My culinary tastes and theories have been pilloried more times than I can remember, by all sorts of people. A fierce and unwavering loyalty to Heinz Tomato Soup, never having eaten a whole apple, eating Jaffa cakes according to a strict and unwavering system (nibble the sponge & chocolate from around the edge, use tongue & teeth to remove rest of upper chocolate layer, separate orangey bit from lower sponge, eat the sub-par lower spnge before savouring the divine orangey bit for as long as possible); all have aroused unprecedented amounts of scorn and vitriol from friend and foe alike. So I’m well aware that writing a blog post about the foods that we’ve encountered while in South America is likely to go down as well as a Donald Trump visit to Brighton. But I think it’s worth doing, purely because we spend so much of our time eating, or looking for somewhere to eat, or preparing food! Also I know it’ll probably make Ollie Bartlett choke on his quail’s eggs, an image I can’t help but enjoy.
It needs hardly be said at this point that Evie probably agrees with very little of what I’m about to write. Food is a subject that often arouses disagreement between us, though I feel we have improved from the early days in Peru where we’d be trawling around for, if not hours, at least a sizeable number of minutes, looking for somewhere to satisfy our taste buds. Often at least one of us would be pretty grumpy by this point, not helped by me taking a ‘George Osborne approach’ to food expenditure for the first few weeks of the trip.
Here are some of the foods that have had an impact on our trip, for good or ill. In alphabetical order:
Asado – Just means ‘barbecue’ in South American Spanish I think. Argentinians & Chileans flipping love them. I actually think barbecues in England are grossly overrated. I have no desire to stuff myself with cheap Tesco burgers and sausages burnt to a crisp, that would taste much better if they’d just been cooked in an oven. Over here, they literally just suspend big slabs of meat over hot coals, let it cook for an hour or two (they’re seriously big) and then give it to you to eat. There’s sometimes a vague effort made at a salad, but I think everyone present is aware that it’s primary function is to justify the consumption of a colossal amount of meat. We were very lucky to stay with families who had mastered the art; I’ve never met a man who loves asados as much has Pato Oyarzun, who I think treated us to more than one per day during our stay!
Banana and milk – Supposedly a Chilean delicacy, I have my severe doubts. It’s just bananas and milk in a blender, so it tastes like banana milkshake, which tastes fine I guess. Obviously far, far below strawberry and chocolate in the milkshake stakes, and can be done without.
Chicken feet – They look horrible and quite sinister. Someone told me they’re a delicacy, I don’t believe them. They taste fine but have v little meat on them. I guess their consumption is born out of an admirable attempt to put all of an animal to use.
Chinese – For some inexplicable reason (or complex cultural and historical reason that I’m unwilling to research), Peru, and to a lesser extent Chile, has a very strong Chinese influence. While we didn’t see huge numbers of Chinese people, we did see Chinese restaurants on basically every street. It was slightly different to English Chinese (which I know isn’t actual Chinese but then it is to most people who will read this as take up of the blog in the Far East has been very poor). Dishes like arroz chaufa (rice & anything leftover from yesterday), lomo saltado (meat, onions, tomato, pepper, rice, chips) and lomo pobre (basically the same but with an egg on top) dominated the menus. What they lacked in variety, they made up for in low, low prices. When we did finally find ‘Sweet and Sour Pork’, it was radioactive, as you can see below. I don’t know why the Chinese have a presence in Peru, but I’m glad they do.
Churrasco – It’s just a very moist slab of meat in a big sandwich, with lettuce, mayo, tomato and other stuff if you wish. So simple, so elegant. Like David Beckham. Chile, Santiago in particular, is renowned for it.
Crisps – They don’t do flavours of crisps here. 95% of them are plain, you’ll occasionally see some dodgy Cheese Doritos that taste horrible and some cheese puff type objects that really should be outlawed. Prawn Cocktail? No chance. Salt and vinegar? Forget it. Cheese and onion? Jog on. (You get the picture). In my head I imagine a South American, on their first visit to England, going to Tesco, reaching the crisp aisle, and dropping to their knees, weeping, and hammering their fists into the floor at the overwhelming variety of flavours and colours on offer. If anybody has confirmatory evidence for this happening please let me know.
Dulce de Leche – This is literally just caramel in a packet/pot. There are various things you can do with it, my favourite is to eat it, neat. I almost got through a whole 250g while watching one episode of House. Also nice on pancakes, crackers and bread. I don’t know why it doesn’t exist in England.
Fanta Naranja – Not technically a food but I’ll make an exception. Forget everything you previously knew about Fanta. The English version is an absolute disgrace, a vaguely yellowish coloured liquid that tastes of the oranges that weren’t good enough for Tesco Everyday Value Orange Juice, let alone Minute Maid or Tropicana. Fanta Naranja is a different beast entirely. As you can tell from below, the first thing you notice is the vibrant and unapologetic bright orange colour, which seems to be saying ‘come and get me, if you think you can handle it’. The bottle is almost vibrating, I presume due to the huge quantity of E-numbers and sugar contained within. It tastes as good as the following things, if only they could be captured in taste form (pick the one that resonates most with you); an Ian Bell cover drive, Enya singing a lullaby to send you to sleep, Roberto Carlos’s free kick against France, finding £20 in your jeans just before you put them in the washing machine. Yeah, wow. Another product I’d love to see in England, though Jamie Oliver would go flipping mental.
Inca Kola – Another non-food sneaking into the list. Would you like to try a bubblegum flavoured drink that looks like dehydrated urine? No, me neither. But we’d both be wrong. It’s a very hard taste to describe (not least because as far as I’m aware bubblegum is less a flavour and more a thing, you wouldn’t get anything chewing gum flavoured). But whatever it tastes like, it’s borderline addictive. I’m pretty sure no Incan ever actually drank it.
Llama – Yeah I’ve eaten llama. Sounds outrageous and boundary pushing on paper, kind of like eating a baby kangaroo. In reality it just takes like quite dry beef. Unlike most animals, it’s best product is definitely not it’s meat, get a nice fluffly llama wool jumper instead.
Nectarines – I like nectarines now! They’ve jumped up from nowhere to be number one in my list of favourite fruits (if you’re interested, 1. Nectarines 2. Strawberries 3, Watermelon 4. Tesco ‘Easy Peelers’). They’re just so sweet and juicy, and the fact that they’re fruit gives me a little, probably unjustified, moral boost. Eating one is like doing a good deed. Evie warns me that in England they’re much less nice so I’m filling my boots now.
Palta – The Spanish word for avocado. They’re everywhere over here. Nothing makes me want to be a hipster less than the fact that their signature food is the avocado. If instead it was Sainsbury’s pre-filled Chocolate Crepes, I’d consider donning some skinny jeans, a Che Guevara t-shirt and some unnecessary, kooky glasses. But no, it’s the avocado. I don’t know exactly what it is that sparks my disgust, but it’s a combination of the outer colour and texture (olive green and the face of a gnarled old man respectively), the inner colour and texture (mint green and an unnerving mixture of soft & hard) and the taste (awful). I haven’t even eaten any while we’ve been here, I just had some things to get off my chest.
Roast – Yeah, you could hardly find a more quintissentially British thing than a nice Roast. But we never claimed to be particularly adventurous in our tastes. When we’ve had our own kitchen in Airbnb places, roasts have been a big winner. They’re very easy to do and always taste delicious. Plus, when there’s only two of you, you can get 3 meals out of them by having cold leftovers in sandwiches, then making soup with the rest of the carcas. Just call us Aunt and Uncle Bessy…
Salteñas – A nicer version of Cornish pasties, except they sometimes contain olives and bits of hard boiled egg. Incredibly messy to eat, particularly with a beard. Beware of biting in too deep too early though; the insides, like apple pies, are hotter than the sun.
Sublime bars – Only sold in Peru and Bolivia, these bars containing peanuts surrounded by a smooth and uncharacteristically generous layer of milk chocolate were a big hit during our first 2 months of travelling. Unfortunately returning to Peru now for the last leg of the adventure having experienced the much nicer chocolate of Chile & Argentina has spoiled them a bit. Never go back to an old flame, isn’t that what they say?
Tomatoes – I now like tomatoes as well, and eat them whenever offered. Not particularly interesting to be honest, only included because I know if my Mum reads this she’ll weep with happiness at my slightly increased vegetable (yes, of course it is) intake.
Apples – Not in the right place in the alphabetical order, and I’ve still never eaten one. If either of these things annoy you I’m glad.
Rings & Rucksacks 