation with Lara about Goa, its food and the deeply human act of making someone feel welcome.

Listen to Lara Exploring Goan Food, Culture and Susegad

At The Table with our Culture & Connection Club

We had a fabulous Sunday afternoon with Barbara-jo, making a couple of dishes out of her book. In the works for November is something from the islands of sunshine. More info to come.

If you would like to join us, you can become a member here - pause or cancel your membership at anytime.

The Story I’m Following

I am reading Maya Angelou’s Memoir “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”.

I am on page 35, and I have already put in sticky notes and underlined many sentences. Her writing is artistry, I don’t know how else to articulate my experience of reading her words. Here is one of my underlined sentences: “I heard their laughter crackling and popping like pine logs in a cooking stove.” I can’t wait to finish it, but at the same time I want to savour every morsel of every word.

p.s If you have read this book or other Maya Angelou books, I would be curious to know how you would describe her writing. You can just hit reply to this email to get in touch.