Frying Potatoes...Without the Flying Pan!

Now I have had to go through some hard things in my life but let me introduce you to one I never saw coming. The difficulty of frying food....but without the flying pans! This last Sunday I had the wonderful oppurtunity to cook United States type food for my family for lunch. I chose omelets and my favorite poppy seed cake for dessert. So to start this story off right, I should tell you that I was planning on baking the cake Saturday because it is much better when it is cooled and that way I could have more time on Sunday so I could do everything before lunch. Unfortuntelly, I lost the recipe. Not that you should be surprised by that or anything because I often do that. What was shocking was that even with everyone looking all over the house, in my room, under my bed, in the trash, for over an hour, we still couldn´t find it. And since my mom had mailed it to me, I didn´t have a copy of it on the computer. I that point I was starting to feel really disapointed but I sent an emergency help request to my sister and mom to scan the recipe and email it to me before the next morning. Then, I was invited to a party that night. I was already going to be crunched for time the next morning but there was no way I could turn down a party. :) So I got home at two in the morning and slept until 11. I started cooking at about twelve and theoretically it should have only took twenty minutes at MAX to get the cake into the oven. But then I had a panic attack. :) When I opened the looked closely at the poppy seeds I had bought (on my own), I noticed that the black seeds were mixed with a lot of grey ones. I didn´t remember any grey ones being in our cakes at home. I quickly began researching on the internet and freaked out when I learned that there is a difference between baking poppy seeds and ones for planting. And one source said (which I have now found to be inaccurate) that planting poppy seeds can be poisonous to humans. Oh crap! I was going to poison my family! So as you can guess, that was when my panic attack set it. Thankfully, after talking to my family about it they assured me that these were the poppy seeds my sister had cooked with before and since I purchased them at a food store, I was sure to be fine. Not only did my panic attack tick down the minutes but the fact that my recipe used cups and the only measuring stuff here is in grams. I had to research the converstion for each ingredient and then measure it out. Taking notes to make sure that I wouldn´t have to do it over again next time. I finally finished the cake and got the chocolate ganache frosting cooling at two o´clock. I think two hours baking a cake must be some kind of record because it should have never taken that long.

Normally we eat lunch at about two ish but there was no way I could make omelets and fry potatoes in zero seconds. Now matter how awesome I am at a lot of things, I just haven´t mastered pulling that one off yet. So Elsa ended up helping me with peeling the potatoes and chopping up the vegetables. Now I have to thank my Dad at this point for raising me with such a good collection of frying pans because when I went to put the potatoes on the stove, I only found one. Yep, that´s right. I was supposed to fry potatoes, fry vegetables, and cook the omelets all with only one frying pan. I figured I was best off using the pan for the omelets because I didn´t want to try to cook those in a soup pot. That wouldn´t work out to well. So that left my potatoes pilled up in a soup pot and my vegetables dumped into what I can best describe as a container to heat water in on the stove. Quickly my potatoes began sticking to the pan, my vegetables turned into soup, and I was running out of time. Thankfully, at about three o´clock I was able to finish everything and we were able to sit down to lunch. I have to say, it all turned out well in the end. The omelets were filled with ham, cheese, onions, mushrooms, with potatoes and tomatoes on top and for dessert we had a fantastic poppy seed cake. All of which my family loved very much.

All in all, it was a wonderful experience although next time I am going to start a lot earlier. I would also advise anyone trying to fry food - make sure they have got a frying pan first! It was a blast to share a little bit of my home with my family here and I can´t wait to do it again!

P.S. The Sunday before I had my friend Charlotte over, who is from Canada, and we made Brownies!! Here are some photos of that cooking adventure!

P.P.S. Also, here are some photos of Vero, Ivan, and I making brownies (and eating lots of them) yesterday.

"25 De Mayo" - Late Party, Hot Coco, and No School!

This last Wednesday we celebrated "25 De Mayo" which is a holiday that celebrates The May Revolution which is inderectly referred to the point when Argentina began its war for freedom. Because of this, we didn´t have school on Wednesday. Now normally, my holidays start at about nine in the morning when I first wake up, but I really want to talk about where I was when the clock struck twelve and it technically came "25 De Mayo". My friend Juli B. turned 16 on Tuesday and she was planning on having all the girls over in my class for tea and cookies in the afternoon. But after the boys hassled her about not having a party that they could go to, she decided that her party would begin at 10:30 that night and include all of our class and more. I have had a blast at the birthday parties in the past that I had gone to and so I was super excited for this one. Juli´s house is only three blocks from mine but since I am not allowed to walk alone during the night, a group of my friends showed up at my house around 10 and we walked over together. Generally, the party was like the other parties I have been to. Loud music, great food, and all of my friends just hanging out outside until the wee hours of the morning. But I swear, I could go to hundreds of this same kind of party and I would never get bored. There is just something so awesome about chatting away in Spanish with your best friends while freezing outside under the stars. I finally got home at about four in the morning and I am proud to say, I wasn´t even tired! I have become accustomed to the strange hours here and have actually begun to enjoy them. Yes, I know that you are probably cracking up reading this because every one knows that I am always the one to want to go to bed first, turn out the light, and tell everyone to shut their eyes. But not anymore! Be prepared folks, cause I am coming back ready to party! :)

So eight hours later at about noon I awoke to the sweet smell of homemade hot coco. Yumm....! It is a tradition here that we drink hot coco on "25 De Mayo". If you are curious why, don´t ask - because I don´t know! :) My sister baked a chocolate cake that we have been eating the last few days and my mama had her friend over for tea. All in all it was a fantastic day. No school, late night party, and yummy treats to fill my tummy!

Peanut Butter Package

WARNING: This post is highly packed with praise for Peanut Butter. If you are a Peanut Butter hater, I highly suggest you skip this post write now before you torchure yourself by reading this.

I am so lucky to have two wonderfuly groups of family and friends. Not only am I surrounded by loving people here but I still have my friends and family back home cheering me on the whole way. As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I needed an emergency shipment of winter clothing from Mom. Thankfully, it showed up in an incredible 10 days! I had no idea that was even possible! Now I was under the impression that I was to find sweaters and my favorite shirts in that package and although those were included like promised, I also found something more. In there was practically a year supply of Reese´s Peanut Butter Cups and a jar of organic Peanut Butter. For many people, although that would be a wonderful gift, it wouldn´t have any signifacant meaning, but when I opened up that package, I burst out laughing. It is hard to explain exactly way I thought it was to funny but I will do my best. Earlier in the month I had jokingly hinted that Mom should mail me a jar of PB but later admitted that it would probably be the most expensive jar she ever bought given that it would cost all of my college fund just to send it. :) My intention by mentioning that, if I am being completelly honest, was that I was hoping she would take a hint and send me one or two Reese´s since I was going through Peanut Butter withdrawl. :) Here I have only had one taste of Peanut Butter in the last three months and it was just a cookie flavored like it. Argentinians have yet to realize the incredible invention of Peanut Butter and are ingnorantly avoiding selling it in stores. :) Anyways, when I saw that jar of Peanut Butter and that family size pack of fifty miny Reese´s, I just couldn´t seem to get over how funny it all was! Thankfully after talking to my mom, she let me know that it didn´t cost ALL of my college fund. :) Good thing too because I was looking forward to getting that degree.

So of course I shared some of the Reese´s with my family right away. I had originally brought one big one for them to try when I first arrived, so they already new they liked them. And since I had so many little ones, I figured they were perfect for sharing with my classmates. Nobody here seems to have ever even heard of these things and keeps trying to compare them to treats from Argentina. As I have patiently explained many times, in my hunble opinion Reese´s are in a category all to themselves. Somewhere between heavenly awesome and addictively dangerous and should not be shoved into a group with anything less tasty. After trying them, they all agreed that they were very good and diffinetelly different from things here. Unfortunetelly, some of them seem to be affected with the same addiction I have recently contracted and wanted to eat all of mine. I will have to watch my stash very carefully from now on. :) But the best story of all happened just seconds ago when Federico tried Reese´s for the first time. We got on the subject because he saw me writing this and I then asked him if he wanted to try one. After peeling of the completelly unique wrapping and seeing the heavenly insides he said "Oh, it has chocolate!". Now I thought nothing of this an agreed that the outside was covered in chocolate and inside was the delicious Peanut Butter. But when Paula started laughing, I quickly learned of his mistake. In the dim light in our living room, he had mistaken the dark brown wrapping around the candy for the chocolate and attempeted to eat it just like that. Well let me tell you, it took a while for us all to finally stop laughing and for him to eventually actually try it. He also agreed that he liked it very much even though he normally isn´t a fan of chocolate. But like any actual Peanut Butter lover would know, Peanut Butter can make everything taste better. :)

All in all, it was a wonderful reminder of home and at the same time, a wonderful way to share my home with people here. And I haven´t even opened the jar yet! I think I am going to need to have a Peanut Butter Party where I have my friends try everything from plain PB- PB with Vanilla Icecream- PB with apples- to PB and J sandwhiches (which I am sad to say seems to be an appauling thought to everyone here). I should probably go to bed and dream sweat dreams of Peanut Butter. It is getting a little late. Love you all so much! Thanks for reading!

P.S. I uploaded a new photo album online so make sure to click on the link to the right of this post. Also, I will be adding more photos to some of my previous albums as I have begun collecting them from friends. I will let you know when you should go back and look at the old ones again.

P.P.S. I think I have broken the world record for say "Peanut Butter" the most times in one blog post. :)

Barn Yard Classmates

Now it might seem slightly offensive to compare my classmates to Farm Animals, but really, I mean it in the nicest way possible. :) The other day I was sitting in class (as standing would be just to exhausting :) ) when I heard these bird sounds coming from the back of the class. In any other situation when the teacher was reading and I heard something like that I would have thought it awfully rude or atleast tried to figure out who it was but not here. I didn´t even bat an eye lash. My classmates have often made strange bird sounds when ever the teachers were trying to get us to listen so it wasn´t anything new. The thing was, that day, they didn´t just make  a bird sound. Soon I heard a wolf start howling and the most realistic owl coo I had ever heard. A goat joined in and that was when I lost it with most of the rest of the class. We just cracked up laughing. Here we were listening to things about Business and Economy and you could have sworn that our classroom was actually in a animal barn and not in a Catholic Private School. Now although my classmates might act like barn animals at times, they are actually pretty smart. They have learned to only make sounds really quietly in order for the teacher not to stop them. It is that fine line between making them loud enough so everyone can hear but keeping them quiet enough so the teacher doesn´t get upset. As soon as we started cracking up, all the guys who were crowing and mooing instantly started yelling at everyone to shut up because they were disturbing the teacher. Which just got us all laughing even harder because we all knew (including the teacher) that they were the ones practicing their animal sounds. :) Eventually, we all quieted down and continued on reading. But for the rest of the class there was that constant cooing and baaing and howling coming from all over the class. It put a smile on my face for the rest of the day. :)

Here are some photos that my friends took during class (although techinically we aren´t supposed to use your cell phones). Sorry about the bad quality.

Some of the various culprets:



Mauro, Agusto, Emiliano, Pigna, and Nicolas

Facundo and Emiliano

Luciano and Nicolas

All the Advertising

Recently I acompanied my sister and parents to vote on a...hmmm... well I can´t remember the word for it but I think you will understand what it is. Techinically the age for voting here is 18 but this vote said that only people who have voted for the past four years can vote so my sister Sofia was left out. One thing I had noticed around San Juan was all the posters for who should be governor. Now this vote wasn´t about the governor directly but the important part is the difference between all the posters. There isn´t any. I hate to say this, but I think Argentinians are lacking creativity in the propaganda and advertising department. :) Not that I normally care about that stuff because usually I think of it as spending a lot of money that could be going somewhere else, but these guys have got nothing going for them. Take a look at these two handouts about the proposed change that my family was voting on. Notice the difference?

Yep, you got it. It is the giant "si" and "no" in the middle. Other than that, they are the same down to the last period. Argentinians are filled with passion about soccer, pride for their country, and protection over their families, but not an ounce of it seems to be included in their advertising campaigns. But in one way, I guess that gives people more oportunity to vote the way their gut tells them and not by many of the misleading things the comercials tell you. So in the end, maybe they thought that and purposefully left them really quite boring. I guess I might never know...

"I am freezing!" "But...aren´t you from Washington?"

So the last thing I expected when arriving in Argentina was to be cold. I thought of the culture, the people, the Spanish; I prepared for the sun, the heat, and every kind of sickness you could imagine. But I have to admit, I overlooked the fact that San Juan does in fact have winter like every other city in the world. I am now stuck in fourty degree weather and having to hussle my butt off to collect the necessary supplies to survive the winter. I feel like some kind of squirell that got the late notice on collecting nuts and is now walking on thin ice. I have got a lot of catching up to do. People keep asking me if I am cold here and I tell them yes. Everytime the reaction is "But aren´t you from Washington where it is even colder?" Well, technically yes it is colder in Washington but I never said I was warm there! Anyone that knows me well knows that I always have on more layers than everyone else. Secondly, I was not mentally prepared to be cold here. I have to get used to the fact that I will have to be careful to check the weather before I go out so I don´t end up an ice-icle. And the thing is, just because I am "cold" doesn´t mean I am uncomfortable. If I ask any one else in my class, they say they are cold and nobody seems to make a fuss. But when I say I am cold, it is like saying that I am one the verge of hypothermia and need some hot tea this very instant or my fingers might fall off!

Before I left the U.S., I had been informed that it could get down to thirty degrees here in the winter but at times everyone suffers from a litte stupidity and I only brought two long sleeve shirts. Two! I have no idea what I was thinking. I did bring a sweatshirt and a nice jacket but nothing at all that would actually keep me warm. This last week I have been managing by layering three different undershirts, a long sleeve, and a sweatshirt all at once just to stay warm when going outside. And even then, the cool breeze always manages to find its way up my pant leg or down my neck to give me the chills. The other thing I was surprised and utterly horrified to discover is that my class room apparently isn´t going to be heated unless it actually gets down to below freezing temperatures. We have a heater in our room but my classmates, who I am going to kindly refer to as idiots at times :), decide to put paper and food in it which consequently makes it so we can´t run it. So this past week when it has been fourty degress out side, I am sitting in a class room for sic hours that is not much above that. Thankfully, my uniform includes heavy winter coats and the warmest sweatshirt I have ever worn in my life (all in the school colors of course).

After discoving that my school is going to be cold all winter, I was anxious to here about my house. I now I would learn to manage with it, but it would be nice if I didn´t have to dress like an escamo inside as well. Thankfully, we do have a heater and we actually began using it the other day when if was awfully cold. But even so, I was still lacking enough clothing to not have to wear the same thing every day for the four months of winter. It quickly became apparent that I would have to ship some stuff from home so I don´t have to purchase as much. As of this last Tuesday, I have a package on the way that is filled with longsleeves and a vest. Unfortunetelly, that is going to get here anywhere between one month if we are really lucky and three months if we are not. Yesterday, I went shopping for some longsleeves that I can use before then. Not to mention, a couple sweaters that I can use for layering. I have been suprisingly successful here for I figured that I wouldn´t be able to find anything that has long enough sleeves. But actually, it is as easy as it was back in the U.S. I have purchased a few shirts and also a scarf for the wind really creeps down your neck, but I am deffinetelly lacking a little. For one, I need to purchase a turtle neck that I can wear to school under my uniform shirt. During the winter, everyone trades out the white t-shirt for a white turtle neck. I never thought I would where those again. When I was little, I used those all the time until I started to think they were a little dorky. Well I guess here they are just fantastic and everyone uses them all the time. I guess I am just returning to old habbits.

One last thing that made me want to run inside and hide under my warm covers - we have P.E. outside all winter long. Rain, shine, snow, or freezing hail, we are running and playing our freezing behinds off out in the concrete court. Unfortunetelly, today is one of those days and I actually have to go get ready. Send me some warm wishes!