Vientos de la Habana

I've been watching Four Seasons in Havana on Netflix. Very high production values and good sound quality. I love to read and watch thrillers and crime fiction. Maybe it's my many years of the solitary life of reading court records and writing legal opinions, many of them criminal. I am loving Four Seasons in Havana, although I suspect they use the same visual clichés I always see in films about New Orleans - the presumption that everyone is always sweating and hot all the time - not true you snow-bound directors! Another interesting visual is the contrast between the decaying structures where everyone lives and the immaculate groomed tourism areas. The protagonist is the clichéd divorced alcoholic policeman who does a great job of solving cases while he rebelliously doesn't obey the rules - a guy who in real life in any type of organization would have been out the door before anyone got the chance to be impressed with his "skills". But actor Jorge Perugorria does a great job of pulling it off without making it look clichéd. I don't speak Spanish, but the English subtitles really work with the nuanced performances of all of the older actors, especially Enrique Molina who pays Major Rangle. The pervasive attitude of paranoia among the civilians - as if they could arbitrarily disappear at any time for no reason added another dimension into this very different world. The struggle for food emphasizes the plight of the majority of people in this society.

By episode 2, I had a craving for Coffee Cubano. Here is how I made mine this morning. Brewed pour-over DARK ROAST coffee with chicory. Warmed 1/2 c milk at heat level 2 out of 10 per serving in another pot. In a third saucepan or pot, put 1 Tablespoon of real refined sugar for each serving, spread thinly across entire bottom of pot. Put the pot on an electric stove at heat level 5 out of 10, watching all the time. Sugar melts to a liquid and then gets caramel colored. Remove sugar from heat and quickly add hot milk to sugar. Watch it foam up. Quickly stir in any caramelized sugar stuck to the side of the pot. Immediately pour hot milk and hot coffee together in glass in 50/50 proportions. Put liquid soap in hot sugar pot and clean immediately with hot water or you will have a permanently dedicated pot!