Panaderia Canadiense

I have a set of these that were passed down to me from my grandmother; they've always been explained to me as corn dishes, although I generally use them for pickles and relishes.

It's dishes. Dinnerware is just post-traumatic stress syndrome for a shell-shocked chef.

Havana Club Blanco, San Miguel Silver, and 100 Fuegos Blanco are all excellent white rums, but honestly without the molasses they're all just basically soft Aguardientes - so Cachaca 51 is the best example.

I'd cover the broccoli, but other than that you're probably just fine to re-roast it. You might find that it makes the flavour of the veg more complex, though.

That confirms that they're not exporting it, then. Too bad - it's one of the best ron agricolas I've ever imbibed.

Also, experiment with the countries of origin for your rum. There is a vast difference between Puerto Rican rums, Cubans, and Jamaican ones, which are worlds away from mainland rums from Colombia or Ecuador (which may be more difficult to find, but which truly are worth it.) I'll second Chris' vote for rhum agricole, as well. It's a completely different playing field. Chris - have you ever tried a rhum agricole from Ecuador called Zhumir Reposado? EDIT - OP asked for recipes.... Try a Cairpiron. Muddle a small lime at the bottom of an old-fashioned glass. To this: 2 oz rum (your choice. I like San Miguel silver because then the drink is clear, but it's also excellent with a Cartagena style black rum) a dash of soda water rocks.

I sometimes use instant mushroom-cream sauce powder when I'm too lazy or exhausted to make the real thing....

You've obviously never dealt with Latin American waitstaff in their own milieu, Tim. I'd never invade the kitchen at a fine dining venue, but in a regular restaurant if they mess things up, I'm going to speak to the chef.

... which is why I generally march right back to the kitchen and talk to the chef directly, bypassing the server completely, if there's a problem with my food that's kitchen-based. (If the server gets my order wrong, I take it up with him/her, but if it's something like I order a steak Medium Rare and it comes Well, I'm going to the kitchen.) It normally shocks the kitchen staff sufficiently that the problem is dealt with, either by replacing the offending meal or discounting on the bill.

You can also take the cores and skins, boil them up in enough water to cover, strain, and simply chill and drink the resulting beverage. It goes down quite smooth (it's sweeter than you'd think), and is even better with a dash of white rum and a bit of strawberry juice.

OK, way back up there somewhere we've been talking about fast foods and their effects on the populace. I'd like to put in a kind word for the Andean notion of fast food. Most US and Canadian small towns have at least one burger joint, whether it's a mom and pop organization or a chain, which is responsible for "food on the run" for that town. In the Andes, we have what are called "comedores" the best of which are simply holes in the wall with a couple of tables. What do they serve? Three course, home-cooking style meals (soup, main, dessert, fresh juice, all of it made fresh that day), in 5 minutes or less. When you say "fast food" to an Ecuadorian, they'll immediately think of their favourite comedor, not the burger chains (which are only in larger centers, and which are often more expensive.) The mom and pop burger joint and the comedor have about the same overheads, but the food coming out of the comedor is head and shoulders above the burger joint in terms of balanced nutrition. I'd pay $1.50 for just the burger at the mom and pop (if I was very lucky - I'm Canadian and food prices up there are absolutely loco, as Darienne will attest), but for the same amount at the comedor I'd get a nice vegetable and potato soup, often with some kind of dumpling or a chunk of meat in it, followed by a plate of stewed or quick-grilled meat with rice, potatoes, and salad, and a nutritious dessert normally including large chunks of fresh fruit. This is washed down with fresh fruit juice that was made when you sat down and asked the restauranteer to feed you. Granted, at the comedor I have absolutely no choice - I eat what they're making that day. However, the quality more than makes up for it, and even in the smallest towns there are three or four of these places, all of which will be offering something different. It's just a matter of asking the proprietor what's for lunch or dinner.

How often do they visit the market? Does that person work a job also? Are the producers of fixed priced goods large and well compensated? People visit the market once a week, on whichever day is market day. They're generally also employed at jobs, but employers here recognize the importance of market day and will normally give employees time off to do their shopping. The great bulk of people who shop at the market where I buy my food are women, some of whom will be domestic employees who are actually being paid to do the shopping for their employers along with their own weekly shop! In cities there is also a Municipal Market system with vendors in attendance all week; produce there is a bit more expensive (stall rental is passed on, and many of the stallholders are middlemen) but if you've run out of critical ingredients or get unexpected visitors, they're incredibly convenient places to shop. The fixed-price goods producers are generally farm cooperatives - one board negotiates for dozens or even hundreds of small farmers. Because of the political system down here, the coops have considerable leverage with the government (it would take only a one-week coordinated strike by the growers cooperatives to oust the president) and such they're fairly well compensated. This is a food-policy win-win, actually. The farmers who produce fixed-price foods aren't subject to market volatility (which can be a real killer in Latin America) and it also ensures that even the poorest people in the country have access to affordable staples, which means that malnutrition is unheard of here.

I think the way you define "food" is also important here. I'd argue that the schmook sold by "fast food" chains doesn't qualify, and that there's a great difference nutritionally for the end consumer between paying $1 for a cheeseburger and $1 for a nice mess of greens at the market (those are my local prices).....

Most people will travel up to the length of an Andean city (ie up to 100 km in Quito) to buy at farmer's markets - but the bus fare in urban centers is 25 cents regardless of if you're going 5 blocks or 500. Fixed price goods are available in all of the corner tiendas (little family-run stores), which in all cases are never further than 2-3 blocks from any given house (the one where I shop truly is the corner store; it's about 30 steps away on the corner). At the farmer's market, I routinely meet people who caught an interprovincial bus from 80 km up the road (which means they spent 75 cents on bus fare) to buy and sell at this particular market, because there are fixed-price goods available in permanent shops within the market area, in both small and bulk quantities and often a bit below the government-regulated price. I'll see if I can dredge up a photo of the market, because it's about 16 square blocks in size with permanent roofed areas and permanent shops and it buzzes with people on Mondays. Yes, here it is. This is one of 16 roofed areas, specifically the one that deals with local apples, peaches, pears, and stonefruits. Taken on a Monday. Ecuador has the advantage of being quite a bit smaller than the US - we'd fit comfortably inside Texas with room left over. This means that even if you live far away from a major center like Ambato, you're always close to a small town (within 30 minutes), and small towns have tiendas and generally also farmer's markets at least one day a week. The other thing that differs greatly here from North America is the excellent, inexpensive, and widely available public bus system. Even if I lived way out in the sticks, I'd still be able to walk out to the main road and catch a bus to my closest town or city very easily, since they run every half hour. Also, how big do you think Ambato is? By our standards, it's more of a small city, only 300,000 people within the metro boundaries. The only thing that makes it appear large is that it's spread along a pair of valley systems and doesn't extend much up the walls of its valleys. The true behemoths are Quito, Cuenca, and Guayaquil - cities of over 2 million with immense sprawls. What we've got that other large centers don't is central location and altitude (2,500 meters up in the central square, closer to 3,000 meters where I live). This said, if I lived off in Valle Hermoso, my nearest town would likely be Pelileo, a burg of 20,000 with a bustling market and all services. It's not like in the US and Canada, where if you live in the sticks and go 2 hours to your nearest town, you're lucky if it has 3 stores. That's just not the culture here. Even the tiniest hamlets will have fresh markets, stores, phone booths (these are shops filled with phone booths), and all other services.

I had Canelazos, which are shots of homebrew sugarcane alchohol in hot spiced peach juice. I should really know better, but they're so tasty!

But GR, those of us who defend chocolate and orange are defining the chocolate as the dark stuff, which is by definition not so rich or sweet (since dark chocolate must be at least 60% cocoa solids and the best is generaly 75% or more) - it's then a marriage of two excellent, slightly bitter flavours, namely cacao and orange (peel, at least for me). The reason I eat chocolate is precisely for the bitter, complex flavours available to me in dark chocolate - I won't touch anything under 60%. I find that the fattyness and sweetness of milk chocolates is off-putting, even when there are macadamia nuts in presence.....

Stan: OK, you've got a point for North America, but here in Ecuador food policy does directly affect the prices of staple goods. The government has fixed prices on milk, rice, potatoes, bananas, and a number of other crops to ensure that they don't rise or fall. 1L of milk is 75 cents and has been for about 5 years; it's unlikely to rise in the future. There's also much less of a culture of growing your own anything here than there is NortAm - the attitude here, due to our progressive food policies as well as our enviroment, is that it's cheaper and easier to buy from the farmers at market than it is to grow your own tomatoes. I'm often viewed as odd for having removed the grass from my backyard to make space for my banana plants, tomatoes, lettuces and whatnots....

Pras, I'd be looking at the fruit ales - Apricot, Blackberry, Raspberry, and Peach ales are lovely, malty, and have less of the bitter flavours you don't like. In Canada, the Alley Kat brewery's ApriKat is an excellent example of the genre.

Hate. Pure, golden-yellow hate.

Fresh green tea leaves from the Sangay plantations on the floodplains of Volcan Sangay here in Ecaudor have been my drink of choice ever since I found them at the farmer's market. It's truly amazing with a little bit of Seville orange squozen in just before drinking. I'm also drinking an excellent 42-herb and flower Horchata from ILE of Loja (where the drink originates.)

I think it's a great idea, Stan - especially since food policy is what determines, by and large, our food prices and many of the attitudes towards growers/growing.

No worries! It's one of the most popular cakes at my bakery.

^^ I love horehound candies! There used to be a fantastic grubber in my province that sold them, yet alas, no more....

I'd like to stick up for orange and chocolate as a mixture, but only insofar as it extends to chocolate-covered candied orange peels.... Absolute worst candy ever? Down here we have something called Jaaz, which are at their base fairly agreeable fruit-flavoured drops. What ruins them is the addition of gross quantities of menthol.

Value on farmer's time is what shows up in the prices of the food, particularly here in Ambato where 99% of the produce comes from about 10 km away or less - this, along with "truck pooling" (everybody in a given community will pile their produce into one or two trucks) makes gasoline price overhead for small farmers in the farmer's market system negligable. Hence what they charge is almost 100% for their labour and production costs. I'd also note that production here is a whole lot less intensive than it is in countries that have winter. If you plant a seed here, it grows. Particularly in my area, where an active volcano ensures that the ground is always well-fertilized. (Point of fact, it's just finished an eruption!) Also, for the greatest bulk of farmers here, pest control is done by turning the chickens loose in the fields to gobble up the bugs, and fertilizer comes from those same critters. Small farmers simply can't afford chemical ferts and pesticides - so they end up with less expense that way, and I benefit by getting food I know is 100% organic. Monsanto has also been banned from the country by constitutional decree - people here save their seeds from one generation to the next, and heirlooms are big business. This is not to say that the farmers from whom I buy my produce are poor in any way - they've often got fabulously large and well-decorated houses, they own their own land, and they'll generally have several vehicles and be putting kids through university on what they make off the fields. In contrast, I'm actually much less wealthy than they are, since even though I own a bakery, I rent the house I live in and have no vehicle. HA! In Ecuador and Peru (and Colombia, and most other Latin American countries), we use lovely big bags recycled out of old flour sacks. That's hilarious - nobody here would be caught dead with a market basket for their purchases - they simply aren't large enough or comfy enough to carry! The groovy eco-baskets are only sold to tourists.... There is a definite "trendy" aspect going on there. The noveaux-riches of this country wouldn't be caught dead at the farmer's market where I shop - good lord, they might step in some llama poop, or be subject to the slightly disagreeable smell of a ripe Borojo, or have to interact with the indigenous grandmothers who actually grew their strawberries! How terribly common! The people who buy their produce at the supermarkets have more money than good sense and/or are desperately trying to forget that their own grandmothers were small farmers. I believe I did note that I buy mushrooms and asparagus at the supermarket, simply because they're not available anywhere else. What I do buy at the supermarket is good cheese, garbage bags, rum, and detergents - they're cheaper there than anywhere else simply because they can order those things in hideously large volumes. However, when it comes to fruits and veggies, grains, spices, and eggs, the farmer's markets will always have the stores beat hands-down for price and quality. --- Thinking about this in greater depth last night, I also recalled something about Ecuador. The country is food-sovereign in a way that very few others are. If we stopped importing all food tomorrow, the only thing that would change is that the price of beer would rise a bit (due to a switch-over to domestic barley) and we wouldn't have peaches in the "summer" - other than that, people would continue their lives in the same manner that they do today and with the same variety of food available. We have a saying here, which actually says a lot about the country and its attitude towards food - "in Ecuador, to starve you'd have to give up chewing."