Peru

Well, gang, Jasper is in Peru now, and after one day there has already done more for the food blog than I have in the past month. But since I'm posting it, can we give me a little credit? Just enough that you all don't pelt me with rotten squash when I see you for not posting at all. Now, I may be a little bit biased, but this post is so much funnier than anything I could ever write. I should probably just give my spot on the food blog committee to Jasper, but then again, he didn't make any of this food and so has no official food blog cred. Keep that in mind at the next group meeting, should a vote arise. I told him he should write for the Phoenix, but he took that as an insult (I just figured he should start small!) and proceeded to tell me that his parents were once featured in the NYT food section. I'm investigating the legitimacy of this claim...But enough of my ramblings. Enjoy!

Peruvian food varies widely. The coast is nothing but seafood, while the Andean people enjoy llamas, guinea pigs, alpacas and other adorable creatures. Not dogs though. Peruvians are civilized enough to not eat dogs. [Thanks for the shout-out, dear.] South America is where corn, peppers and potatoes come from, and in our first day we've already had several forms of each that I had never heard of. Another popular food in Peru is called "Chifa," which comes from the Mandarin word for to eat rice. It's a Chinese-Peruvian hybrid created by Chinese immigrants, and many of the dishes are to Peru what pizza is to Americans.

Dispatch One: 30,000 feet above Cuba, heading from Atlanta to Lima

On the airplane ride down, we were privileged enough to sample some of the cuisine of the Delta people. I had a delightful piece of chicken on a bed of gently mashed potatoes. The grainy yet watery texture nicely complimented the "vegetables," whose fall-apart-in-your-plate tenderness made the terrorism-proof knife hardly necessary. The real star of the meal though was the piece of bread with a "butter-like spread." Also, there was a slice of cheese from Amy's home state. I can now say that Oregon is easily in the top 50 states for cheese, though it's place there is jeopardized by the possibility of Puerto Rice becoming a state. The cookies were super though - Milanos. I later pocketed two additional cookie packs while waiting to use the lavatories for my after-dinner smoke.

Dispatch Two: Lima (photos when I return!)

For lunch we went to an awesome ceviche place near our hotel. On each table was a small bowl of "popcorn" - roasted kernels of corn that hadn't popped, but still had a nice crunch. We started with a mixed plate of ceviche, featuring delicious octopus (my first time eating this!), squid (my brother ate all of it), shrimp (o so good), and various types of fish (all melted in my mouth). The plate also came with some sort of sweet potato or yam that was rich enough to be a dessert and a super-hot pepper that my mom and I tried. It tasted like bungee jumping, except without a bungee cord. My main dish was tuna, which was maybe cooked a few seconds too long, in a pepper sauce with a yellow rice and mushroom risotto. It was all awesome food.

For dinner, we went to a restaurant that is right next to an archeological site. Part of the proceeds from every meal go towards the restoration and archeological work on the pyramid there. The restaurant was awesome, although my brother, Elijah, questioned their choice to buy so many bottles of wine when situated in earthquake territory. My dad and I split an appetizer sampler. It had four appetizers: scallops on shells with some sort of fried onion or potato (my mind is blanking from tiredness), a stuffed meat dumpling, a potato with ceviche on top, and fried guinea pig (at Amy's insistence). The guinea pig tasted a tadbit like chicken, which may either disappoint or delight you. For a main course, I had an Argentinean steak with potatoes. Strips of potatoes had been stacked to form a rectangular cube that looked so cool that I felt bad taking the first bite. Elijah had a Chifa inspired beef dish, my mom had something awesome involving fish, and my dad had ... something else. I seem to have left my memory in the northern hemisphere. Sadness. Dessert was chocolate volcanoes for me and my brother, a dish involving rice pudding for my mom, and a dessert we had never heard of for my dad. His dessert was some sort of pastry, with a chocolate covering and some sort of paste on the inside. We theorized that it might be some sort of sweet potato or yam, since it was orange/sweet potato colored. We also enjoyed pisco sours, whose taste made paces drinks seem like child's play. The waiter also paired the 3 of age (18 is drinking age!) diners' dinners with wines. My parents had white, while I had an Argentinean red wine. Fortunately, I did not pull a Mark Sanford and pair the Argentinean steak and wine with an Argentinean soul mate.

Tomorrow, we head up to 13,000 feet to start getting acclimated for our trek. Whenever I next get internet I'll send in the latest on Andean food and coca leaf tea. Happy winter and thanks for making me a guest blogger!