Wednesday, 26 October 2011 18:20
Peanuts the Cuban way. Photo courtesy of Cubadebate.
There's no Cuban who does not appreciate peanuts, because for a very long time they have been part of our diet.
It's very common to walk the streets of Havana and find yourself with vendors of peanut filled paper cones, peanuts which get roasted homemade style, with their salty ending and which are liked so much by the young, the old and also children, so we all make a cult out of it. You can get them also in a sweetened version, even sugar-coated, as a bar or simply as grain.
At bus stops, parks, hospitals, scholastic institutions, cinemas, theaters and even at funeral parlors and cemetaries you can find a Cuban who invites you to buy one of these famous paper cones or - remembering the unforgettable Rita Montaner - peanut "cucurruchos" which have inspired one of the greatest and most interpreted songs by the popular Cuban singer: "El Manicero".
Not a single cafe of the city can do without those appetizing peanuts, anything can be missed except the processed peanuts.
Their easy preparation as well as the familiar and exquisite taste converts us into an accomplice of peanuts, appreciating their good company in every day life, where the vendors of peanuts form an essential part of the landscape of the Havanan seafront and in the morning leave traces of their delicious load on the sidewalks.
A Cuban can promise many things, but he cannot promise to stop eating peanuts of any kind. They are our close friends which will never be unknown to us, so we will end refering to the last sentence of the song "El Manicero", interpreted by the unforgettable "Bola de nieve" who with his characteristic and contagious laugh repeated: "Si te quieres por el pico divertir, cómprame un cucuruchito de maní" ("if you would like to entertain your mouth, buy me a paper cone of peanuts").
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