Foto Friday # 79

One of the stoves and ovens in the slightly eclectic "Andres Carne De Res" outside of Bogota in Chia, Colombia.

Foto Friday # 51

An open air butchers in the small pueblito of Giradota in Colombia.

Foto Friday # 28

As Winter is with us now, I am reflecting on past travels that add a ray of sunshine to my life. This woman was selling some good juicy fruits in the Colonial City of Cartagena, Colombia.

Foto Friday # 1

This is the small house we lived in for six months or so in Colombia last year. It's in a small parcel of land outside of El Retiro, and about 45 minutes from Medellin. I miss it a little.

Herbario – The Herb Garden

Herbario, we visited on a few occasions and one that every tourist goes to at least once on an extended stay in Medellin. All the new tourists (with their prepagos) just head to the naff eateries in and around Parque Lleras.

Herbario was a new concept when in opened in Medellin. You were given the choice of ordering a different starter, a main course and a dessert. To be able to do this a few years ago was unheard of. A novel concept had hit Medellin. What I really hated about this was that the waiters came over and explained the concept to you. So condescending I thought.

The norm up to this point was to have the “menu del dia”. Which consisted of a soup, main course and a drink. So to be able to order different courses excited the normally traditional Paisas. Normally these fads come and go, but with the good cooking of Herbario it stayed. Plus more Paisas were actually leaving the country for extended periods of time, where as before it had all been those folks from Bogotá. Things were a changing for the returning Paisas.

Our last visit to Herbario was actually very similar to the other times we had eaten there. The menu had not really changed that much. Same cuts of meat, but now came with different sides and different sauces, but in essence it’s the same menu they opened with all those years ago. Time to mix things up a bit I think.  Maybe the chef is too scared to drift to much.

Now Herbario is a good restaurant, a great one by Medellin standards. In fact by Medellin standards its one of the best, but comparing it to places in New York or London, then it’s pretty so so. You could get the same standard of cooking here for half the price you pay in Herbario in Medellin. But this is from a region where people still eat beans and rice at least twice a week. I know I did.

But Medellin is a restrained city and its people are just making there way into a wide world of exotic flavours and foods. They are a people who take two steps forwards and one step back all the time. Traditional people who are just starting to open their eyes a little bit wider. To some it is fascinating, to others it scares the living daylights out of them and Herbario to those who can afford it is helping them on their way.

Queareparaenamorarte – What should I do to make you fall in love with me?

I started to write this blog several months ago, then after a while I forgot about it, but sitting here in North London, I may as well finish it and post it. There is another one, which I shall post in a week or so, maybe.

I first saw Queareparaenamorarte on youtube. It was on an Anthony Bourdain show he did on Colombia. Well actually on Medellin and Cartagena. (Link here).

The name Queareparaenamorarte is a title from an old Colombian song. Which means What should I do to make you fall in love with me? But as being Paisa they have a play on words with that true Paisa dish the arepa. Get it. It’s a Paisa thing, what can we say. You either love them or not, that’s arepas.

The food in this restaurant which sits in La Fe is regional Colombian fare, dishes taken from all over the Colombia. Some recipes seem to be from someones Nan, Aunt or whoever. It’s a mixed bunch.

I’d heard from people that the food was fantastic, well presented, but everyone had the same complaint. The portions were small. Very. What we found was perfectly portioned food. Normal size for us, but for Mr and Mrs Average Paisa the portions were super duper small. Starter size even.

On the youtube video people are singing the praises of the restaurant owner, who is seen hovering over a cook waiting for a chorizo to be cooked. He then takes a piece off the grill. Not very hygienic, but makes great television.

The first time we went, we just sat in the bar and had a beer, when Faustino Asprilla (ex Newcastle footballer and all round Colombian superstar) walks out and jumps in a car with some hot blonde and shoots off. I would have run out and grabbed a foto or autograph, but my beer was getting warm. So I left him in peace. Well he only played for Newcastle.

We went back a few times after to sample the food. I somehow preferred day time eating than night time eating in Colombia, as I always used to goto bed on a full stomach. Never a good thing.

The place is always jammin’ on a weekend afternoon, with the high society of Medellin popping in more to see and be seen than actually eat. I could be rather cynical here and say they wouldn’t understand the food, but you would have to be pretty dead not to enjoy it. For Medellin and area it’s some of the best.

I can not actually remember what we ate when we went during the day, as it was such a long time ago, but when we visited it at night once, we had the mixed platter of little nibbles. A couple of chorizo, morcilla, chicarron (crispy pork skin and fat), platanos. Well basically everything you will find up in the mountains above Medellin, but all served together in bite size morsels. Nice, went down pretty damn well with a few beers, and watching those lovely people of Medellin see and be seen made it a fun evening. 

Isla del Rosario – Great Food, but Someone Paid the Price

The beaches in and around Cartagena are to say the least, pretty crap. Dark brown sand, dirty looking water. They are jammed packed with vendors selling their wares. It’s harassment every 5 seconds.

The list of things to buy on the beach are endless, ranging from drinks, sweets, fruits, cooked fish, t-shirts, sunglasses, local curios, massages and you can even get your hair braided.

After walking up the entire length of the beach we decided that it was pretty pants. Plus it was a quiet day, so the amount of harassment was enormous. Too much to handle.

Trying to get away from everyone, we ended up in the so called fancy Hilton hotel. I used an old trick I always used in the Middle East. It’s amazing how by just being a white tourist, how much you can get away with. We spent the afternoon in the pool. Noone battered an eyelid or questioned us. All you have to do is make out you are staying there. I have friend who on stopovers from Singapore, regularly visits 5 star hotels in Dubai and uses their amenities.

There are some nice beaches about an hour or so by boat from Cartagena. The largest is on La Isla Rosario. We booked a couple of nights at a hotel belonging to the Santa Clara. An ex nunnery now transformed into Cartagena’s most stylist hotel.

The hotel has only about 16 rooms. All created to give you that feeling of class and style. Something, since I stopped being a travel agent. I have missed.

The hotel has 2 beaches, they are both small and compact. The sea is nearer to the Caribbean that I know, but not quite. Most of the visitors to the hotel only come for the day. So after 4pm the island is pretty quiet. A great place to relax.

The menu for lunch and dinner is short and sweet and heavy on the fish. Which, staying on an island is pretty good, and makes a lot of sense.

A lot of the food as in most professional kitchens is kinda precooked. Difference in the kitchens I have worked in is that all food is chilled as quickly as possible. Reason being is bacteria thrives at between 8˚C and 64˚C. So you have to get food down below this as soon as possible. We do this with a blast chiller. A super duper freezer type machine that blasts so much cold air, that within less than 90 minutes all food is more or less bacteria free. Well as long as you heat it above 72˚C for a minimum of 2 minutes before service.

From what I can gather speaking to people and looking in kitchens. Not many if any have blast chillers. I heard of a large chain of restaurants here in Colombia that pour their sauces in plastic bags and dunk them in buckets of water to cool them down before sealing them. A hot house for bacteria.

Now there is a theory that us in the West have become more suspectical to bugs and bacteria in our over mollycoddled lives, and peoples in other parts of the world are more resistant to these bouts of food poisoning.

The restaurant on the island served some fantastic food cooked in their kitchens. The whole red snapper had crispy skin and soft juicy flesh. Everything we ate there was perfect. Even la Cazuela del Mar had a fantastic taste and was full of different types of fish.

Now only one of us had that Cazuela del Mar, and only one of us suffered a bout of food poisoning in the worst degree.

A morning of vomiting followed. We were supposed to check out at 12pm, and the boat was not till 4pm. Surprisingly the hotel allowed us to keep the room till the boat was due to leave. Makes sense really, who wants to see a vomiting guest whilst you are eating.

Now I can only think of one reason for this. The soup had been left to cool down all day, more than likely in the pot, rather than in a fridge. Or had been put straight in the fridge after cooling a little. Which means it was full of bacteria. The pieces of fish were cooked in the soup when it was ordered. Or were cooked separately at that time, as they were soft and juicy.

Back home this would have meant a visit from the health inspector, and closure of the kitchen. Something in Colombia that I am sure never happens, as monies always change hands to prevent these things from happening.

Cartagena – A Great city

Cartagena seems like a dream now. A wonderful walled city still in pristine condition. Those tranquil streets, the smell of the sea, the slight breeze that cooled my face in an otherwise very humid city. The colourful houses, adorned with flowers and trees. Oh how I wish I could still be there.

Why oh why it took me 10 years to go there is quite unbelievable. I believe that if I’d visited it before. Maybe the last 7 months would have been spent in Cartagena. Oh how my Spanish would have been a lot different. Maybe better, depending on whom you spoke to.

Cartagena as we know it today was founded in 1533, but the area has been inhabited for the last 9000 years. First by the Puerto Hormiga Culture, then later all along the coast by other people like the Tayrona communities.

These communities flourished until about 1500 A.D. when Los Conquistadores came and well we all know what that brutal group of people brought did.

Over the following few hundred years, Cartagena flourished and was one of the richest cities in New Spain.

But with rich cities far away from their lords and masters, they were prone to attacks from pirates or independent businessmen, as I like to call them. But that depends on whom you speak to. A friend of Lina’s in Argentina, does not call me by my name, only el pirata.

One of the first pirates to pillage Cartagena was by a French nobleman Jean-François Roberval, who was a privateer licensed by the king of France. Years later a Basque, Martin Cote would attack the city.

This brought about a programme of defence building. Namely building walls around the city. But Spain being Spain, didn’t rush into this. It took over 200 years to complete the defences of over 11 km’s of wall, with the culmination of the building of the Castillo San Felipe de Barajas.

This finally put an end to the successful attacks by some pirates like John Hawkins and Francis Drake, who ransomed the city to the equivalent of $200, 000,000 of today’s money. All good for the English crown.

Cartagena declared its independence from Spain in 1811. Since then it has seen good times and bad times, but recently the times have been very good.

Today it is the major tourist destination spot in Colombia, and is on the route of the large cruise ships which call into Cartagena for a couple of days, and the passengers wander around getting ripped off by the local vendors.

The tourists as in other old colonial cities are keeping Cartagena in the pristine condition it is today. Thankfully it’s not only foreign tourists who come to Cartagena. Colombians come in droves during December and January and flock to its beaches. It’s kinda funny all the Colombians head to Boca Grande, a strip of beach several km’s in length jammed packed with high rise hotels. Where as all the foreigners head straight to the old city for its quiet, tranquil streets, it’s good restaurants and serenity.

The Colombians come here for the beach and beach only. Which is kinda odd, as it really is a bad beach. The sand is a dark, dirty colour. The sea is not that turquoise green colour we dream of in the Caribbean. It’s also very rough.

But it’s such a difference from the mountains of the interior, that noone really minds.

You can either just drop a towel or rent a small tent to shade you from the sun. In the busy season you will be called upon every few minutes to buy either fruit, drinks, cigarettes, cooked fish, sunglasses, shorts, t-shirts, towels, curios, even massages are offered on it’s beaches. To say it’s a piece of hell is an understatement.

For me Cartagena is only worth going to for the old city. Not it’s beaches.

The people are also very friendly in a genuine way. I have become all too aware of the non genuine way people are friendly in Medellin, but here it was genuine.

Los Cachacos, this literally means “the people who wear suits”. Which is how los Costeños, people from the coast call the non-Costeños. Los Cachacos all think they are superior and above Los Costeños, who regard Los Cachacos as uptight and too materialistic. Los Cachacos all think Los Costeños are lazy. But if you had to work in the heat of the coast, you’d slow down a lot also.

I found the people from La Costa as very warm, friendly and very chilled. Oh how I envy them. Their lives are spent in the street, as it’s so warm, so why not.

La siesta is a big thing there, which is probably why the mountain people think those rather relaxed folk by the sea do not work much either. But I’ve never seen street cleaners work up to midnight before.

The area we stayed in was Getsemani. No garden here. It’s the cheapest place to stay in Cartagena. A few years ago, rooms in certain hotels were rented by the hour. We saw a few down and out scrubbers peddling their wares outside a few bars. It’s amazing how people find ugliness so attractive..

But in these prosperous times, the area of Getsemani is being dolled up to be the hippiest place to stay outside of the old city. Lot’s of Boutique hotels are springing up along its streets. All of them have small pools for you to relax in and cool down from the afternoon heat.

I loved Cartagena and when or if I return to Colombia. It could possibly be the only place I will visit.

Raspado, Shaved Ice Drink Heaven

What works best on a hot day, when your mouth is dry and your body is overheating?

A fizzy drink, that doesn’t quite hit that mark and leaves your mouth dry 5 minutes later.

A bottle of water, that may cool you down for a while but just doesn’t satisfy you.

Well in Cartagena there are vendors wandering around with rickety old carts, loaded with bottles of fruit syrups and big blocks of ice waiting to refresh your spirit.

The drink is called Raspado. It literally means grated or shaved, and in this case it’s the ice that is shaved.

A block of ice is shaved into a bowl by an ancient machine that may have been used to do the same thing in his grandfather’s day. The vendor scoops the shaved ice into a paper cup and a fruit syrup of your choice is poured over the top and allowed to soak in. To finish it off, condensed milk is drizzled over.

It’s sweet and fruity, it definitely cools you down and it so hits the mark.

It is an act of faith that the ice is made from clean water, but as people in the Americas have slightly stronger stomachs than us folk in Europe or North America, no one seems to give it a second thought. I seem to have an iron stomach after so many years of travelling in Asia, so I survived this near death experience, as someone would call it.

The choice of syrups was numerous. I choose mora (loganberry), as they are the only berries that you can buy in Medellin, well apart from unripe yellow strawberries and I’d become kinda addicted to its tart taste.

The condensed milk adds a sweetness that works well on this cooling sweet drink. It went down very well, and it was cheap, which in Colombia makes it a hit.

Cartagena – A Very Welcome Change

To say the food in Cartagena was a welcome change is a bit of an understatement. After 6 months of eating nothing but rice, beans and over grilled tough, tasteless meat. La Costa was a slice of paradise. Why we never came here before is beyond me. It really is.

The city is divided into 2 parts. The old walled city, and everything else.

Everything else seemed like anywhere else in Colombia or the Caribbean for that matter. A large, noisy, chaotic, mad city. My kind of town.

The old walled city is like stepping back in time. Well kinda. It’s a piece of paradise.

It is one of the largest and best preserved old cities I have ever been to. There were very few dilapidated buildings around. Everything was well maintained, streets were clean. Not too much traffic. Actually sometimes I had to pinch myself to remember I was still in Colombia.

The food in the old city is a lot better on average than say in Medellin. As they cater to tourists more, the restaurants are a bit modern looking also. Food is a bit more modern too. No beans, rice and meat here. Well kinda, as the menu of the day on the coast is very different from the interior.

The menu del dia on the coast is coconut rice, fried and squashed crispy plantain, and fried or grilled fish, plus the typical Colombia salad. That never changes.

The coconut rice is cooked with a coconut paste, which is derided from a fresh coconut and fried till a dark brown colour. This is then added to the rice and coconut milk and cooked in the normal way. It ends up a dark brown colour but with a fantastic coconut flavour.

Take a green plantain. Cut it in 2cm thick slices. Deep fry it. Then squash it in a machine similar to a tortilla press, but smaller. Then deep fry it again till crispy. Sprinkle it with garlic salt and there you have a patacon. It should resemble a large gold coin. So named after the money of the Spanish colonial era.

The fish is any that is fresh that day. Either fried or grilled. Sometimes over done, but thankfully most of ours was done just right. All this is finished off with a small salad. It’s a Colombian tradition to serve salad with everything. Ask my mother-in-law.

All washed down with a freshly made fruit juice. Not bad for a maximum of £3.

But Colombians are very traditional, inward looking people and I could after six months that I’d be just as mad here as Medellin. Well maybe not, but you get the drift.

But they do offer other coastal delights in the menu del dia. Plus a lot more different items on their a la carte menus, than your normal eatery in the mountains.

As we were in Cartagena in the off season, we missed the Miss Colombia extravaganza by a week or so. Bummer. We actually saw the “supposed” most beautiful woman in Colombia one day. It’s amazing what a touch of make up can do to a woman. As she looked a little rough in the flesh. She was never my choice, but what do I know, I’m not an obsessed observer.

Anyhows, Cartagena was a little empty. A lot of restaurants were empty, with a few jammed packed. As they were in the best areas of the old city.

One of the best and fun places we ate at, was called “Pizza en el Parque”. The pizza was pretty good, but you just sat on a wall opposite the small hole in the wall. The pizza was delivered to you and put on a stool in front of you. The pizzas were good, beer was cold and the prices cheap. Plus you had the added bonus of watching the world go by as you ate. A favourite pass time of mine. The place had some odd combos. Like pears and apple. Please. But we had a good time none the less.

Also big on the coast is Cazuela de Mariscos. A coconut flavoured stew jam packed with fish and shell fish. The ones we had were thick, flavourful and crammed with fish. Yum yum.

Cartagena is possibly the most expensive city in Colombia, but you pay for the location mostly and it was well worth the extra expense. I just wish we’d gone there years ago. As I’m sure we would have headed straight to la coasta instead of the mountains. Hey ho. We know for next time.

Cartagena – There and Back again. A Journey by Bus.

For some strange reason, I had never been to Colombia’s Caribbean coast. Shameful I know. Even more shameful is that I had never set foot in the old walled city of Cartagena. I’m told that you have to visit Cartagena or you’ve never been to Colombia.
So as we have decided to leave Colombia and return to Europe. I felt I had to see this wondrous city at least once. I wish I’d done it 10 years ago. What had I been missing?
So on the spur of the moment, we decided to take a trip there. But how were we going to travel there? By plane. As we only decided to go about 72 hours before hand. It would have been very unlikely that any seats would have been available. But as Colombia is hideously expensive to travel in, especially by air. We shelved that idea. So the only alternative was by bus. 12 hours it was then.
Thankfully for this long journey the buses are pretty good. Air-con, not by Malaysian standards, where without thermal underwear and artic socks, you will get a touch of frostbite. That actually happened to me once in a cinema in KL.
We were told by the two bus companies that have the best buses between Medellin and Cartagena, that the journey time was 12 or 13 hours.
We took the early morning bus from Terminal del Norte. Amazingly busy at 6am. I’m sure I haven’t woken up before 7am since we arrived to Colombia back in May. It was difficult to say the least, and I slept the first 3 hours on the bus.
Now, on all buses I have travelled on in my many travels in the world. The buses always stop somewhere enroute for us weary passengers to grab a breath of fresh air, stretch our legs and grab a bite to eat.
Amazingly this driver only decided to stop once. At 9am in the freezing heights near Yarumal. A beautiful town, set upon the slopes of a mountain.
The pit stop we stopped at was a normal place where they sell overpriced bad food. Couldn’t face anything, except a bad empanada and a papa rellena. Why people sell shit food at truck stops amazes me. Especially when it’s so expensive.
This was our only stop of the day. The driver later reckoned he told us to eat all we could, as we weren’t stopping. He finally relented at 3pm, and gave us an extra 5 minutes somewhere in La Costa to buy a few treats.
The trip through the mountains, plains and finally the Caribbean coast of Colombia took us over 15 hours. I was climbing the walls to get off it.
We passed some great towns, like Piedras (Stones), Planeta Rica (Rich Planet). The scenery was pretty spectacular as well, going from mountains to plains to coast.
Thankfully I had my Ipod with me, and was catching up on 3 weeks off podcasts. Got my fill of Premiership football.
When we finally arrived, the heat that greeted me was like a slap in the face. Damn it was hot, and this was nearing 9pm.
After a blissful week there. The return journey over night was blissfully smooth and short.
It took me a week to persuade Lina to travel by night, as she was still remembering the dark times in Colombian history, where travelling by night included the extra entertainment of being robbed by bandits.
Thankfully nowadays under the leadership of this president, those days are long gone. Hopefully never to return.

Arepas

The arepa is more or less one of the only true indigenous foods to come from South America that is still popular today. This native bread originated from the Northern Andes of either Colombia or Venezuela.
They are essentially made from ground corn or maiz flour, salt (sometimes) and water. The dough is formed and then shaped into rounds, however big you want them, and then either fried, grilled or baked.
I do not know anyone who makes arepas the old fashioned way, and I am pretty sure I have never eaten one either. Nowadays, everyone uses a pre-cooked arepa flour. In the good old days, the days of “las abuelas”, to which everyone in Medellin reminisces about. Those poor old abuelas soaked the corn kernels, peeled them, ground them in their large mortars, known as pilónes. This they then dried, boiled and then ground into an arepa dough.
As you can see, it was a time and labour intensive way. So thankfully for las abuelas of today, it’s a lot easier to make arepas. You can also buy ready made ones as well. Even made with yucca flour. I know! Only problem with these aprepas, is that they are lower in nutritive value and it’s protein is decreased by half.
Most people in cities and large towns today buy premade arepas. It’s easier, and less time consuming. As city inhabitants have no time for to spend 5 or 10 minutes mixing the flour with water and salt, and then shaping them,.
I have become less of a fan of arepas as time goes by, except for arepa de chocolo. It’s the only one I like nowadays. They are so sweet, and have some flavour.
Arepas are generally eaten at breakfast time. Grilled, then buttered and a tad of salt on it. Then as my wife likes it, with lashings of quesito smothered on it.
There are countless restaurants selling arepas with all types of toppings, and I mean all types of toppings. These range from a simple cheese topping, to the Antioqeunan. Which as you would imagine comes with beans, platano, chiccaron and slices of avocado as a garnish. Hideous. But we are in Antioquia. Don’t go to a sushi bar, you get a paisa roll. See ingredients above. Not good.
In the area we are currently in, visitors from the city come here to sample a bit of the countryside for the day or night if they have a farm nearby. There is a small outdoor place that has a giant sign saying “Ricas Arepas”. From Friday nights to Sunday afternoons it is jammed packed with those city folk getting their fill of handmade arepas, that little bit of the country life they desire so much. Thing is I’ve eaten the arepas from there. They are ok, but not rica as they claim.
There is another type of arepa,, called arepa de mote. It’s made with the ashes of a fire. They are mixed in with the flour, and it gives the arepa a greyer colour, and some added taste and texture.
There was a story going around about a small town, somewhere in Antioquia, that the entire population came down with some serious illness. After many months of doctors testing, patients getting more and more sick. Noone coming up with anything. Someone discovered that the inhabitants of this pueblo had been eating arepa de mote a few times a day for many many years.
It turned out that the ashes added to the flour, in small doses is actually quite beneficial to the digestive system. But continual doses over a long period of time have the opposite effect.
Thing is, this being Colombia, the people of this town apparently still regularly eat their favourite arepa de mote.
Will they ever learn. I doubt it.

Chocolatina Jet – The Best Worst Chocolate in the World

It really is the best worst chocolate in the world. Not a lot more can be said really. The scary thing is, I have become addicted to it. It is a real struggle not to buy large packs of those small choccie delites. Well maybe we should not call it chocolate, as I’m sure some chocolatiers in Switzerland would take it as an offence. I do sometimes.

The good thing about these small bars, is that you get a sticker in each one, that goes in their album of the animal kingdom. Bad for your health, good for the brain. It reminds me of the dinasour album that I used to try and fill for many years when I was a wee child.

So now the excuse is we are only buying the bars to fill the album. Honest. Only about 150 more stickers to go.

We are going to look like a bar when we are finished.

Hamburgesas de la 80

Every country has it’s after hours food. That really bad food that you love to eat after you’ve had way too many drinks on a Friday or Saturday night.

My weakness was those kebab vans that you always found near pubs. It was a love hate relationship. They tasted soooo good once you lost all your taste buds. But once you were sober you despised yourself for eating such shit. They used the cheapest meat sucked off the bone by a machine then compacted into this oval shape ready to be cooked and then reheated time and time again until it was sold.

In Mexico I used to eat a lot of Gorditas. Deep fried fatty tacos. Just watching them cook you put on a few pounds, and your arteries clogged even before you took your first bite.

In Egypt the countless times I ate a Dynamita. A loaded pita sandwich that had everything bad for you in it. But soooo good…

All of these foods I have eaten and only should be eaten after several drinks. Never have I seen these foods being consumed by sober people. Until I hit Medellin. La 80 is one very long street and at several places along its busy roads are stalls selling some bad nasty food.

Not only are they bad for you health wise, but the portions are huge. The burgers would make any grown Texan cringe.

Did you know that all Paisas are banned from eating contests, because for them it’s an everyday meal.

Las hamburgesa stalls de la 80 are famous for cheap filling food. Only good for eating after way too many beers, but as I said the amount of people young or old, fat or thin cram around these nightly stalls gorging themselves on these monstrosities. Without been intoxicated.

As a so called foodie, I have my weaknesses. And these fatty, greasy foods that are not good for you. I do not know why, maybe it’s being in a city surrounded by bad and badly cooked food, that has weakened me. Please forgive me.

Maybe this is what this blog is all about.

Forgiveness.

Please forgive me for even thinking of going to these stalls without consuming unimaginable quantities of alcohol.

Please forgive me for my repeat visits to try all what they have to offer.

Please forgive me for ordering the special version of everything. Ie the larger version.

Please forgive me for actually thinking that as they have quails eggs they must be sophisticated, and therefore somehow ok to eat.

Please forgive me.

Please.

Versalles – An Old Favourite

I have been eating at Versalles for more than 10 years now. I first discovered it whilst I was staying at a small hotel in central Medellin. The smell of those Argentinean and Chilean empanadas made sure I was a regular visitor.
From then on, whenever we visited Medellin to see family. I always made sure we ate a meal there.
Now, as we are living here, we really have no need to goto into the center. But if we are there, then lunch has to be had at Versalles.
The food is not amazing, not out of this world, but what they do they do it well. Plus the restaurant has a charm that is rarely found in the world these days.
The service is definitely old school. All the waiters wear white jackets and look as old as the place itself. I’m sure some of them have been there since day 1. But even for their age they flit between tables, picking up empty plates, delivering food, greeting customers like old friends. Some of the regulars I am sure are.
The walls have a scattering of photos of Argentinean writers, artists and intellectuals. The restaurant was at the forefront of an intellectual scene in Medellin in the 50’s. I’m pretty sure the décor is today as it was when it opened. Just a lick of paint every 10 years or so. Sometimes I close my eyes and apart from the accents I could be in a small family place in Buenos Aires.
What they specialise in apart from the empanadas is the milanesa. Theirs is a thin piece of beef, breadcrumbed and lightly fried until golden. This is served with some papas ala francesa and a tomato, onion and lettuce salad. Oils and vinegars are awarded separately. As you would expect to find in B.A. you can also have it with a sweet tomato sauce, which is the Napolitana option.
Their menu of the day is always : soup, grilled meat, rice, chips and a salad. Well we are in Medellin, and those Paisas love their carbs. You also get a juice, which changed daily, followed by a bowl of ice cream and a coffee. It is more than you would pay elsewhere, but you do get more, and hey, with great old fashioned service like this its well worth it.
It kinda reminds me of a little of the New Piccadilly that once stood the test of time in central London, until some greedy land developers forced them to close by upping their rent. I hope this does not happen here, as every city needs a place to remind you of a gentler time. And if any city needs that, it’s Medellin.

Fish by the Lake

As we only had orders to keep us busy for a couple of days last week. We decided to make the most of the free time. So we made a few trips around la zona to see this part of Antioquia. It’s amazing really, just by taking a side road you see a whole different landscape.

It was a glorious few days. The scenery in this part of Colombia is truly beautiful. Smaller and smaller country lanes took us deep into the countryside. Field upon field growing all manner of vegetables. Cows relaxing in the fields munching on the grass. Chickens pecking at the side of the road, and dogs sleeping in the middle of the road.

On one of these days we ventured to El Peñol and Guatape. The later is on the shore of a large lake. The small town gets jammed packed on the weekends with day tippers from Medellin. The town is famed for its watersports and its fish, either to eat or to fish.

On our hot sunny Wednesday, it was a little relaxed, but still quite a few people had ventured out there, like us to see the place with a more tranquil feel to it. These small towns that play host to the stressed city folk at weekends change personality over night. Monday to Thursday they are small, nothing happening towns. Come Friday night they are thronging with hordes of party revellers. Everything happens on the weekend. But it is nice to see the otherside of these pueblos.

As I said Guatape is famed for its fish, cheap fish at that, and there are many restaurants that line the shorefront. All have the same menu and prices (more or less). All feature heavily on trout and bagre. (Cat fish). But as we are still in Antioquia, grilled meats and frijoles have to feature on every menu. There is no escaping it.

After a more or less pleasant stroll through the village center, and trying to avoid the restaurant and boat touts. I’m not really into those short trips on lakes for 30 minutes anyhows. And doing it alone would have been really dull. The view from the shore was just as good.

As it was around lunchtime and my belly was telling me to eat. We stopped in one place called “Vaso e’ Leche”, just for the name really.

I went for the catfish, which came floured and fried. More than likely deep fried, as everything is here. Lina had the trout apanado, which is supposed to be like milanesa, but it was deepfried also. Ohh we are in grease heaven.

Deepfrying food is a non cooks way of cooking. It’s a lazy way out. Also so is over grilling meat. We were in a small place a few weeks ago, and the meat was so tough a filling came out. It was tougher than old boots. A phrase to which my dentist, did not understand or find funny.

The catfish actually had a nice flavour even though it was swimming in grease. If I can find some here I will def buy some. But I think a quick grilling will do it justice.

On the route back we saw lots of handmade stalls set up to sell freshly caught fish to those weekend trippers. The few we saw that had fish for sale looked quite fresh, but in this heat, they must spoil quite quickly.

Next time we go, bring the cool box.

Alberto Lechona – Where pigs goto heaven.

We were told about this small joint, which has been sitting in the same spot since 1974 serving wonderful plates of lechona. Which is a Spanish/Latin version of the Italian Porchetta, or my favourite the Balian Babi Guling.

So after a small shopping spree buying the necessary bits and bobs for our home cooking business, we stopped there for a small lunch.

They sell the Tolima version of lechon. The pork is served mixed with rice and a small salad, with a delicious crispy piece of skin on top. You can either buy a pound or half pound of meat. As my belly is growing at the moment and I am trying to stop it reaching out so I can not see my feet, I opted for the half pound version. The waiter looked at me if I was some sort of nancy boy.

Lina had a (large) Tolima tamale. She got a respectful nod form our waiter. The Tolima version of the tamale comes with more meat, less maize. The Paisa version is the opposite. It came with mixed meat of pork (of course), chicken and a boiled egg, which had all been steamed inside a banana leaf.

I like eating tamales, and I helped Lina finish hers, but after a while the maize just gets to me. I think I’m anti-maize, which explains why I’m not a big fan of arepas.

My lechona was perfect. Nice soft meat, crispy skin and was the perfect size, even if the waiter kept giving me dirty looks as he walked past. No tip for you.

So when instead of having one of those huge hamburgers or hot dogs on La Ochenta late at night after a few beers in Medellin, I will be heading to Alberto’s for some delicious porkie treats.

Lunch at Mondongo’s (again) – Bandeja Paisa.

For some reason, we never managed to eat breakfast today. We were in a rush to get a delivery down to Medellin before 11am. So by the time we dropped off our consignments to their relevant places, we were famished. Where to eat was the burning question. As we were quite close Poblado, and hadn’t eaten at Mondongo’s for quite a while. Well it was a set deal.

I was starving. You could be mistaken that you were hearing a storm coming. No it was my stomach screaming for food.

So it was not going to be the baby portion of their fabulous tripe stew for me, but a Paisa portion. But I felt like a change, as Lina was having the baby portion, I could steal off her plate. So I wanted to see what else they did. I felt like a bandeja paisa.

This I have to admit was not one of the better ones I have had. The minced meat was so finely ground that it was really dry. And how I crave for somewhere to serve me a fried egg that still has a runny yolk. The beans were ok, needed a bit more salt but ok. All in all I’d give it a 6/10.

What I enjoy about eating at Mondongos, apart from eating mondongo. Is people watching. And as we were in the affluent area of Pobaldo, the people are more fun to watch.

Medellin is well known as being the plastic surgery capital of Latin America, and I’ve seen all types of implants here. But to see a 14 or 15 year old girl fresh from the surgery with two black eyes and a heavily bandaged nose really took the biscuit. Is vanity reaching an ever decreasing age here. Maybe it was a present for her Quince años. Beats a trip to La Costa I suppose.

I also noticed a lot of men eating the mini portion of mondongo, and their female companions eating the full blown gut busting portion. Maybe the men are becoming a little vain themselves and dieting now. Where as the women know they can just goto a surgery and have it trimmed off. Maybe this is a public version of matriarcado.

The Medellin Food Show

I was supposed to publish this right after the show, but I’m just pretty damn lazy these days….. But better late than never ….

The food show was billed as the spectacular culinary event of the year in Medellin. I’d been to one or two food shows before, and sometimes they are a little disappointing. This one fitted that bill perfectly.

It was held in the Jardin Botanical, which is trying to set itself up as a culinary wonderland. They had closed the Botanical Gardens for this 3 day event. They also decided to impose an entrance fee of 16,000 pesos, which to a lot of people is a lot of money. Grudgingly we paid and entered.

The fair was set up in 3 different areas, quite close to each other. One area was designated to foods from around the world (?). These included Peru, Mexico, and Ecuador and from Colombia, the State of Boyoca was being highlighted.

Another area was for food demonstrations. We were there for over 3 hours and never saw sign of one.

The final area was where the stalls were selling locally produced culinary delights. All everyone was selling were jams, conserves and sauces. It occurred to me looking around that people here really have no imagination. When one person comes up with an idea, instead of going forward from there, everyone copies. As everyone was selling literally the same products.

As we wandered around, we noticed no one was giving tasters. Now, I am a sucker for buying stuff at markets, if I have been able to sample a little bit of it. Maybe they were worried that people would just taste and walk away and not buy anything. We were given lengthy talks on the products, but when we were expecting to sample a little. Alas no. So we did not buy. Shame.

Back to the first area, a restaurant represented each country invited, and they had prepared dishes for people to try. Small tasters I think are the best way to describe it. These were not free, but the dishes we saw were 6,000 pesos each.

The look of the food from Ecuador and Peru did not tempt me, as it was mainly stir-fries. Not very Latin. The Mexican stand was only selling tacos. Lot’s of them. They were really busy. It had been a while since I had eaten a good taco. So looking at the list I had to have a mole and a tinga one too.

It was pure Mexican street food. The taste was superb, slightly less hot than you would get in Mexico, but Paisas can’t take much heat. The consistency was a little too runny, but they had made it in bulk, and to last for a while. Apart from that they were pretty good. The price was a little out of order. $3 for a taco that would normally cost less than a tenth of that back in Mexico. But hey ho.

We only tried a loganiza from Boyaca. It’s kinda like a chorizo but filled with chicarron (kinda similar to pork scratching), and a few other bits of meat. It was pretty damn good, but as was only a taster, not enough of it. It went down well with the beer I was drinking.

All in all it was a pretty crappy fair compared to others I had been to, but for Medellin this was a big deal.

On a positive side it is showing Medellin going slightly forward in a land of inward looking people. But for me it is too slow. I’d say they are where England was back in the 70’s or early 80’s. In some restaurants the decoration is a bit too much. I mean who really wants to eat a whole sprig of rosemary. But on the whole, at least they are moving forward.

Mondongo’s

There is something about tripe that sends me into ecstatic excitement. I can remember my Nan cooking tripe and onions as a child. Not sure if I ever ate it back then, as I was a fussy kid. I still won’t eat brussel sprouts.

Tripe or mondongo in Spanish, hence the name of the restaurant, Mondongo’s.

They do of course sell the typical foods of Medellin. Bandaja Paisa; frijoles; carne asado. But you can get that anywhere. The one and only reason I goto Mondongo’s, is to eat Mondongo.

There are 3 restaurants in this chain. One near to the University where I am studying Spanish at the moment. One in Poblado, and one bizarrely enough in Miami. The Mecca for all Latinos.

The stew or soup that they serve comes in 2 sizes. A normal size, which they call the half size, and a slightly larger version, which would easily make Mr Kresote a content man. As I’ve commented before, I can only ever eat the baby portions, which still leaves me full and content.

It comes with a few accompaniments. A slice of avocado, a couple of small arepas, rice (of course), a slice of fried platano, a bowl of finely chopped coriander, and jars of sweet chilli, and a hotter version.

You can order a few extras, like, chicharron, morcilla and the like.

When the bowl of steaming soup arrives. I gaze at its beauty. This bowl of offal, which some many people find repulsive, sends shivers up my spine. I immediately scatter over some chopped coriander and a good hearty spoonful of hot chilli sauce, lastly is a squeeze of lime. I give this a mix around, and dip my spoon in and fill it to its limits.

What most people hate about tripe, is it’s smell. Thankfully this soup does not smell of anything but goodness. The initial taste is of the freshness of the lime, the herbyness of the coriander and then the spiciness of the chilli. The tripe only shows itself in the texture of its honeycombed body. The small potatoes are only there to beef up the stew, and a good job they do as well. The base of the stew is a rich chicken stock, as most soups here are, even the vegetable soups.

You also get a quarter slice of avocado. Which always gets left behind on my plate. Rice, which I spoon into the soup and moisten it with the soup broth. A banana is present also, to which I have never been able to figure out why, but I eat it nonetheless. It doesn’t make the soup any better, but I like bananas, so I don’t complain. The small arepas, just fill me up, again I like them so they get eaten also.

I sometimes have an extra order of chicharron and fried platano also. I love the crunchiness of fried pork skin and the sweetness of the platano. It’s pure heaven.

I’m still waiting and probably will wait for a while longer for their bean stew. It’s been saying soon for quite a while now. But as soon as it’s available I will break a habit and try something different in the Holy Temple of Tripe.