Day of the Dead

Now Today’s a Day That Really Brings the Living and the Dead Together

Sugar skull by the Mondragon family, displayed at the National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago.
Sugar skull by the Mondragon family, displayed at the National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago. Photo: Gozamos via Flickr

We like Halloween as an excuse for the kids to wear costumes and to sneak one, maybe two Butterfingers. And that’s it; the last thing we want around the house is a bunch of grocery store candy calling to us. Which brings us to this point… want something new and novel to nosh on this time of year, suitably ghoulish but not the same old? Go Mexican. Dia de los Muertos, the Day of the Dead, which is today, is like a Halloween that comes from a whole other culture with its own traditions or something! Traditions that are actually deeper than “buy some plastic stuff at Target,” in fact, as they involve rather morbidly remembering actual dead people and stuff. Day of the Dead is all about cool art, but David Hammond points out the cool food that goes with it in his Sun-Times piece, including where to get your hands on sugar skulls, tamale mucbipollo (“buried chicken”), and the bone-shaped pan de los muertos. Beats a pack of Skittles any day… of the dead. [Sun-Times]

Now Today’s a Day That Really Brings the Living and the Dead Together