Cooking in Peru
Much has been written about the many great foods of Peru, but let me give you some insight in the process of cooking, how that great yummie food ends up on our table.
Now my experiences are not representative of all of Peru. There is a world of difference between the elite in Miraflores who have beautiful grocery stores, cooks and maids, and the rural population who live of the land and cook on a fogon. I can only speak from my own experiences living in a middle-class area of Cusco.
What you need to know in order to grasp the concept of cooking in our neighborhood, is that there are many small stores and very few larger stores in Cusco. In our complex, there must be 6 or 8 of these 1-man or 1-woman stores, like the one in the picture below. Each store is about the size of a big pantry and serves maybe 2 or 3 apartment blocks.
One of the little stores in our neighborhood
Just for contrast, a little bit of background about the process of cooking in the other cultures I’ve lived in:
Cooking in Belgium:
Belgian people are super-efficient, in an old-fashioned, hard-working, German kind of way. In addition, for many in the graying population, the Depression and World War 2 are only a generation away, so their comfort level is to stock up a ton of food in their pantries, freezers, etc.
In my house, this is how we used to cook:
(1) Dad peels potatos — God knows Belgians eat a lot of potatos.
(2) Mom gets meat and vegetables out of pantry / fridge / freezer.
(3) 20 minutes later everyone’s at the table eating and another 20 minutes later the dishes are done.
Cooking in the US:
In the US people do everything big, not just in Texas. Twice a week I used to stop at the grocery store on the way back from work and spend $100 or more on groceries. I’d eat as much red meat in a week as I do now in 2 months. Seriously.
(1) Drive home, fire up the grill.
(2) Open bag of salad and put baking potato in Microwave.
(3) 15 minutes later dinner is ready.
Cooking in Peru:
Let’s take a typical weekday, lunch is the big meal. The cooking is usually done by mamacita or my suegra.
12:15 – Hey, it’s time to start cooking.
12:17 – I’m going to Señora Maria’s store. (see above).
12:22 – At the store, there are three or four other ladies from the neighborhood. Everyone talks, and talks for a while.
12:47 – I’m back from the store. Time to cut the vegetables.
12:57 – Holy guacamole, you realize you forgot to buy onions.
12:59 – You go back to Señora Maria’s store only to find out it is now closed, Señora Maria is also cooking. No problem, you go to another “store” 200 yards away.
13:05 – The lady at the other store has the new Avon / Esika / L’Ebel / Leonisa or whatever catalogue, so you check it out.
13:24 – Walking back to the house with your 2 cebollas, you run into your friend from “collegio” and talk for awhile.
13:48 – Back at the house you chop up the vegetables and potatos and throw them into the trusty pressure cooker along with some noodles. Soup will be ready soon.
13:50 – Don’t forget the rice. I think Peruvians eat more rice than Belgians eat potatos.
14:02 – Time to set the table.
14:04 – Yell at your ayudante (in our case, my sister in law). Helen, Heeeleen, Heeeeleeen.
14:12 – Tell Helen to go to “the store” and buy something to drink. Helen and my suegra then argue about what kind of soda to buy and how much money to spend.
14:15 – Food for the wawa (baby) is ready. Papi feeds the wawa.
14:26 – Table is set, Helen came back with soda, soup is served.
14:35 – “Segundo” or the main course is served.
15:50 – Table is cleaned and dishes are done.
Until tomorrow, then we do it all over again 
I have to work 10% harder this year
The man who destroyed my previous employer (or at least he spearheaded the destruction) invented this illusion of 10% earnings growth every year. That kind of corporate BS is NOT what I’m talking about here. In my case, it’s a plain and simple truth: if I want to have about equal income every year that I’m in Peru, I have to work a good bit harder every year.
The reason is that most of my work as a contract pilot or consultant is paid in US dollars, but my groceries are paid in Peruvian Nuevos Soles.
And here’s how the US dollar has been fairing against the Nuevo Sol this year:
US$ vs Peruvian Nuevo Sol - 1 year chart
And 5 years:
US$ vs Peruvian Nuevo Sol - 5 year chart
View charts at XE.com.
Here’s an article about Peru’s central bank as well as the central banks of other so-called developing economies taking measures to prevent their currencies from rising too much:
And here are Peru’s foreign currency reserves over the past 10 years, standing at around $40 billion at this moment. Chart shamelessly robbed from IKN:
Peru foreign currency reserves
Now foreign currency rate swings are nothing new and I am not predicting the demise of the US dollar or the end of the world here. But it should come as no surprise that consistent near-zero interest rates and monetary easing (printing money) in the US will erode its currency’s value.
When I was a young boy in the early 1980s and Belgium developed large budget deficits and high unemployment, I could not understand why the government just didn’t put all the unemployed people to work printing more money, kill 2 birds with 1 stone.
No matter what the guys in stuffed suits tell you, how they saved the world and you owe them eternal gratitude all that, the fact remains that some future generation in the US (mostly) will have to deliver $40 billion of goods and services to future generations of Peruvians.
Mario Vargas Llosa wins Nobel Prize in literature
Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa won the 2010 Nobel Prize in Literature today. The first South American to be awarded the honor since 1982.
Read the full story at the New York Times and most other major news outlets.
This is a great honor for Vargas Llosa and I hope it will spark some interest in reading and literature in Peru, where average Peruvians in my observation read very little.
Mario Vargas Llosa
Foto (c) Sara Krulwich, The New York Times
Peru elections 2010 – ley seca
Yesterday Peru held local / municipal elections. I don’t follow politics very closely but the local elections seem to be quite important because in the provinces outside Lima the local government seems to be more relevant than the central government back in Lima.
Here are the official 2010 Peru election results.
What amazed me about the elections is that the entire country was “dry” by ley seca. No alcohol was sold in the country during the entire election weekend.
Papi votes in Belgica, so no ley seca for papi! Mamacita went to a birthday party Saturday evening where I believe the ley seca might have been enforced a weee bit loosely as well 
no ley seca here!
Salud!
Forget 2012 – watch the ice on Ausangate
I shamelessly robbed this picture of my friends FB page, just gorgeous:
Nevado Ausangate near Cusco, Peru
Picture copyright Jorge Vera.
The picture’s caption:
Eerrgghhh, if Hollywood can’t get the end of the world correct, surely Facebook can, right
All kidding aside, the indigenous Peruvian people do worship the “apu” or deity in the many mountain peaks of the Andes. “Nevado Ausangate” or “Apu Ausangate” is a magnificent mountain peak in the Southern Andes of Peru. It is the site of the annual Señor de Qoyllur Rit’i pilgrimage which has origins in Andean culture long before Christianity.
From The Sacred Land film project:
More info about “apus” from Apus-Peru:
About us
View from Machu Picchu, Peru
Read the story about 2 tickets to Lynyrd Skynyrd, love over gold, and our move to the beautiful city of Cusco, Peru.
Ward Welvaert & Patricia Carrasco
Cusco, Peru
contact: ward DOT welvaert AT gmail DOT com
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