This will be the second Easter here in Thailand. Last year of course we had just arrived, and with settling in and organizing, Easter sort of came and went un-noticed. Being this is a primarily Buddhist country, Easter is not something you see or hear much, if anything about. Back in Canada it was always a guaranteed 4 days off of work, with Good Friday and Easter Monday. Here it is just another day. The Australians this year have it pretty good, they get the Friday and Monday PLUS Tuesday for ANZAC day, so if you play it right you can actually end up with 10 days off work for taking three days of holidays. I look at Facebook and see the postings about chocolate, eggs, ham and turkey dinners and the one that irritated me the most HOT CROSS buns.
Hot Cross buns are a sweet dough bun, that is typically found only at Easter time and is toasted for breakfast on Good Friday. For all of my life, as I can remember,, this was breakfast on Good Friday, with the exception of twice. One time I was doing work in Southern Sudan, Africa and they did celebrate Easter, albeit in the traditional sense, getting dressed up nice and going to church. No Easter bunnies, or chocolate and certainly no hot cross buns. I knew I would be there over Easter and so i took a few bags of some of the Easter candy eggs, which I passed out as a treat to one of my classes of senior government officials, who recoiled at the sugar and sweetness and less than natural, day-glow, reds, oranges and purples. And last year no Easter goodies or hot cross buns as Easter had simply come and gone before we knew it. Locally there are a few expat establishments that will have a Easter brunch and two even with Easter Egg hunts and candy for the kids, at friendship beach and at Ao Chalong Yacht Club.
Having settled now, we are beginning to look for some of the traditional celebrations and events that formed part of our life prior to Thailand. And in some way paying respect or token remembrance. So this year, my hunt was on for the Good Friday Hot Cross Buns. This was triggered by my friend barb, posting on facebook how she had had her first hot cross buns, weeks before Easter, and gloating in a non-malicious way about how good they were. So I posted to my facebook that any people in Phuket who knew where you could get them, please let me know. Unfortunately no one on Phuket responded, although the North Americans (well, Canadians, as Americans do not see to share the same reverence for hot cross buns) responded in droves. Telling me how many they had eaten; how good they were; telling me to bake them myself and some even offering family recipes. All kind, but not helpful to my actually getting some. I then made the unfortunate choice of sharing the comments with Clive.
A little background here. In Canada I spent a lot of time in the kitchen. cooking has always been a passion of mine, and I loved baking. When we moved here, everything we had in the kitchen went to donations, give-a-ways or was sold. Clive was concerned about my sudden leaving the kitchen that had everything you could want in a kitchen, to one that had a can opener, spatula and a wok. And so he had researched and found this wonderful 4 in 1 oven. It microwaves, convection, steam high and low, all in a unit about the size of a large microwave oven. It can do everything that my previous range and microwave could plus some. I have however gotten away from baking, mostly because things like flour have a very low shelf life and most things you would bake with contain no preservatives, so they are susceptible to getting bugs or attracting them very quickly. My other excuse has been the heat here, makes it unbearable to be baking anything, that will be heating up a kitchen that is already warm. The water to the kitchen sink is cold water only, but with the heat here, during the day you get hot water from the heating of the water pipes.
So now with the feedback, he joined the chorus to say that I had this fancy do everything oven now, so why did I not bake my own buns? I even had a helpful comment from Canada regarding cooking in the heat. Tilly who has been here and seen the wonder oven, knows it is very portable and suggested I simply place it outside and bake. This is quite feasible and I do see a baker and a pizza maker who have the huge industrial ovens in their front yards baking.
On Good Friday we decided to ride up island to see our friends and stopped at the large shopping mall, Central festival. As we drove past a local place called the Delish cafe, we saw on their sandwich board on the roadside a sign that read "Fresh Baked Hot X Buns". Less than 1KM from the house after 2 days of driving around 30 KM to try and find them at a larger European/Western styled stores. Rather than stop, Clive felt that to buy them and leave them in our carry boxes on the bikes, it would be too hot and they would probably dry out before we got back home. So we continued on to Central Festival, and found some chocolate shops that actually had Easter bunnies and eggs. About the same prices as a high end chocolate shop in Canada, but they did have them. We tried other shops and store, in our search of the more shops that may have the elusive buns, and alas the availability of said buns and chocolate eggs, with M&M's or other such miniature fillings are not to be found. I recalled the aisles and aisles of everything in chocolate you could imagine for Easter back in Canada, but the best we could find here were the left over chocolate tins from Christmas and Valentines Day. So we secured our chocolate for Blaze and headed north for a nice lunch at Legend Music recording studios with our friends. Blaze was delighted to have chocolate eggs, and his mother was mortified to realize she had forgotten all about the whole Easter candy part of Easter, so she would obviously have to make a quick trip to Central Festival herself, thanks to our delivery sparking Blaze's recollection of the Easter Bunny, and no doubt expecting the arrival of chocolate on Sunday morning.
On our way back home, we stopped at the Delish cafe and they had 4 hot cross buns left, which we quickly bought. So instead of the buns for Good Friday, this year they were had on Saturday.Clive knows my weakness for chocolate and he went to his computer clinic on Sunday, expecting to bring me some Easter chocolate, only to find that whatever had been on the shelves on Friday was not sold out. So we will instead have a chocolate bar, and I can pretend it is the bunny as I try to decide to eat the feet or eats first. So we have some semblance of customary Easter rituals, just with some adjustments. And yes, I will venture forward on baking my own hot cross buns. Who knows, next year I may bake a whole batch and drive around in Thunderbird 3 selling door to door like in the olden time shouting, "One a Penny Two A Penny, Hot Cross Buns!"
For more information on Hot Cross buns you may wish to go here:http://historicalfoods.com/the-history-of-the-hot-cross-bun
For more information on the history of Easter Eggs and the Easter Bunny you may wish to go here:http://wilstar.com/holidays/easter.htm
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