Food

Whereas most of this blog is in chronological order, I'm taking a break from the Bolivia posts and making this post about some of the food we had on this trip.

Featured here is one of the most popular foods in Chile, empanadas. These are smaller fried empanadas de queso (cheese empanadas). For the North American audience you can think of empanadas like hot pockets, only some are oven baked and some are fried. Pretty much every country in South America has it's own version of empanadas. Also shown here is freshly made cantaloupe and watermelon juice.

Here is something that is purely Chilean: Mote con Huesillo! It's a sweet drink/dessert made from sun-dried peaches that have been reconstituted in water with sugar and had mote (husked wheat) added. These are served chilled in the summer time and are so good.


Kuchen, which is a German word for cake is hugely popular in Chile especially in the south where large populations of Germans immigrated. This one was home made by the people who rented us the cabin in Pucón, and stuffed with local grown blackberries.
Ah umitas! For those of you from New Mexico I can most closely relate these to tamales, but they are different. They seem to be made from corn meal and freshly mashed corn along with various other ingredients, most commonly including zucchini. All of this is wrapped in the corn husks and then tied together by strings.
Porotos Granados con Pebre, or Select Beans with Pebre sauce, is the name given to this dish. As far as I know any soup made with porotos (common beans) as it's main ingredient can be called porotos granados, it also commonly uses a squash like winter squash or pumpkin. Pebre is a sauce made from oil, vinegar, water, onion, cilantro, jalapeño and ground aji pepper.


Salsa that was served with fried empanadas de queso.
More empanadas de queso, any one hungry yet?


Some deserts we picked up from a sweet shop in downtown Santiago. These are like cookies sandwiched together with manjar (similar to dulce de leche or caramel) and sprinkled with shredded coconut.
More sweets.
Freshly picked Almonds from our portion of an old Almond farm in Pirque just outside Santiago.

I've already made comments about how expensive things were in San Pedro de Atacama. While the cost of food is expensive you do get quite exquisite food. This is a pesto pulenta topped with cheese and served with vegetables.


The desert they served with the above meal. Since I don't partake of caffeine, hence no chocolate, Sita enjoyed this to herself.

Cabin

We stayed in a placed called Mirador los Volcanes which means viewpoint of the volcanoes while we were in the south of Chile.

Here Sita is standing on the deck in front of the cabin that we stayed in.

Sylvia, Sita and Jorge on the deck with some other cabins in the background.
A side view of the cabin with Jorge Jr. on the deck.The cabin was almost all wood, the outside and inside walls, the ceilings and the floor.



Although you can see 3 volcanoes from this place the other two are a real strain to find in comparison to this one, which I'm (Hari) standing in front of.
The first thing we did after arriving was "tomar once" this means to take 11. It's a bit like "taking 5" (a break) only with food and a different origin. Eleven comes from the fact that there are 11 letters in the word "aguardiente", this is a term for alchohol. People used to use this as a code to signify it was time to drink alchohol, but now it usually does not involve alchohol. It usually involves tea with bread and other snacks. In this case we were eating bread with avocado, cheese, tomatoes, along with a Chilean/German delicacy known as kuchen (pronounced coo-hen). "Once" (pronounced "ohn-seh") is a very Chilean thing.
Jorge Sr. looking at the view.
There was wildlife all over the place including these strange birds with long beaks that would make sounds kind of like a duck.

There were also chickens and more prominently turkeys that roamed the place.
The owners also had their sheep grazing amongst the cabins.

Here's Sylvia posing with the sheep.
This was the view from our bedroom window. I was leaning back with my toes in the window. I think it's obligatory to say "wish you were here".