Suman and Hallow's Eve

Tomorrow night, A. and I will celebrate our first Hallow's Eve. We have candies for the kids who will come Trick or Treating and a scary contraption we have christened as the "Fag Hag", with no disrespect meant to our gay friends.

The Fag Hag

Halloween is such a foreign concept for us, having  celebrated only the All Souls and All Saints Christian holidays for most of our lives. We both grew up visiting the graves  of long dead relatives every November 1 bringing flowers, candles and food offerings that the souls of the dead can partake of as they travel to the underworld.  The food offerings are commonly made of grains and yams cooked into sweet sticky concoctions... champorado, bico, suman and ube. A small part of what was cooked would be put in small containers and left on the tombstones of our loved ones.

Though I no longer practice this tradition and have been converted into celebrating Halloween (as the fag hag floating on our gate can attest to) I still miss having sticky food during this Filipino holiday. And so tonight as we prepare the candies to give out tomorrow night, I am thinking of the most recent  sticky treat I had the chance to eat... Rosalie's Buko Pinipig suman.

Wrapped in fresh banana leaves, each green roll of rice smells like tradition.

There is no need to coat each small log of rice with sugar. The sweetness is blended in as well as the toasted pinipig and coconut bits.

Biting into it brings back good memories of the All Souls Days of my childhood... innocent laughter amidst the darkness and graves of those who have lived their lives.