Ecuagiving

So, I have gotten a bit behind with the blogging and over the next few days I will be filling in the gaps since my last post. There has been quite a lot going on since I enthralled my dear readers with my adventure running 22 kilometers two miles above sea level and stories need to be told. Lets start with our all-American competitive eating holiday known as Thanksgiving. My original plan for Thanksgiving was to tag along with some Peace Corps buddies and go to one of the many embassy workers’ dinner parties. Each year the well-heeled embassy staff invites poor, dirty and hungry volunteers to their house to enjoy luxuries like couches, Sam Adams beer and a meal without rice! It seemed like a no-brainer that I would be able to go to the party, I was a Peace Corps volunteer and I am pretty close with some of the Peace Corps brass. At the 11th hour, the long arm of Uncle Sam reached out and snatched away my dreams of turkey dinners in outrageous mansions paid for by U.S. tax dollars. As it turned out being a returned volunteer holds little merit in getting invited to parties, I’ll have to remember that when I try to go the Black and White Ball next year on my P.C. credentials. I wasn’t allowed to go because I am not a currently serving volunteer, well that just contradicts the whole spirit of Thanksgiving The spirit to, you know, give thanks to your family and friends and enjoy their company. Ever the optimist, I set off to trump those silly tie wearing international development workers with a Thanksgiving feast of my own. I was going to need help and enlisted the help of my great friend Ryan and after two days of planning the menu we had our feast mapped out. On our first day of shopping we went to a place called SuperMaxi, this is a giant Costco-like super market comparable to anything in the states. We spent over an hour perusing the isles and generally ogling over things such as goat cheese, bagels and Budweiser and ended up leaving the store with three items: olives, potatoes and walnuts. Not the most productive shopping trip but when literally had six dollars on us collectively. Not the most productive trip ever and we returned the next day with sixty dollars and a more devised plan. We bought a 16-pound turkey and enough fixings to fed 10 people then headed to Ryan’s house. By some wired twist of fate Ryan’s landlord has an industrial kitchen adjacent to the house, apparently his landlord used to run a catering company and they were kind enough to loan us the kitchen. On Thanksgiving Day, Ryan and I woke up ready for a full day of cooking. Collectively, what Ryan and I know about cooking a Thanksgiving bird was limited but with ingenuity and creativity we got after it. We seasoned the turkey with an enticing mix of salt, pepper, garlic, and a lot of curry, I think the curry really turned out well and added a unique taste to our bird. Some of the side dishes were garlic-curried mashed potatoes, stuffing with raisins, olives and apples, spinach salad, homemade gravy and an apple crisp for dessert. All and all we cooked for 6 hours listening to and discussing every early 90’s Hip Hop album on my iPod, Ryan happens to be a Hip Hop fan like me and we debated East Coast /West Coast style, positive versus gangster rap, among other riveting topics. Around 6 that night a bunch of friends came through, many of the same friends that had already eaten at the embassy worker’s houses but they were ready to double up and eat two dinners. For my first attempt at Thanksgiving dinner I think it went very well, we hardly used any recipes and cooked the way we thought would taste good and it did! With the leftovers we made a turkey and stuffing omelet, which was amazing and instead of zoning out to football like our compatriots stateside, we watched a bootleg copy of The Big Lebowski on a 13 inch T.V. Thanksgiving Ecau-style was great and not soon to be forgotten.