Advent Calendar: morcilla

Advent Calendar:

Dec 14
MORCILLA

As kids we would get chicks for Easter and every year they would meet premature ends. Either Baby Eddie would squeeze them too hard or they would fail to survive his six-story flight indoctrinations. (We would take turns going downstairs to recover the lucky ones or report on their demise.) But one year, one of them was a survivor. His name was Gillo. (He was named for someone's ex boyfriend, Lydia's I think, maybe Mom's.) How Puerto Rican we were, we had a rooster in our apartment.
But, lo. Came the time that Gillo had to be relocated and he was moved to Tia Celina's house where we visited him on our weekly jaunts. He grew proud and tall and we loved him. We loved him so much we ate him. But we only found out about it when the Old Man told us about it at the dinner table. We all started crying and there was a big hullabaloo: everyone screaming at us, us crying, Mom pissed at the Old Man for being such a goober. I swore off chicken for many years.
My other childhood food crisis happened at Christmas. I was probably 10 years old and eating morcilla . Uncle Al asked me if I knew what it was, which, of course, I didn't. To me, they were these crunchy little sausages that went so well with rice and pasteles. "They're blood", he said. "Uh, Uh" I shot back, incredulous that he could propose such a stupid thing about one of my favorite Christmas delicacies. Tio was a notorious kidder and rascal and I just knew he was pulling my leg. I looked for some assurance from my Mom and she gave it to me. She assured me that "They are blood. Pig blood." I swore off morcilla that year. But it didn't last long. PR morcilla isn't like that wimpy Spanish morcilla or wussy-assed Boudain or, for that matter, like anything else that advertises itself as blood sausage. None of them compare to morcilla , This shit is real. It's part of the old country tradition of butchering the pig and saving the blood to make the sausage. And, like the pasteles, the morcilla has to be right and it's best if it comes from PR. Back when travel wasn't quite so restrictive, that would be one of the items someone returning from PR would bring you. Now, if I'm going to Tampa, I make it a point to have a cooler with me. (Janet jokes that I must have a trillion coolers at home since I end up buying one every time I visit.) It's like dope when I get back. If I'm lucky, I've scored some alcapurrias and pasteles , but If I'm really lucky I have me some morcilla and I don't have to share when I tell folks what it is, a sausage membrane clot of pig blood and rice.