Pigata. n. A piñata in the shape of a pig, in our case filled with chocolate, streamers, and tiny bottles of liquor. You'll just have to imagine that there is a tilde over the g in "pigata" -- obviously it's pronounced "pig-yata", and not "pig-ata".
We had friends over for Cinco de Mayo (Eve, since we celebrated a day early) and somehow Stephen and I got it in our heads that we needed a piñata (and some
mini piñatas too, in the shapes of donkeys and bulls). Pretty much from the start it was clear that our piñata was going to be a pigata, though I'm really not sure why in retrospect -- maybe the round shape of the balloon was inspirational. We used
this tutorial, starting with a balloon and
this cheap and easy glue (just flour and water!) and some strips of scrap office paper (next time we'll use newspaper; you know your life is kind of weird and corporate when you have more access to scrap office paper than to old newspaper). We covered the balloon with three rounds of papier mache, letting it dry overnight each time, and once it was all dry we popped the balloon and painted the pig with kids' acrylic paint and attached a snout, legs, and tail made from pink painted toilet paper rolls. We had a little trouble getting the legs/tail to stay on, and the holes we punched in the top for hanging it were not particularly stable, so we ended up having to add some extra reinforcement in the way of packing tape. (We think next time in addition to using newspaper, we are also going to add in the use of a box fan for assisted drying and make sure it gets truly dry before continuing with each subsequent layer.) In spite of all this, the pig turned out excellent.
We walked the pigata down to the river, discovering his pig friend underneath Alte Brücke along the way, and then strung him up and beat him. (Something about the idea of taking a way-too-personified pigata to the river to be beaten with a stick was incredibly hilarious.) We had a rock-paper-scissors competition to determine who would get the first go. I guess piñatas aren't that common in Germany, and particularly not on the riverbank, because we gained quite the crowd -- at least a dozen or more people were watching the proceedings. People here are not at all shy about stopping and staring when there is something weird going on.
I barely have any pictures of the food, for once, because we had made nothing but the dessert in advance and we all consumed everything pretty much the instant we got it on the table. You really work up an appetite when you've been beating a pigata. But here's what we ate:
+ Fresh guacamole (no tomatoes, only three avocados, lime juice, garlic, jalapeños, onion, cilantro, and salt)
+ Real American-style queso (Velveeta and Rotel, even better as leftovers when we added chopped-up jalapeños and ate it with homemade tortilla chips -- we had not been so ambitious as to make homemade tortilla chips for the party)
+ About a million tortilla chips
+ Oaxaca cheese quesadillas
+ A second round of three-avocado homemade guac, which was demolished too quickly for me to even try (a real compliment to the chefs, I think)
+ Eggplant carnitas with avocado salsa, cheddar cheese, and sour cream
+
Mexican chocolate tofu pudding
+ Stephen's homemade margaritas (similar to
this recipe, but replacing the lemon juice with a second portion of lime)
+ A decent portion of Stephen's Jose Cuervo Reserva de la Familia tequila, which he'd brought back from Mexico a couple of years ago
And that is how you celebrate with a pigata.
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