Last weekend, we went to the first of our Halloween celebrations. For a family who had never celebrated Halloween until last year, we have been making up for lost time while here in Mexico. The Mexicans seem to really get into this holiday – I’m not sure if its an American influence or related to another upcoming celebration in Mexico (Day of the Dead) or a bit of both. This weekend’s party was with our expat group, which is largely made up of Americans, Canadians and some locals who speak English (they mostly have some American connection) and was a Trunk or Treat party. This is apparently the new trend in the States, where instead of dressing up and visiting neighbourhood homes to knock on doors and ask for lollies, everyone parks their cars in a car park and the kids visit the decorated boots (“trunks”) and collect their sugary loot.
We were game to join in the fun, despite being a little ambivalent about Halloween. If nothing else, it was a chance to get together with our expat friends, for the kids to dress up and to enjoy the Mexican version of an American hot dog – which, by the way, are surprisingly tasty – they are piled high with salad, chile and guacamole. Guerita had a last minute change of heart and opted for the tried and true fairy dress instead of Cinderella and Chiq tried out her new butterfly costume, which, if I do say so myself, looked pretty cute.
It was a nice evening and Guerita collected a ridiculous amount of lollies, which we are now rationing out. At the rate we are going she’ll still have some left by next Halloween, but at some point in the next week or so, she will start to forget about the bowl of treats at the top of the pantry and I will seize the opportunity to spirit them away and save them for her next birthday party!
As I’ve said before, the Halloween season is about the only time we see pumpkins in the shops, which is probably my favourite thing about this holiday. I bought these beauties today
and we had yummy roast pumpkin for dinner tonight. Sadly, I haven’t found anymore Butternuts, but there’s still a few days left…here’s hoping! OK, I’ll stop raving on about pumpkins now, or I’ll become known as “weird pumpkin girl”.
What a cute butterfly dress!
Mexicans aren’t big pumpkinks fans, we ate only the small green pumpkins (calabacitas), at least those big orange pumpkins have been introduced a few years ago, and only for halloween, but some people use those pumpkins to make pumpkin candy.
Ivelisse, I’ve never tried the little green ones, I will have to give them a go. The photo makes the pumpkins I bought look very big – they are actually the medium size ones. I haven’t bought any of the enormous ones as I’m not sure I’d be strong enough to cut them up! I think maybe they are just for carving and might not taste that good anyway.
[...] Cooking Classes, Coffee Mornings and parties for the various holidays throughout the year (like the Trunk or Treat), take collections for a few local charities we are involved in and have a meal and a gossip with [...]