What the Hell Is That?

One of my favorite things to do is cook. I love cooking. I fancy myself pretty decent at it. I know how to steal some good recipes, but mostly I like to have a go and throw some things together. Colombia is a wonderful place for that. The weather is pretty much the same all year round. Everything is always in season. The fruit and veg I'm familiar with is phenomenal and tastes as fresh and flavorful as any I've had elsewhere (oh the Mango, oh the sweet sweet Mango, and the Pineapple. Mmm). But the real treat is running into dozens of things I've never seen before.

We took a trip to a farmer's market yesterday. They had things there that Colombians don't recognize. Stuff pulled out of the belly of the Amazon and piled on a table. They great thing is that, unlike many other things here, produce is quite affordable so you can grab a little bit of everything and bring it home to try. Walking by one of the tables I asked my friend if he had seen this vegetable before. Had he tried it? Did he know what it was. No, he replied, adding. Get it. Try it out. So I came home and googled it (he went home and asked his Colombian roomate). Turns out it's a relative of a cucumber. But it tastes more like a mild pepper (think yellow wax pepper). It cooks just like a mild pepper too. Then there's the exotic fruit. We have a few varieties on our shelf at the moment. You cut them open, have a look, and then have a try. It's like all the fun of old-school experimentation without the worries about poison. The fruit juice alone is a new world of food. Lots of different fruits are good for juicing. I don't know the names of half of them, but they are good.

If you're in the neighborhood, come on down, stop by and I'll whip up a little something for you.

The farmer's market is in this great neighborhood too. By great I mean that kind of great neighborhood you see in early Martin Scorcese films. Strung-out under-age prostitutes swaying in doorways while their pips spin business on cell-phones. Alissa and I had thought about walking to it. It's not far from our house. Maybe a mile and a half. But we took the metro a mile and figured we'd walk the last half mile. We made it about 100 feet before we decided it was best to flag down a bus. I'm sure it would have been fine. It was the middle of the day on a Sunday. Sometimes you just feel like taking a bus.