Eating in Quito: Part 1

So my trip to Ecuador started off in the capital city of Quito.  Quito is in a valley between mountains and is at an elevation of almost 3000 metres.  This altitude makes it hard to breathe when you first arrive and forget about walking up hills or stairs - whew!  I was winded in seconds.  And I took altitude sickness medication!

The city itself is gorgeous.  It's a UNESCO world heritage site because the Historic District is full of beautiful colonial era buildings.  This is where I mostly hung out, haunting the vendors and restaurants for delicious bits of food.  The streets are narrow and everywhere you look is a little store with someone cooking up something.

Staples in this part of Ecuador are rice, potato, chicken, fruit and pastries.  There are lots of street food vendors selling fresh fruit, beautiful juices, barbecued meats, ceviche, and roasted pig skin.  It was not abnormal to see a big pig head sitting out, waiting for some lucky person to dig in.

I saw these little piggies (right) on my first day there but I hadn't quite worked up the nerve to fully dive into the street food scene yet so I passed up the opportunity for a napkin full of pig skin and nuts.  Day two, on the other hand, had me feeling more adventurous and led to my first run in with barbecued street meat.  

It all started in this little park near my hostel - Parque Alameda.  I met two street kids who were trying to convince me to let them shine my shoes.  Instead I decided to buy them something to eat and they took me to this stand.  The skewers had chicken, potato, plantain, and some sort of sausage.  I will admit to feeling a bit nervous as the chef piled the new raw chicken skewers onto the grill right next to the cooked chicken skewers.  As well, my chicken was quite pink in a few places, but I decided that if this was how he cooked them then this was how I would eat them.  Delicious!

My next stop took me to another park in Quito - Parque Eijido (if I remember correctly).  As I wandered through, checking out all the various happenings, I saw this lovely lady serving up some of the delicious pig skin I mentioned earlier.  How could I say no?

The meal was fully loaded with pig skin, pig meat, two types of corn, boiled potatoes, and salad - all covered in a yummy creamy, salsa-like dressing.  It was lovely to just sit in the park and enjoy the beautiful weather and some authentic Quitoean food.

The weather in Quito is absolutely perfect.  The morning generally starts out warm, glorious and sunny and stays that way until about mid-afternoon.  At that point, the skies cloud over and it rains for a little while, sometimes heavy, sometimes light.  It's like the perfect signal for a nap.  The night then cools down to about 10 degrees, great for bundling up under the covers and getting a snuggly sleep (or salsa dancing until the wee hours of the night).

After surviving my first two days of eating with nary an upset stomach, I decided it was time to sample the national dish of Ecuador.  Cuy or to us English-speakers, guinea pig.

One thing that I really appreciated about the food in Ecuador was that they have no need to sugar coat what they are serving you.  There is no disembodied chicken thigh or fish fillet.  This method of serving their meat carried through to the guinea pig.  If you order half a guinea-pig, that's what you get.  Skull, teeth, soft palate and all.  Mine was deep fried and I found the taste quite mild.  The meat on the head was the most flavourful, probably because the guinea pig chews alot and so the muscles in the head get a good work-out.  I really enjoyed it!

Besides the meat, which I know I am quite focused on, there was also amazing amounts of fresh fruits available to snack on.  These little gems (right) are called ojos.  They are a most interesting little fruit.  The peel is quite thick, kind've like a tomato and then there is about half an inch of sour flesh.  A giant pit takes up the majority of the inside.  They were a great refresher after heavy meats and starches and were sold all over the place.

Another really interesting type of fruit juice that I tried was Colada Morada.  It turns out that my trip fell at a point in the year when an Ecuadorian blueberry was in season.  Nothing excites a foodie like a limited-edition food experience and this special blueberry is the basis for the Colada Morada drink.  It is a hot, yes hot, blended fruit juice with chunks of fruit in it.  Besides the blueberry, there was pineapple, strawberry and mango.  Oh my goodness I never would have dreamed it was as delicious as it was.  I am totally sold on hot berry smoothies now!

To top it all off, the prices are incredibly cheap.  My chicken skewer was $1.50, the pig skin was close to the same, a huge hunk of watermelon sold for $1.00.  Talk about a food paradise.

Next up?  My adventures on an organic farm on the coast!  I make chocolate, make coffee, eat tons of delicious food and then return to Quito for part 2!

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Shonagh explores the guts of food in An Offal Experiment.

My Award Winning Sour Cherry and Dark Chocolate Pie

Yeah.  Uh-huh.  I placed first in my category!  I can officially say that I have an award winning pie recipe!  But before I get to the recipe, let me explain my process.

The night before, I blind baked my pie crust.  To blind bake is to bake an empty pie shell.  I like to use parchment with mung beans on top to weigh my pie crust down.  This time, I also decided to shroud my crust in tin foil so it didn't get too brown.  It worked perfectly.  In the past I have tried using a pastry shield but I find that because the pastry shield sits on the crust it actually makes it brown more and faster.  Has anyone else found this?

As well, the night before, I made my sour cherry filling.  I mentioned in an earlier post that I had purchased, roasted and frozen some sour cherries.  To make the filling, I thawed the cherries, cooked them a bit on the stove top just for good measure and then added sugar and Instant ClearJel (see recipe later).  Instant ClearJel is pre-cooked corn starch that thickens acidic fruit without needing heat.  My test pie failed because the thickener I used couldn't handle the acid in the cherries and basically turned my pie into a sopping wet disaster.  This was not going to happen with my sour cherries.

With my filling and crust ready to go, all that was left in the morning was making the ganache.  I gave myself two and a half hours to make ganache and paint it on the crust.  It took me about fifteen minutes.  Yeah, I'm a bit anal about time management.

Then into the car I went.  Normally I am a hard core cyclist.  I don't even own a car in fact.  The competition was in Langley though and I was not going to cycle or skytrain out to Langley with my precious pie.  The heat would kill it!  So I found a car (thank you Grandmummy), loaded up the painted crust and the cherry filling, turned the air conditioner on full blast and made my way out to the Langley Bypass.  As I drove, with chattering teeth and goose bumps from the car's chilly air, I reflected on what I was willing to do for this pie:

1. Use chemicals.  I don't think they used Instant ClearJel to thicken up their pies in the old days.
2. Drive.  I hate the car, especially spending an hour on the highway.
3. Air condition myself.  Just the term air condition freaks me out, but hey, what the pie needs, the pie gets.

Once I arrived at the competition, I assembled my pie in the car.  I waited until then because I didn't want to risk a soggy crust.  While the chocolate ganache was there to protect the crust, I still didn't want to take any chances so I waited until just before dropping it off to spoon the cherry filling in.  Then, like an anxious mother, I hustled my little pie into its special room where it sat with all the other pies, waiting for judgement.

The verdict: And I won!  Yeah, cherries and chocolate are pretty good and it looked so pretty, though you'll just have to imagine what it looked like because in my anxiety I totally forgot to take a picture...  Sorry about that.  Ironically, I'm not really sure what it tasted like.  I only bought enough sour cherries for one pie so I am going to have to wait until next summer to make another one.  I just love the patience in seasonal fruit.






Ingredients

Pastry crust
Cherry Filling

• 4 cups sour cherry
• Pinch of salt and pepper
• 1 tbsp of peanut oil
•  ¾ cup white sugar
• 10 tsp instant ClearJel

Chocolate Ganache

• 100 grams of 70% dark chocolate, chopped finely
• 1/3 cup whipping cream

Directions

Pastry

1. Cut together flour and butter, add liquid ingredients, chill for 30 minutes minimum or up to 24 hours.  Roll out thinly, pat into pie pan and crimp edges nicely.  Wrap and freeze shell overnight.

2. Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit, line shell with parchment and pie weights and put in the bottom third of the oven and turn the temperature down to 400 degrees for 20 minutes.  Pull the shell out, remove the parchment and weights and put back into the oven until golden brown, approximately 10 minutes.

3. Sprinkle baked shell with almond flour.

Cherry Filling

1. Coat sour cherries with oil, salt and pepper.  Bake at 350 degrees for approximately an hour or until the cherries split.  Let cool.

2. Add ClearJel to sugar and mix well.  Stir into cooled cherries and stir to combine well.  Thickens up in approximately 5-10 minutes.  Chill in the fridge.

Chocolate Ganache

1. Put whipping cream in a saucepan and warm at medium-low heat until small bubbles form at the edges. 

2. Pour half of the cream over the finely chopped chocolate and let sit for 30 seconds.  Whisk gently as chocolate melts.  Once almost smooth add the rest of the warm whipping cream and stir to combine.

To Assemble

1. Paint the warm chocolate ganache on the baked pie shell.  Make sure to spread the chocolate over the entire base of the shell and up the edges.  Let chill in the fridge until the ganache hardens. Approximately an hour before serving put the chilled cherry filling in the chocolate-filled shell and allow to come to room temperature.

Notes

• Instant ClearJel needs to be added to the sugar before being added to a liquid to prevent clumping.  If you find the fruit mixture too sweet after doing this you can use a little bit of balsamic vinegar to balance it out.
• I highly recommend checking out BBQ on the Bypass.  There is tons of free BBQ sampling and for people who love to BBQ you get a great opportunity to check out BBQ set-ups and chat with people who BBQ a lot.
• I am going to add a new pastry recipe soon because I am actually not super happy with the one I am using.  I think using egg makes it too crispy so look out for that.
• This is actually a great pie for entertaining because the majority of the work is done the day before.  
• I saw this dog wearing sunglasses and I needed a picture.  Isn't that the cutest thing you've ever seen?

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Shonagh explores the guts of food in An Offal Experiment.

Braised Pork Shoulder

I think knowing how to make a tasty braised pork shoulder is a really good kitchen skill.  Why?  It's easy, it's cheap, it's tasty, it's versatile, and it's quick (kinda).  In the context of a casual dinner party, braised pork shoulder is one of those crowd-pleasing dishes.  A really good pulled pork is wonderful in the winter when it's cold outside and fantastic as part of a summer time barbecue.

I winged this recipe and if I do say so myself it turned out delicious - the leftover braising liquid especially.

Directions

1. Buy a pork shoulder.  I bought a small one, about two pounds.  Mix up your dry rub and massage it into your shoulder.  You can let it sit to absorb the spices if you want.  I decided not to simply because I wanted to use the pork for dinner. 

Dry Rub

1 teaspoon smoked paprika
3 tablespoons salt
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon mustard powder

2. Then get a pan nice and hot to sear the pork shoulder.  Sear it on all sides and then pop it back into the pan with all of the ingredients below.  Add some extra water or apple juice if there isn't enough liquid in the pan. 

Braising Liquid

1 chopped apple
1 chopped jalapeno
1 star anise
2 tablespoons of ginger roughly chopped
1 chopped onion
1/4 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup malt vinegar

3. Cover the whole mess with tin foil and pop it into an oven at 250 degrees fahrenheit.  My shoulder was small so it only took about four hours (the prep time is quick though, all you need to do while it cooks is go take a nap).  You want to pull it out of the oven when the internal temperature gets to 190 degrees or higher*.  Let it rest for half an hour.

4. While it is resting, pour the contents of the roasting pan through a sieve.  Try to remove some of the fat if you would like - I'll admit to just leaving mine as is.  Once the pork has rested (allowing the juice to distribute through the meat) it is ready for pulling.  If cooked properly the pork should shred easily using either your hands or two forks.

Eat pulled pork on its own, on a bun or in a taco with the pan sauce drizzled on top.  So yummy...

References

Cooking Time
Barbeque Thoughts

*I read that 210 is best for pulled pork.