Off the Map Chile Adventure: Adventures of Daily Life

I like to write about adventures, but I realize too that so many of the things that we take for granted in daily life are in fact a bit of an adventure here in Chile. Take cooking for example. When you walk into our home directly to the left is the kitchen. It is fully functional, yet it functions in a much different way. The stove has to be lit each time you need to use it. Elijah is my official match lighter. Also there are no numbers on the oven and in fact, the dial actually goes from low to hot and then down to medium. Go figure? So when I bake, I have absolutely no idea what temperature I am baking at. Measuring is a little complicated too (esp. with butter) as they use metric measurements but as I don’t have any measuring cups or spoons, it doesn’t matter much. I just put some in and hope for the best. So far so good. I have actually made some super yummy things.

Many foods that come prepared at home have to be made from scratch here. There are times I really miss TJ’s, but for the most part I have enjoyed learning to make my own. I make hummus and beans, soups, breads, sauces, jams and juices. I even tried making saag paneer. When I see something interesting in the local fruit and vegetable market I always ask what it is and give it a try. Different things appear seasonally. The berries are gone and now we have pinones and castanas (chestnuts) in the markets. There are also some fabulous squashes. One is a gigantic orange squash that they actually cut up with a saw and then sell in chunks.

On rainy days Chileans have a tradition of eating sopapillas, a fried sweet bread type treat. It's kind of like us and curling up with a cup of hot chocolate. A few weeks back we were visiting our friend Jose Antonio, and indeed it was a rainy day. He introduced us to the custom and taught Elijah how to make sopapillas.

Back to house adventures. To try and minimize chilinitis (or montazuma's revenge) we boil our water to drink. This is an ongoing process of boiling water and then storing it. Boiling, storing, boiling, storing. Not hard, just different. As I do the cooking, Achilles has taken over dishes. This is such a treat! No dishwasher though, or garbage disposal, but we do usually have hot water in the sink.

Now that it is getting colder there is the issue of heat. There is no central heating (of which I must say I have discovered that I am a huge fan!) instead, we have a wood burning stove. It is very charming, but if you have ever used a wood burning stove as your only heat source, the charm soon wears off. It is a lot of work to start and then keep a fire going. Achilles is in charge of bringing in the wood (luckily our rent includes access to a wood shed), but he still has to chop up kindling. Sometimes he makes the fire, but more often than not it is me as I am the cold blooded one who needs the heat. Of all the conveniences of home this is the one that makes life the most different for me here. Starting and tending a fire is much different than selecting a number and flipping a switch on the thermostat!

Washing clothes is also way different. We do have a washing machine, but it only washes with cold water. To dry the clothes we put them outside on a drying rack and hope for a sunny day. Sometimes we have to bring them in and dry them inside as the weather changes quickly here. They get clean and dry eventually, but not ever super clean and never that soft yummy just right out of the dryer feeling.

Luckily since we are on vacation there is time to do all these things. I really feel that I have blossomed as a cook and can make delicious interesting meals from all sorts of different raw ingredients. I also can say that without the pressure of time each day cooking and housework become creative endeavors. It is funny after three months things that seemed so different at first seem quite natural now. Life is good!