I bought bread .....

I bought bread!!!

Tantawawa .... bread for a special occasionI

This week there have been 2 special days - Dia de Todos Santos (All Saints Day 1 Nov, a public holiday) and Dia de Los Difuntos (Day of the Dead - 2 Nov, also a public holiday, but not for everyone - apparently).

In the weeks leading up to these 2 significant days, unusual bread started to appear in the shops, but on 2 Nov, a local market, San Pedro Market was packed with this bread - along with other sweets, meringues, biscuits etc.
Not all market stalls were open for business but the entire central corridor of the market was filled with tables and all these breads - in different shapes and sizes.

Tantawawas are often shaped like baby dolls and may be decorated with baby faces or masks as well as sweets, coins or gifts.  Other shapes include horses or ladders - for transporting the souls of the dead from Mother Earth to the above.  Families traditionally visit cemeteries taking flowers and food on this day.

I just had to try it - so I bought a small one S/4 ..... it was hard, more like biscuit than bread.  In all, it looked better than it tasted.

Bread in Cusco - from Key2Cusco website  

I was interested in the meringues since Zac has asked for a pavlova while we are here. Not surprisingly, I can't find the instant pavlova 'eggs' that we have back home so back to basics.... use a recipe.  Best advice I have is that you need caster sugar and so far I haven't found that either.  Most of the sugar here is rather coarse grained raw sugar.  Some shops stock white sugar, and I have seen what appears to be icing sugar.  

Back to the meringues I bought (for a taste test) 4 for S/1 ...  they were grainy - I could taste the larger grains of sugar.  Looks like I have to keep searching for caster sugar!!!!