In Marcel Proust’s book \u201cIn Search of Lost Time,\u201d he waxes poetically about how madeleines, dipped in his cup of tisane<\/em> (herbal tea), reminded him of his childhood, when his aunt L\u00e9onie used to give him a bite of her madeleine every Sunday morning. It\u2019s a reference which has now made its way into modern French culture as the expression, \u201cWhat is your madeleine de Proust?\u201d\u2014or in other words, which food reminds you of your childhood? <\/p>Behind the Bite: Madeleine (Devour Paris)<\/a><\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Being the curious foodies we are, we couldn’t resist the urge to round up some of the most beloved childhood bites and foodie memories from across the Devour Tours team. Here are some of our own madeleines de Proust (along with recipes in some cases if you’re looking to try something new in the kitchen!).<\/p>\n\n\n When I think of home, I think of my grandma’s baked macaroni and cheese. My grandpa worked for the Prince pasta factory, which has since closed, in Massachusetts. He would bring home dented boxes of pasta that he got at a massive discount or for free. When I went to their house for lunch, my grandma would make her mac and cheese. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Other people in the family caught wind of this and started showing up too, proving that food does bring people together. She used simple ingredients and always served it with hot dogs on the side, which I think she did especially for me. She always made it in the same deep white casserole dish but the best part was the topping: broken up Ritz crackers dotted with butter browned by the heat from the broiler turned on just for the last few minutes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Caitlin online @prntjunky<\/a><\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It may seem silly, but my favorite food memory is Chex Mix! It’s a type of savory, crunchy, salty snack mix made up of cereal and pretzels, and sometimes nuts and chocolate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Whenever I go home to visit my parents, the first thing my dad does when we get in the car at the airport is hand over the freshly made Chex Mix. All my life we’ve been making it, whether it’s for the holidays, a rainy day, a party at school, or for a movie night in. The recipe has changed over the years, as we’ve tinkered with different ingredients and measurements to get it just right. What’s funny is that my brother and I like our Chex Mixes different, so my parents always have to make two batches, one for each of us. <\/p>\n\n\n\n On Thanksgiving Day I’m always full off of Chex Mix before the meal even begins, and Christmas morning to me always smelled of Chex Mix baking in the oven. As most of the ingredients are difficult or impossible to find here in Europe, I’ve tried my best to adapt the recipe each year to make my own, but it’s just not the same. While my brother and I rarely get to spend holidays together anymore, he always teases me by sending me pictures of his Chex Mix every year. My parents are coming to visit in a few weeks, and while I can’t wait to see them, the first thing I’m going to ask them when they get here is, “Did you bring the Chex Mix?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ingredients:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Instructions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Courtney online @corkybrink<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s so simple, but my favorite food memory is sitting in our kitchen as a child with my mother preparing food beside me. And serving me a plate of pork schnitzel with mashed potatoes (DOLLOPS of butter) and peas. Perfect! <\/p>\n\n\n\n Find James online @jamesblickspain<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n N\u00e9grillon<\/em> is a chocolate, mousse-like warm cake that has been passed from generation to generation in my French family. What makes it special is that it’s a big, spongy chocolate cake, with a moussey texture in the middle. It is served warm, and it has more butter than chocolate in the recipe\u2014that’s how French people would serve it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ingredients for one cake:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Instructions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Claudia online @claudiaordinascuisine<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n From a very young age I was a food lover and admittedly a bit too preoccupied with when and what my next meal would be. Once, on a long car trip through Texas, I was questioned about why the clouds moved and responded, without skipping a beat, that they were looking for food! <\/p>\n\n\n\n My favorite food memory doesn’t involve one particular dish, but how much I absolutely loved eating as a kid. To this day my family still talks about Thanksgiving 1987. That November, I was just shy of 3 years old and beginning to walk and talk with confidence. I started exploring the living room before the whole family sat down to eat and when I got to the dining room, I put my tiny hands up on the table’s edge and peered at the endless spread in front of me, exclaiming, “Oh boy! Too much food!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n To this day, no Thanksgiving meal passes without the whole family joining in the joyous exclamation: “Oh boy! Too much food!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Hayley online @hayleycomments<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Even though my parents have been divorced my whole life, both of them observed the tradition of making weekend pancakes when I was a child. Since I am and always have been a late sleeper, on Saturday mornings I would wake up to the smell of pancakes cooking in the kitchen. Without a doubt, there were always bananas, chocolate chips and a whole lot of Vermont maple syrup (the real stuff, no Aunt Jemima in our homes). <\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Rachel online @rackle31<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n My granddad (my mom’s dad) was famous in my family for making just two things: martinis and cinnamon toast. Sadly, he passed before I ever got to try one of his martinis, but as a child one of my favorite treats was his cinnamon toast. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When we visited him, my sister and I would wait excitedly each morning at the table while he prepared something that was so simple but that made us feel so special. It’s remained one of my favorite memories of him all these years later. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Start with sliced white bread. Smear one side evenly with soft butter. Shake a sugar\/cinnamon mix on top\u2014as thin or thick as you like! Set the bread on a tray under the broiler and wait for about a minute. It’s about as fast and easy as a recipe can be! <\/p>\n\n\n\n My favorite food memories revolve around my grandparents’ dining room table. Made of solid mahogany, it was a far cry from the IKEA table I own today. It officially sat eight people when extended, but somehow it always squeezed in just enough chairs for aunts, uncles, and cousins to dine together. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It was at this table where I fell in love with food. I recognized early on that food brought us together, stimulated conversation and made people laugh. I realized that as long as there was food on the table, we’d be together as a family. <\/p>\n\n\n\n And my family took food seriously. We started the meal with a huge Italian antipasti: marinated olives, sun-dried tomatoes, soppressata<\/em> sausage, fresh mozzarella cheese…all of the delicacies from the motherland. As Italian-Americans, maintaining these food traditions was our duty. <\/p>\n\n\n\n After the antipasti, we had soup. My grandma made tiny meatballs in a chicken broth. She called it Italian wedding soup. Next up was my favorite course, pasta! We’d each get three enormous ravioli stuffed with fresh ricotta cheese and smothered in my grandma’s homemade sauce. If I was lucky, I’d sneak an extra once everyone was served. <\/p>\n\n\n\n By the time the meat course came along, I was often bored (and full) and would run off with my siblings and cousins to play. My grandma’s basement was a treasure trove of nicknacks, and the perfect place to get into mischief. But before we could cause too much trouble, we were called upstairs for dessert. <\/p>\n\n\n\n First up: fruit and nuts. My grandfather would roast chestnuts and we’d get to use the pretty silver nutcrackers to crack open hazelnuts, almonds, and walnuts. I always took a bite or two of my grandfather’s pear, too. Then we had Italian pastries with impossible names to pronounce (try saying sfogliatelle<\/em>)! And lastly, because we were Italian-American, after all, we had the American cakes and pies\u2014my mom’s famous carrot cake, my aunt’s store-bought coconut cream pie, and sometimes even a jello mold. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I would give anything to have one more meal with my family at this table. And since that’s not possible, I take my responsibility to carry on these traditions seriously. It may be over an IKEA table, but my kids will learn the joys of food and family. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Lauren online at spanishsabores.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Growing up, family time at home always involved baking cookies of some kind. Especially during the holiday season, my parents always made sure the pantry was stocked with a variety of desserts and that we kids (I’m the oldest of five!) got involved. My mom would make the intricately decorated gingerbread house with piped snow, icicles and hard candy windows to show off the flickering lights. But my dad, who is known for two desserts\u2014his cheesecake and sugar cookies\u2014would take over the cookie baking and decorating with all of the kids. <\/p>\n\n\n\n We used a very simple recipe for sugar cookies, took ages picking out the different Christmas cookie cutters we wanted to use that year, and then got on to the fun part of decorating. Using five different icing colors, we covered all of the cookies with royal icing while also managing to get half of it in our mouths. We’d walk around the house for the rest of the day with bright green, pink or yellow tongues, and then jealously hoard our creations for the next week. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ingredients:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Instructions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Abbie online at lavitaroma.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n When I was a kid, I would make Anzac biscuits every year with my mum. These cookies are an Australian institution, on par with Vegemite on toast or killer spiders under your bed. But Anzacs aren’t some sort of unique Australian ingredient\u2014they’re people! <\/p>\n\n\n\n During the first World War, simple cookies of rolled oats, golden syrup (a type of amber-colored sugar syrup), butter, flour and coconut were made by Australian families to send to the troops abroad. Australian and New Zealander soldiers were referred to by their unit name, and called “ANZACs”\u2014and so the biscuits were born! <\/p>\n\n\n\n But the problem my mum and I had was that we only made these cookies once a year. We didn’t have a written recipe, so we’d spend half our time trying to remember what we put in the cookies last year. We had as much vintage variation in our cookies as a winemaker does in Burgundy! Some years would see a bumper crop of cornflakes make its way into the recipe, while other years would feature raisins, chocolate chips, or an extra pinch of salt. But no matter what, the cookies were always delicious! <\/p>\n\n\n\n Find David online at everydayfoodblog.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n My favorite food memory is my Grandma Edith’s coffee cake\u2014it’s something that reminds me of all the time I spent with my grandma, cousins, aunts and uncles growing up as a kid. Grandma’s coffee cake was famous in our family\u2014it was at every family gathering and each family was sent at least one to take home. She would also make them for her friends and neighbors at Christmastime. The recipe makes eight loaves and my grandma would sometime make up to 32! It all started with my great-grandparents, who lived on a farm in Missouri. It was based on a German stollen bread recipe that we eventually just started to call coffee cake. <\/p>\n\n\n\n My grandma was extremely active in her community and always had something new she was working on. But I think her greatest pride was her family, and she always made sure that we kept up with each other by organizing at Christmas and a week at the beach in the summer. She even started a monthly family newsletter that we still do today! <\/p>\n\n\n\n My Grandma Edith passed away in 2014, but my Aunt Janice still makes her coffee cake at our family’s annual “Second Christmas.” Every time I eat it, I’m reminded of her and how much she cared for her children and grandchildren. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ingredients:<\/p>\n\n\n\n For the dough<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n For the glaze & dusting:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Instructions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Jessica online @jesslalcorn<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s not very classy and does not show off my great taste, but what really brings me back to my childhood is a special kind of cinnamon bun that’s called a kanelsn\u00e4cka<\/em>. I dare to say that in Sweden we have the best cinnamon buns in the world but the kanelsn\u00e4ckor<\/em> are not the impressive ones\u2014they’re bought premade in plastic bags (IKEA might even be selling a version of these). <\/p>\n\n\n\n We used to bring them to the beach as part of a bigger picnic when we went with the entire family (yes, we do go to the beach in Sweden!). I grew up right next to the beach but it was pretty rare that all of us would go down together. Biting into ones of those buns transports me to my 7-year-old self sitting on that beach surrounded by my family eating kanelsn\u00e4ckor<\/em> with a little bit of sand mixed in with the cinnamon. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Victoria online @vicbat<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n When I think about my childhood, I always think about patatas fritas con huevo y filetes<\/em> (fries with a fried egg and grilled steak) Of course, I ate all that with bread\u2014I mixed it into my dish and I just loved it. I can say it is still my favorite meal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I also would love to mention the bocadillo de tortilla de patatas y filete empanado<\/em> (Spanish omelet and breaded steak sandwich) that we used to eat when we went to spend the day on the beach. I am from Seville so we went to spend the day in Matalasca\u00f1as, the best moment of the day was sandwich lunch time under the umbrella.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was kind of hard picking one, but I finally decided on “Gaggobrot<\/em>” or “Ovobrot<\/em>.” In English, I would describe this “dish” as a slice of bread with a spread of butter and some typical Swiss cacao powder on top of it\u2014either cacao (Caotina) or Ovomaltine (a malt-based powder). Every time I had friends over, we were usually playing outside, and my mom would make us this as a “Zvieri<\/em>” (4 o’clock snack). She brought a big plate outside filled with this classic. Everyone loved it so much and it was usually the highlight of the day. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There is not an actual recipe, but the three ingredients are important. The bread should be a typical Swiss thick round loaf (for example, St. Galler bread<\/a>), the butter also must be real, high-quality Swiss butter and then, of course, one of the chocolate powders mentioned before. Add enough butter so that the powder really sticks to it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Find Hannah online @cuisinehistory<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The smell of Mama Ninfa\u2019s<\/a> does not daintily stroll down Navigation Street street like the air from a Parisian bakery. Its carnivorous char and toasted wood is most certainly seared into the crevices of the Houston, Texas parking lot and jolts one\u2019s stomach into a fit of crazed hunger that can only be satisfied by the almighty Tex-Mex. <\/p>\n\n\n\n As a kiddo, this jolt would be momentarily forgotten by my sights of the tortilla station. I would plant my little self in front of the glass window and watch ladies pat mounds of pillowy dough into thin, lard-laden rounds. They would throw them onto the fiery flattop and use their bare hands to quickly flip them, sliding stacks into plastic containers to be quickly whisked off to hungry tables. That same dark corner still welcomes guests today, promising them chewy marvels to hold every drop of fajita grease. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I was too short to see then what I see now when we wait for the annual table at Ninfa\u2019s. Just behind the tortilla ladies, the kitchen throws down two-foot slabs of beef onto the smoking grill the size of a twin bed, fire blazing beneath. Men circle around the center station to plate up crispy tacos, roll enchiladas, and spoon refried beans. It is constant, it cranks, and it sends clouds of mesquite into the dining room, hazing the vision with its fragrant Maillard reaction<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Before we\u2019ve even warmed up our chairs, servers drop creamy tomatillo and spicy red salsa onto our table with a glistening mountains of chips. My dad orders his Negra Modelo as he always does, and my mom her Paloma. My brother and I begin the race of chip to tomatillo salsa, to roasted tomato salsa to mouth, now washing the salt down with frosty tequila and lime. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Trays of smoking fajitas pass by like burning pyres. As a kid I would clench in fear and order the cheese puff instead: an inflated and fried corn tortilla drenched in chile con queso<\/em>. To this day the pale yellow puff is an explicable marvel. It was always crispy, always coated in that thick, zippy, industrial cheese, and somehow still hollow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The rest of the meal comes quickly on an oversized tray: tacos al carb\u00f3n<\/em> for mom, enchiladas with extra onions for dad, fajitas for the adult me and brother. We inhale as though the food will disappear. We dunk tortillas in chile con queso<\/em>, spoon extra salsa onto enchiladas, and dig up caramelized onions from the char of the cast iron fajita dish. We eat to the hum of the sizzle and the ranchera music and the eternally crowded dining room. <\/p>\n\n\n\n From the outside it seems a lot has changed at Mama Ninfa\u2019s. They\u2019ve expanded, redone the parking lot, given it a paint job or two, and proudly remounted the sign to boast their presence in East Downtown. But the air and feel and sound inside has only been amplified by time and the constant roar of the kitchen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n A new mural of Mama Ninfa covers an entire back wall to match the oversized photo that sits at the entrance of the restaurant. But this time she\u2019s depicted as a D\u00eda de Los Muertos ghost, with a calming skull-candy face, flowers in her hair, and eyes that follow the servers and patrons. She is alive. She is eternal. And she watches over her masterpiece of a family and food\u2014a legend so far exceeding fusion cuisine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mama Ninfa\u2019s is Houston at its best. It is a proudly heterogenous crowd of age, race, gender, language. It is loud, fast, big. It is beautiful in its grunge. It is warm in all its southern charm, smiling servers and full guests. It is tables of first birthday parties and first dates, of hundredth birthday parties and hundredth dates. To me it\u2019s an everlasting vision of my family: of my Texas-born grandma coming to town from South Carolina to get her fix with a red can of Tecate. It\u2019s my dad flooding his plate with whatever sauce within his reach. It\u2019s my mom closing her eyes and saying how much she loves refried beans like it\u2019s the first time she\u2019s tried them. It\u2019s all of us now, bringing our families and filling our tortillas and nodding to Mama Ninfa as we walk out the door. <\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\nCait English, Madrid Operations Manager<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Cait](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-Cait-with-grandparents.jpg\")
Courtney Brink, Customer Service & Human Resources<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Courtney\"](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-Courtney.jpeg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nCourtney’s family’s Chex Mix recipe<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
**Please note that this recipe is adapted from the original Chex Mix Party Mix recipe, and is made to be extra flavorful (it has three times the original amount of Worcestershire sauce! I like mine extra dark and crunchy, but if you prefer yours the original way, I’d recommend sticking to the recipe on the Chex Mix box or website. Also, sadly Chex and Crispix can only be found in the US as far as I know, so when I make it here in Europe I use Shreddies cereal or anything else I can find that is similar in texture.<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\nJames Blick, COO & Co-Founder<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Claudia Sophie Ordinas, Devour San Sebastian guide<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Claudia\"](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-Claudia.png\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nClaudia’s family’s n\u00e9grillon recipe<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"French](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-claudia-negrillon.png\")
Hayley Salvo, Seville Operations Manager<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-Hayley.jpg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nRachel Schneidmill, Marketing Director<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Meredith Miller, Customer Service Manager<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Meredith](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-Meredith-with-granddad.jpg\")
Meredith’s granddad’s cinnamon toast recipe<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Lauren Aloise, CEO & Co-Founder<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Abbie Stark, Rome Operations Manager<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Gingerbread](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-abbie-gingerbread-house.jpg\")
Abbie’s dad’s sugar cookie recipe<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
David Pope, Seville Assistant Operations Manager<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"David](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-David-and-sister.jpg\")
Jessica Alcorn, Account Manager<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Jessica\"](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-jessica.png\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nJessica’s Grandma Edith’s coffee cake recipe<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Victoria B\u00e4tz, Devour Barcelona guide<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Victoria\"](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-victoria.jpeg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nIrene Ojeda Iglesias, Devour Seville guide<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Hannah B\u00e4chtold, Devour Barcelona guide<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Hannah\"](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-hannah.jpeg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\nHannah’s Gaggobrot recipe<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Megan Lloyd, Devour Seville guide<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Megan\"](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-megan.jpeg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n![\"Mural](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-mama-ninfas-mural.jpg\")
![\"Decorating](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-ashley-decorating-cake.jpeg\")
![\"Easter](\"https:\/\/assets.devourtours.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/food-memories-ashley-bunny-cake.jpeg\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n