A year in a cookbook...really?

I don't know. I saw the Julie & Julia movie and liked the idea. And I have to make out a new menu each week for my assisted living house. I have reached the point that my creativity has pooped out and I'm repeating my same old standbys every week. Now that I've noticed it, I've begun to search the cookbooks for fresh ideas and dishes. There are 2 books that I seem to always come back to: Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution and Gordon Ramsay Makes It Easy. So, maybe I won't be cooking one recipe from one of these cookbooks every day, but I will be using both these books, and probably some more, on a regular basis. The problem is that I can't assume that the guys will like the taste of what I cook, even if I successfully execute the recipe. They are the ultimate "man and a can" dudes, preferring the taste of instant mashed potatoes and mushy canned veggies to fresh produce. I discovered right after I started working at the ranch that they didn't enjoy fresh garden vegetables or fresh meats. Seriously. Given the choice between ramen noodles over instant mashed potatoes and roasted root vegetables and stuffed pork chops, they will go for the ramen and instant every time. I wonder if it's all a matter of educating the palate and getting them used to fresh, clean flavors and vegetables that haven't been cooking into flavorless mush and non-plastic cheese. So here I go on my cooking odyssey - starting with a shepherd's pie. Pork, carrots, green beans, garlic, and onions in their own juices and topped with REAL mashed potatoes. Wish me luck. They're a tough bunch.

A Drylander's Easter Holiday

Easter this year wasn't exactly like I thought it would be...in some ways, that's a relief and in others, it's a bummer. One of the bummer things is that Omar isn't here, so I'm lonely and spending a lot of time on Facebook, bothering my friends and family while I wait for the work week to begin. One of the good things is that I get to do whatever I want. One of the ways that it's a relief is that there's no one else's stuff pushed on me.

Usually, we go to Fanny's house. Fanny is Omar's cousin, who lives in Ica. They have a bed & breakfast inn there and we usually try to throw our holiday business her way when we can. In fact, nearly all the family does. Usually we would arrive first in our car (which was a minivan), oblivious to the fact that the rest of them were following (or maybe it was just ME who was oblivious to that fact.) Then a day later, two carloads of people - aunts, cousins, nieces, and nephews - would arrive, all jammed and crammed into one single vehicle. How they managed it year after year without someone dying of asphyxiation or being crushed, I'll never know.

So, anyway, during La Semana Santa (Holy Week), this entire family only eats fish. That's a whole week of fish for breakfast, fish for lunch, and fish for dinner. Fish, fish, fish. There's usually fried fish for breakfast, ceviche or fried fish for lunch, and fried fish for dinner, with the more martyrous older ladies picking at fish heads, tails, and fins and declaring them delicious, while the others consume the choice parts of the fish. It's usually at this time that I choose to go vegetarian. Watching someone picking the eyeballs out of fish heads at breakfast or just before going to bed gives me nightmares.

I'm notoriously a drylander. I won't go to the pool on my own - I have to be forced. I don't enjoy swimming and a trip to the beach only entices me to play in the sand and get my feet wet. I don't particularly enjoy the scent of the sea. It smells like fish to me. I do like sea shells, but only if they don't smell like dead fish. So I guess it all comes down to not really being a fan of fish. So during this Easter week, I explore other food options that aren't in conflict with what most people here consider proper. At Fanny's, I ask for bread and butter or avocado with tea for breakfast. For lunch, I can handle ceviche one or two days, but for the other 2 days, I usually ask for potatoes and salad. Dinner is usually similar to lunch. Eyebrows are usually raised at this. I've noticed that unless one specifically asks for vegetables, they are usually not given a starring role at any meal.

During the time at Fanny's we usually go to the fish market in the evening to help her pick out fish for the next day's meals. This market is right on the pier where the fishing boats come in with their catches, so sometimes you have to look sharp to avoid stepping on an escaping crab or the gull that is in hot pursuit. There are also processions on Good Friday that start from the church (I think) and carry the image of Christ and the Virgin Mary through town, returning to end at the same church. It's quite an amazing sight. The streets are closed for the processions, and people line the streets and pack the Plaza de Armas in hopes of getting glimpse of the spectacle, with the devout following throughout the entire route. And in the morning, the men and boys usually go fishing while the women stay in the house and prepare the fish and the rest of the food for the day's meals. After that chore, I usually read in the garden, which is huge and green and filled with pink and purple blooming buganvillia trees, or play with the dog. There's no Easter Egg hunt, no Easter basket, no Easter Bunny. Wah.

All in all, it's a nice week, filled with interesting things to do and see. At the end of the week, we pack our things to head home. It's at this time that it's usually announced that Aunt So&So has gained so much weight by eating too many fish heads that those who originally packed into the one car can't possibly fit into it for the 4 hour ride home. And being the good boy that he was raised to be, Omar usually offers seats in our car to those who would have been at the bottom of the pile in the other car. It's in this way that family members subtlely take advantage of one another. We never refuse. We would never consider refusing...unless there were fish heads brought as an after-Easter snack.

This year, Omar's in Trujillo with his brothers, so Celeste and I are on our own. No sign or scent of fish here. It's still been a vegetarian week, and keeping in mind that I don't bake in this heat, here are a few quick and easy although probably not peruvian things on my menu:

For breakfast:

Fried Granny Smith apples
Peanut butter and jelly sandwich
Miso Soup
Fried zuchini squash with new red potatoes, onions, and tomatoes
any above served with hot black tea

For lunch:

Twice cooked yellow chili peppers stuffed with bread crumbs, cheese, and onions
Fresh lettuce/tomato/cuke/carrot salad with lime juice and salt
Fried eggplant with cheese and fresh tomato/red wine sauce on french bread
Spicy tomato soup with shrimp and lime juice (okay here's a nod to the sea, but only a nod!)
any above serves with lime water or cebada

For dinner:

Anything from the first two menus, freshened up with ensalada criolla (shredded onion, marinated in lime juice and salt, with fresh mint leaves added at the last moment)

- O - throw it all out the window and have...
Pear and apple slices with good bleu cheese and a small glass of dry red wine...My favorite!

Happy Easter!

Birthday weekend

Last week I had a birthday. I celebrate my birthday in a much different style than most people here in Peru. For my birthday, I prefer to forget about parties and have a quiet day. This year, both O and I were working, so there was no party planning on any one's part. O knows I don't go for parties, but his friends are pretty determined to take advantage of any excuse to have a fling. This year, thanks to my job, there was none of that. There was, however, a birthday lunch at some one's house.

Rosa and Flover live in Rimac, which is a very nice part of town, except for the smallish area where they live. Their neighborhood is SCARY. They have no car, and they live a little too far away from the market or the grocery store to walk, so we often give them rides to wherever they need to go. They repay the favors by making lunch occasionally, inviting us to barbecues, parties, and other events. I rarely go, but now it's understood that I just prefer a quieter lifestyle.

Anyway, Rosa insisted on a birthday lunch on the 2nd. Rosa is from the highlands and her taste in food is a little different than mine. My special lunch was actually Rosa's favorite: chanfainita, a typical highland dish.



How does it look? Tasty, right? Chanfainita is stew, made from chopped potatoes and cow's lungs. Now, I know she went to a LOT of effort to prepare this delicacy, but there are just some things that I don't want to eat. Lung tissue is one of those things that I choose not to eat. I think Celeste would enjoy this stew immensely.

Luckily for me, there was plenty of picante sauce and a good bottle of dry red wine. If not for those, I couldn't have managed to eat any of it. Rosa would have been offended and I would have been embarrassed to pieces. So I poured on enough hot sauce to set the house on fire added handfuls of chopped mint, and washed it all down with judicious sips of wine. Everything ended quite well. I didn't ask for seconds, but Rosa felt well pleased.

On Sunday, O and I went to dinner at Club Sullana, where we had a fantastic steak cooked with annato oil and fried yuca and banana slices. Then we went to see "Ice Age 3" and went home.

fruits from the tropics

Here in Peru, we have fruits that I've never heard of anywhere else in the world. For example, chirimoya. It's often called Guanabana, too. The flavor is kind of like tootie-fruitie, and it makes a great sorbet.



Maracuyá is another fruit that I've not heard of outside of Peru, either. It has a sweet and sour flavor and is popular in ice creams, sorbets, and drinks.

We love both these fruits for breakfast! They are quite common in this area, along with giant mangoes and avocados. I'll be looking for some other unique fruits and veggies from around here, too.

Lunch

Hi! I'm so glad you came through the market. Most of it is closed today, but there's a lot of fruit for sale there, under the umbrella. Have you had lunch? This is the same market where Pondside and I had lunch when she visited.

This afternoon for lunch, O and I are eating at El Rinconcito Ferrañafano. They specialize in typical foods from northern Peru, like you might find around Chiclayo and Ferrañafe and some live music, loudly and enthusiatically played, even though it's out of tune most of the time.

Come on inside the restaurant and have a seat:

Ahh, lunch is served:

I had the Pepián de Pato (Duck with pumpkin seed sauce) and rice. The usual bowl of ají is there with the red and green Limeño chili peppers.

O had Cau Cau...I can't handle this. Although the flavor is good, the cow's stomach fights with my stomach and the cow's gut is just a little bit stronger than mine. We part ways quickly, so I passed on this dish, even though it comes with a wonderful plate of rice and beans...if you have a stronger stomach than I do, I recommend this dish. But, if not, go for the pepián...it's much easier on the stomach, even though the duck is a tough old bird.
The Rinconcito Trio:

Meatball cravings

Today, I was in the mood for spagetti and meat balls. This caught me by surprize, because I swore off meatballs years ago. My Oldest Sister, along with her Italian husband, has the corner on the meatball market. Every time I've been to their house they've pushed "real Italian-style" meatballs on me.

So today, when I got the urge, I tried to stop myself. Then I surrendered and gave myself over to meatballs, my style. This is what I did:

Hamburger, a handful of dried oregano that's been rubbed between my hands so I can loose myself in the aroma, diced yellow chili pepper, mushrooms, onion, garlic, and ground comino, all mixed well in a bowl with a raw egg. Then I let that sit to develop it's flavors. While that was sitting, I prepared the sauce: in a saute pan, I heated olive oil with more rubbed oregano. After I recovered from the intoxicating aroma, I sauteed sliced mushrooms in the oil. I dumped tomato sauce in a pot to heat, with even more rubbed oregano and ground comino, added the mushrooms, and a half tablespoon of miso. I would have preferred to add dry red wine, but somebody (me) drank it. So miso helps to intensify the flavors. Then I put that on to simmer.

While the sauce was simmering, I fried the meatballs.

Then I ate one of the meatballs - definitely NOT "real Italian-style" meatballs, but just how I like them.

Then I commited a cardinal sin and cooked egg noodles instead of spagetti. YUM. Sorry, no pictures...I ate everything before I thought of photos...

The socks and a little bread

The finished pair of socks...and yes, another shot, just because I love looking at my handiwork.






Here's a second sock in the almost finished stage. Toes just to finish up. I've actually finished this pair, and have to take a good photo for the "Year In Socks" blog. The only thing about these is that the toes turned out a little square and clunky-looking. My last pair had clunky toes, too. How can I fix that? What's the secret to non-clunky toes?



And lunch yesterday was a thick slice of fried eggplant with marinated onions and mild chilies in salt and lime juice on bread. Not as tasty as a piece of meat or chicken, but still good.



Every morning, we have fresh bread delivered to our apartment. It arrives at 6 am sharp, and it's tied to the handle on the front door of each apartment that orders it. We love it. So do the pigeons, who arrive at 6:05 am. This is the neighbor's bread. Every morning, the pigeons share their bread.



I'm a little more stingy. To keep our bread for ourselves, this is what I've begun to use. I thought it was a brilliant idea. I've outsmarted the pigeons for the moment. Not pretty, but it works. The pigeons think I'm terribly inconsiderate.

Food Poisoning

On Sunday, O and I went to eat lunch at the officer's club at the end of the block, El Circulo Militar. We had a small ceviche that we shared and later in the evening, I had a bowl of won ton soup.

Yesterday, in the afternoon, it hit me: that dreaded roiling and cramping of the stomach, multiple trips to the bathroom, waves of nausea which were luckily pretty mild, headache and body aches. Quickly to the pharmacy to get a couple of ciprofloxicin tablets. If I hadn't taken the cipro tablets, I think it would have been much worse, but still, I couldn't finish teaching my second Survival class and had to go find a substitute. When I went to tell the evening director that I needed to go home, I must have looked absolutely green, because he leapt into action and found me a taxi home. They also called O, and he met me at the door of the apartment building.

We didn't go to the hospital because I had already begun the treatment they recommend, so it was just a matter of going to bed and waiting it all out. O dosed me again with cipro and gatorade sometime during the night and again this morning. I'm happy to say that I'm back on my feet again and, although kind of washed out and tired, I'm functioning again and have a bit of energy. Whew! Glad that's over!

The thing about living here is that food poisoning is not that uncommon. I've never gotten sick from eating at home. I take a lot of care to be sure that our food is clean and wash everything well with a clorox solution, especially fruits and vegetables that we eat right from the fridge: apples, cucumbers, tomatoes. And usually food from the Circulo is safe. But I guess once in a while, someone skips a step (like washing hands) and something ugly can creep into the food.

I'll be eating at home for a while, till I get past the memory of last night.

Escape from the City

Part 5

While Celeste was dealing with the kids, I slept a lot. During the first couple of days, I heard the screams and squeals of the kids, the cries of "Celeste! Where are you?", a quick clattering of dog toenails on tile floors, and the subsequent whuffling and scrunching sounds under the bed as Celeste hid herself deeper in the darkness below.

On the third day, I arose like a flame from the bed, refreshed and decidedly without cough, snort, or snot. Thank heaven. I was ready to go play in Trujillo. After a leisurely breakfast, O and I put Celeste out of the main part of the house and up on the rooftop, to escape the kids and enjoy the view. We had to drrraaag her from her hideaway under the bed. Then we left the house and went out to visit O's old college friends and have lunch. Celeste serenaded us from the rooftop in typical Siberian siren style - throaty yodeling with a few wolfish high notes.

In Peru, "visiting friends" usually means having drinks, mostly beer. This is a little hard for me, because I only drink beer on occasion and I have to be in the mood for it. This day, I wan't in the mood for it, so we brought bottles of water. The people that we visited were gracious about it...some are offended if guests don't drink with them, but I chalk this up to insecurities about themselves ("Oh, we're not good enough to drink with?", etc) so I usually just continue with water.

These friends, however, were just fine. Along with my water and the offered beer, we had a snack of canchitas (fried corn kernels), and shredded yellow chilies and onions mixed with salt and lime juice on the side. The idea is to take a mouthful of corn and a teaspoon full of the onion/chili/lime/salt mixture together. It's a great remedy for plugged noses - spicy, but not enough to really torch the mouth and cause discomfort. And quick to make. Shredded hot peppers and shredded onions marinated in lime juice and salt are typical and almost overly common flavors here in Peru. Hot peppers in various forms and lime slices are included on the side of almost every dish.

After we spent a few hours with them, we started back to the house. I say "started" because we got another invitation to visit from someone else on the way. So on to another house for water and beer. But this house was filled with people rapidly becoming drunk, so we didn't stay long. For me, the only people who enjoy being with drunks are other drunks. Happily, O understood that even though some of them were his friends, I was uncomfortable around so many who were unsteady on their feet. We left and headed to a restaurant for lunch.

Lunch was the absolute best ceviche I've had in a very long time. It was a mixture of sea foods, ranging from regular sea bass to tiny squid and scallops. Spicy and marinated in strong lime and salt, it was wonderful. Garnished with a couple of slices of sweet potato, corn, shredded onions, and sea vegetable of some sort. We had a lemonade to drink and they restaurant played typical Peruvian music, but not too loudly. It was great!

The Creation Of A Recipe

I've made a new recipe of garbanzo bean soup. Inspired by Capriel Pence's book, Bistro Soups and Sandwiches, I set out to replicate "Yellow Tomato and Garbanzo Bean Soup"...

Start with half a bag of dried garbanzo beans, soaked the morning in water. Capriel calls for a can of cooked garbanzo beans, but all there is in the kitchen is the dried ones, so after soaking for about 4 hours, pop them into a pot of water and set them on the stove to cook. Bring them to a boil, then go read your current novel till you smell burning beans in the kitchen. Cut off the fire and rinse the burnt beans under cool water. Transfer to a medium bowl and scrub out your cooking pot. Put a lot of water in the pot, and return the beans to the pot, too. Turn the fire on again under the beans, at a medium heat and take the dog out to pee.

When you return, cut up two over ripe roma tomatoes and toss them into the pot. Cut up some mushrooms that are beginning to smell and cook them in olive oil, then add to the cook pot with the beans and tomatoes. Cut up that extra chorizo sausage that you couldn't eat for lunch and toss it into the pot, too. Add a handful of rubbed dried oregano. Think about all those tomatoes you bought that are bound to go bad before you make a salad, and chop up three of them and throw them in with the beans mixture (that's 5 tomatoes total). Get a headache and pour yourself a glassful of white wine that's sweeter than you remembered. There's only about 1/2 cup left in the bottle, so dump that in with the beans, stir well, add a cube of chicken bouillon into the mix and stir well. Put on a cd of Fleetwood Mac. Simmer your beans until the Fleetwood Mac cd is finished. Start the cd again, sit down, and try a cup of your soup.

I just finished a cup of this, and Fleetwood Mac is singing "The Chain", Lindsey Buckingham is a little over the top, and I've also finished my glass of wine...it was too sweet, but the bean soup was good...though probably not what Capriel had in mind.

panetone

This is an example of panetone. It's a fruit cake, but not the usual nasty, dry fruit cake that comes in one of those Christmas tins. This is moist and flavorful and stands between 12 and 15 inches tall. I'll try to get a picture of our last panetone before we eat all of it...

Tuesday stuff

Not much going on here...I'm in the midst of the circular crocheted vest. It WAS on the way to being a sweater, but morphed while I was looking through other patterns, and now it's a vest. There's a lot of repetitive stitch work, and it's getting tedious, although I'm just about finished with it. Actually, that is why I'm writing now - I had to take a break from it. It's done in alpaca, the inside circle is a hand painted skein and the outside is the natural light fawn color of some alpacas. The whole piece is nice, but with the hand painted portion, it's beginning to look just a little too hippy, even for me.

Have you seen this? I can't remember how I came across her blog, but wow. It's done by Greenfingers. She does beautiful work! I really like the white doll.

I've been watching "The Last Mimsy". I love it. What a charming little story! I bought the cd. I only buy the movies that I'm sure I will watch more than once, since I tend to do that. I watch them several times, a habit I got into when my daughter was little, because inevitably I would be called away from the movie for something. So now I only buy the movies that I'm sure I will love. My next purchase will be "Stardust", if it ever comes to the theaters here. I've been waiting for it, but so far, only the posters have arrived here in Lima.

I finally got on Ravelry! Yey! But now I'm so busy surfing through it that I have not put up any of my own stuff - my stash, my FOs, my UFOs, etc. With time, I suppose. For now, I need to get a Flicker account, so I can add photos and, I guess, be seen.

And, lastly, I do try to be adventurous in food. But there is a limit to what I can handle. On Sunday afternoon, O and I went to eat at a place we'd never tried before. The food style was from northern Peru, specifically from Ferrañafe, which is quite close to Chiclayo. We tried tacu tacu. Everything I've read says it's made with beans, rice, bacon, and other basically harmless ingredients, so I was open to try it. And we ordered a cold dark malt beer to drink with it. When the food arrived, it was not as I was expecting, but hey, I'm not an expert here, so I ate.

Apparently, Ferrañafe style tacu tacu is different than the rest of the world's idea of what it should be. The meat was definitely NOT bacon. The flavor was quite good, and the sauce was wonderful. But the meat...well, let's say I suspected it was not something that I would be eating at any time. I thought it was the skin of a tongue, but later (O prudently refrained from telling me what it was while I was eating) I found out that it was the lining of a cow's stomach. But I had eaten it, and it was okay. Later that evening, though, the cow's stomach began to pitch a fit and fought with my own stomach, resulting in a HUGE case of heartburn. Luckily I do have quite a strong gut, and my stomach proved to be the stronger of the two. I hope I don't run into another cow stomach too soon.

TACU TACU

Ingredients :
3 cups canary beans
150 lb (300 g) pork fat or bacon, diced
2 cups of cooked rice
2 onions, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
2 fresh yellow aji/chili (aji amarillo fresco), seeded and deveined

Preparation:

Soak beans overnight. Drain and cook in unsalted water together with pork fat or bacon until soft.

Remove from heat and let cool. Beat with a wooden spoon to form a coarse purée. Set aside and let cool.

Heat oil in a large skillet and add onion, garlic and aji. Saute onion and aji until soft and tender and correct seasoning. Add the beans and the cooked rice, mix well and correct seasoning. Cook stirring, until golden and remove from heat.

To make the tacu tacu:
Take one part of the mixture into your hands and form a small oblong tamale.

Cover with bread crumbs or crackers to maintain shape.

Heat oil in skillet, place one part of the bean mixture, and fry turning constantly to avoid sticking. Repeat with the rest of the mixture.

Serve with breaded fried tenderloin, fried banana, fried egg and Creole sauce.


6 servings

More on Causa

More about the causa...

There are so many variations on this dish. Causa rellena con atun (tuna), causa filled with shrimp, causa filled with crab meat, causa filled with chicken...etc, etc, etc...



The causa that I ate had different colors of potato layers - the bottom layer was green, but the flavor was the same as the other layers, so I'm guessing that a small amount of avocado was mixed with the mashed potatoes to add the color. The middle layer was yellow, and I'm sure they used a bit of yellow pepper paste to color it. The top layer was orange - I think they may have used tomato sauce or red pepper puree to color that layer.



I found a recipe for causa filled with tuna, but the fillings are really very eay to change out. Suggestions for filliings are at the bottom of the recipe:

CAUSA DE ATUN / Tuna Fish Potato Loaf

Ingredients :
2.2 lb (1 k) potatoes (yellow, if available)
1/4 cup oil
Juice of 2 key limes
Salt
Pepper
1 tablespoon ground aji amarillo fresco / fresh yellow aji (chili)
1.1 lb (½ k) fresh tuna fish or 2 6-oz cans of tunafish packed in oil
½ red onion, diced
2 tomatoes
2 sliced avocados
2 cups mayonnaise
Parsley
8 Spanish olives
2 hardboiled eggs
Optional: Red pepper, thinly sliced

Preparation:

Boil potatoes with salt. Peel and mash. Combine with salt, white ground pepper, key lime juice, aji and oil.

Mix tuna fish with mayonnaise and diced onion.

Spread potato mixture on a thin rectangular sheet of plastic. Spread the filling: top with tomatoes, sliced avocado and roll using the plastic to help form a round loaf.

Refrigerate for one hour, remove plastic and place on a serving dish. Garnish with parsley, chopped olives and hard boiled eggs, sliced avocado (with drops of key lime juice to prevent discoloring) and if desired, mayonnaise and red pepper slices.

Note: If canned tuna fish is used, season with key lime juice and chopped onion.

If fresh tuna fish is used, bake first with salt and ground white pepper.

Different fillings for Causa:
Avocado, mayonnaise, diced tomato and boiled diced eggs.
Avocado, mayonnaise, beets and boiled diced eggs.
Shrimps, mayonnaise, ketchup, drops of lime juice and ground yelow aji.
Crabmeat and mayonnaise.
Octopus in olive sauce.
Olives and mayonnaise.

6 servings

Wednesday weavings

I'm finished with the skirt portion of my latest project. Now all that's left is the border at the bottom edge. That is taking more time than the whole upper skirt took! I've decided on a different motif for that...no snowflakes. I changed to a leaf style of motif, and really like the looks of it. Connecting the motifs to the skirt will be a little challenge, since the skirt was designed for snowflakes, but I don't think it should be too difficult. The snowflakes just didn't inspire me when they were done all in one color - gray. I'm still scattering a few beads here and there on the motifs, and will have beads on the final lower edge when the skirt is finished.

Celeste and I went walking in the rain today. It's been raining off and on for the last week. Rain here is not really that cut loose and pour kind of rain; just drizzle. Things are wet and chilly outside, but inside we are all comfy - crocheting, watching soccer, and sharing a bag of chips between the three of us: O., Celeste, and me. Days like this are sometimes dreary for me, but when I have plenty to keep me occupied, I'm fine. It also helps to know that everything is fine with my family at home. My daughter has been writing me a lot more than usual, which thrills me to no end (seriously!), and I talked with my dad yesterday.

I spent the morning preparing for my conversational class this evening. I hope several people come. One of the instructors here at the institute wants to attend! We talked yesterday about pronunciation. She is dissatisfied with her pronunciation. Although she has studied and taught English for 25 years, she feels that her pronunciation is terrible. Actually, I don't think it is. She has an accent, of course, and keeping up with the evolving language and all its idiomatic phrases is difficult, but honestly I think she speaks quite well. She just doesn't sound like an American nor does she sound British. She sounds like a Peruvian, which is perfectly acceptable to me.



We went out to eat a few days ago, and I had una causa rellena con cangrejo (layered potato pureè filled with crab meat. Yummy! I'd never had causa before, but have always been curious about it. I'll hunt for a recipe. For now, here is a picture of causa rellena con camerones (shrimp).

Lunch For A Wild Tomato

Tiradito, the younger brother of ceviche, has only become well-known in the last 20 years or so. Its origins can be found in the approach of Japanese immigrants to eating raw fish, though some suggest it's closer to Italian carpaccio, popularised earlier in the 20th century by Genovese immigrants.

Two are the main differences between them: the cut and onions. While ceviche is cut in bite-size cubes and comprises a generous amount of onions, tiradito is sliced in fine, long pieces and carries no onions.


Ingredients:

600g of white fish (sea bass, flounder, grouper, sole, etc).

Juice of 15 key limes

1 mild chile pepper seeded, deveined, and finely diced

4 tbsp ají amarillo paste (medium to hot chile paste)

1 tbsp fresh ginger, chopped

1 tbsp freshly chopped cilantro

Salt and pepper

Preparation:

Make a dressing with the lime juice, diced pepper, ají amarillo paste, ginger, salt, and pepper. Set aside (preferably in the fridge).

Slice the fish into fine, sashimi-like pieces (stripes about 6cm long, 2.5cm wide, and 1,5cm thick). Place in a cold serving dish, the pieces on a single layer. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Cover with the dressing and serve immediately. As with ceviche, tiradito can be garnished with sweet potatoes and boiled corn grains, yuca or clean, edible seaweed.

Adventures in sea food

I have a new favorite food: conchitas a la parmesana. It's scallops on the half shell, with lime juice poured over them, and freshly grated parmesan cheese (not the boxed stuff) sprinkled over the shell to cover. Then they are broiled till the cheese is melted and lightly golden brown.


I also like choritos - steamed mussels on the half shell, covered with a mixture of marinated minced onions, tomatoes, cilantro, and lime juice, with a dash of salt.




Today we tried a new food for lunch - tiraditos. Tiraditos are like sushi, a lot like ceviche. It is raw white fish, sliced thinly and marinated in lime and covered with a sauce based on hot peppers and vinegar. Garnished with white corn kernels. It seems like a very simple dish, but wow, is it good.

Ginger Beer

I've been wanting to try this for a little while. I've tasted the bottled ginger beer from the liquor store, but I didn`t like it. This may be better; at least I'll be able to change the recipe to suit me. I lack the cardomom pods, but it says they're optional anyway:

Ginger Beer

4-6 servings

Juice from 4 limes
2 3-inch pieces of ginger, coarsely grated
1/2 cup sugar
4 whole cloves
4 cardamom pods (optional)
1 cup orange juice

1. In a large saucepan, combine the limes, ginger, sugar, cloves, cardamom, and orange juice with 4 cups of water ingredients and bring to a boil.

2. Remove the pan from the heat and let cool. Transfer to the refrigerator and let sit for at least 2 hours. Strain and chill thoroughly before serving.

Garlic

Rani asked about what to do with a multitude of garlic. So, I have put together a few ideas, being a garlic fan and loving to cook and experiment.

Almost every day, I use garlic when preparing a meal. I put about 25 peeled cloves in a blender with a bit of water and whiz it until it's smooth, then I scrape it out and put it in a glass container to use when I cook. That much usually lasts me about a week.

I also like to make stir-fry through the week, so I make pickled garlic. I peel a pile of garlic cloves, and put them in clean glass pint or half-pint jars. Then I add one teaspoon of pickling spices (you can buy this in the grocery store in the spice section. Just look for the bottle labeled "pickling spices") and bay leaf to each jar. Mix water and vinegar (make it half and half) and add sugar to taste. Bring that liquid to a boil, and pour it over the garlic in the jars, up to the shoulder of the jars. Be sure that the liquid covers the garlic cloves. Cap the jars tightly and either process them in a hot water bath or put them in the fridge, if you haven't made too many jars full. Let them sit for about 6 weeks to allow the flavors to develop. If processed in a hot water bath, they will keep for a couple of years. The pickled garlic adds a wonderful flavor to stir-fry and the vinegar is great for salad dressing.

Another way to use garlic is to roast it. Preheat your oven to 250 deg F. Cut about 1/4 inch off the top of a whole head of garlic and discard. Drizzle a couple of tablespoons of olive oil over the garlic and wrap it in foil. Roast it until soft, about 40 to 50 minutes. Roasted garlic will keep in the fridge for about 2 weeks. Use it warm by squeezing the cloves out on bread or in soups.

I'll think of some more ways to use garlic, but I like the pickled idea the best. No spoilage, no loss of your purchase and you can make it last for years!

Dinner last night

My O. thought that I had slaved over a hot stove, cooking a rich, meaty tomato sauce and meat and cheese sandwich. Actually, it was fried eggplant and cheese sandwichs, with homemade meatless tomato sauce, and took about 15 minutes to make. The eggplant doesn't have a meat texture, I didn't think, but the red wine and soy sauce kind of gives the sauce a meaty flavor:

4 fresh buns of your favorite bread

1 medium eggplant, sliced and fried
2 slices of your favorite cheese per sandwich

The sauce:
3 ripe tomatoes, minced
4 dashes soy sauce
1/2 cup dry red wine
2 tablespoons minced onion
1 clove garlic, mashed and minced
1/2 cup medium hot red chile paste (or mild, if you aren't into hot stuff)
oregano (I use a lot of it)

Put all the sauce ingredients into a skillet and cook until thick.

Assemble your sandwiches, alternating slices of cheese and eggplant, and spoon the sauce in there between the layers somewhere. Put a little extra sauce on the side, if you like it, and use more bread to absorb the sauce after the sandwich is gone.

Makes 4 thick, juicy, and messy sandwiches.

Today's lunch

For lunch today, I made a thick soup and had it with the usual fresh French bread. My soup consisted of:

2 cups of cooked yellow beans
a cup of cubed carrots
1 1/2 cups chopped green beans
three Roma tomatoes chopped finely
1/2 medium onion, chopped
1/2 cup of that really good red wine
one clove of garlic, crushed and minced
two pinches of oregano
a pinch of rosemary
1/4 teaspoon pepper
salt to taste.

I enjoyed it very much...but I enjoy almost all my own cooking :o)