Cebiche

So we are actually off in Brazil now enjoying beaches and tropical fruit juices, but before posting about that we had to say at least something about cebiche. As you may know, cebiche is basically the national dish of Peru and is taken very seriously here. We´ve eaten as much as we could stomach (no pun intended, it hasn´t made us sick yet), but it’s just not always appealing to eat a cold fish dish. In any case, along our way through Peru we made the best of our opportunities and tried cebiche in not one, not two, but three different cities, all with a style of their own.

The photo above is from our first tasting, a mixed cebiche plate we got in Trujillo (northern coast). It has half of a fish cebiche and the other half a mixed seafood cebiche with octopus, squid, etc.

Our second tasting was actually from a cebiche class we had in Cusco where we watched someone actually make cebiche from scratch! This cebiche is a traditional Cusco version made with a lake fish called Kingfish.

And for our final tasting we went all out, a full cebiche sampler plate at one of Lima’s finest cebicherias, Segundo Muelle. What you are looking at above is three different cebiches, one traditional and two mixed. The cebiche on the left is mixed fish and seafood, the center is the traditional style with just fish, and the right is a purely seafood cebiche. Yum!

La Paz, Salteñas, and The World´s Most Dangerous Road

So, before and after going to the pampas our base in northern Bolivia has been La Paz, the world´s highest capital city at 3600m. We did such a whirlwind of activities in La Paz that I don´t even know where to start, but why not start with the food, Salteñas. Mmmm, so good. Here´s a couple pics to wet your appetite a bit …

Salteñas are a kind of food filled pastry, usually coming in either pollo or carne, and they have a nice semi hard exterior and a juicy and delicious mix of meat and other goodies inside. They are typically eaten in the late morning, kind of like a second breakfast (gawd what a brilliant idea that is!) We pigged out on Salteñas while we were in La Paz and it was thoroughly enjoyable.

Aside from getting fat on Salteñas we also walked around the city a fair amount and probably our most interesting stop was the Coca Museum (yes, coca as in cocaine). The museum itself is very small and unassuming yet totally fascinating. We had already taken for granted that coca is part of the way of life of people (mainly andean people) here in the mountains and it´s been steadily available since we got to Cusco, but we hadn´t had a chance to learn much about where it came from and why it was so important. The museum explained lots about how the plant was discovered (there is a nice religious tale to that), how it became important for andean people, and how it was exploited to make cocaine.

It was quite fascinating to learn some things like … Coca Cola really did contain cocaine originally and that`s where it´s name is derived; Pretty much the only legal growers of the coca plant are the most powerful countries in the world, supposedly allowed to grow it to use for medicinal purposes. Anyways, it´s a fascinating plant and has had an equally fascinating history. Cool stuff.

So now that we are fat on Salteñas and high on coca we are ready to mountain bike down the World´s Most Dangerous Road! Chels isn´t big on biking so she passed on this trip, but I couldn´t resist it. Basically what we did was started in the morning by busing up to La Cumbre at 4700m up in the high mountains, then we went bombing down about 30km of paved road (well, as much bombing down as you can do on a mountain bike) before we reached the entrance to the dangerous part, from there it was another 35km or so down a fairly narrow road which has no rails and the shortest drop off the side is about 120m. We ended down at the bottom as some tiny place i can`t remember, but it was at 1100m, so that means we covered 3600m of altitude in about 5 or 6 hours, on a bike. whoot! Okay, the pics can say the rest …

I wish I had some kind of downhill video which I could have used, but couldn´t get anything setup. There are some more pics coming as well as some videos of people going down the road, so I´ll post those as soon as I can.

So, that´s what we did in and around La Paz. After La Paz it´s on to Sucre and Potosi on the way down to Uyuni where we´ll do what sounds to be a pretty great trip around the salt flats in the southwest of Bolivia.

The Food

So of course, besides checking out the city, people, and daily culture, we couldn´t go long without trying the local food. Everyone here tells us not to eat the food or drink the juices on the street or in many cheap restaurants. Basically, like everything else, you are supposed to be really careful because the food can be dangerous. It´s a little strange to us because we´re thinking it can´t be any worse than the street food in Asia or Mexico or anywhere else in the world, but the people insist it´s not safe.

Despite the warnings, we couldn´t resist. While wandering through the park this weekend we had to try the ceviche de chochos. The stand was packed with people so we knew there was something good coming from that little cart. We were right! And the vendor gave us a sly smile…

I´m still not exactly sure what it was, but for only $1 we got a huge plate full of what I think was a mixture of lima beans, something like popcorn kernals but bigger and a little softer, and thinly fried plaintains, covered in a salsa of red onions, tomatoes and herbs that was delightful. The crispy beans and chips slightly melted in the tomato salsas and it was surprisingly tasty.

Overall, the food here is pretty good. They have a ton of fresh fruits and juices. We pretty much get a different one everyday at breakfast, lunch and dinner, which is a real treat. The cooks in our house prepare a good variety of dishes for us everyday that are simple, but good to us because they are different. Breakfast is usually pretty small with just some toast or an egg and fruit juice. Sometimes they throw in the occasional crepe with stawberries and bananas, which is really good. Lunch is the biggest meal. We always start with a bowl of soup that is usually simple, but really flavorful and then have a plate of meat, rice, and vegetables. Dinner is usually similar without the soup.

The good thing is the cooks are really creative so we haven´t repeated any dishes yet and we get a good variety of chicken, fish, meat and usually always a fresh vegatable salad. They use a lot of yuca and make all kinds of fried mixtures using bananas, cheese, corn, etc. that are my favorite. I need to find out what´s in them so I can recreate.

Don´t want to bore you with too much food talk, but there are a few funny things they do here that are worth a try, my favorite of which is putting popcorn in their broccoli soup! Sounds strange, but its actually good! You can also try another good one – putting crispy potato slices in your tomato soup. That is the favorite dish of our Ecuadorian sisters, in addition to french fries and hamburgers – just like all little kids.

¡Buen Provecho!