The day I ate some alpaca [YQrtw Day 90 Jul 8]

Location: Arequipa, Peru

[The internet at my homestay couldn’t connect last evening so I couldn’t upload this post until today!]

Although today’s main event was my 5-hour long Spanish classes (with breaks in between), I thought you would be more interested in reading about eating alpacas for lunch. I’ll get to school talk soon.

After class, I headed to a restaurant which my teacher recommended. The place didn’t have the Menu of the Day at 2:30pm so I chose something a la carte.

The most interesting items seemed to involve alpaca so I ordered one that was drenched in sweet pepper sauce with some ravioli.

Alpaca steak tastes like gamey beef steak

The texture of alpaca is a bit like beef–slightly tough. However, the taste is very different from beef.

My dish of alpaca tasted a little like not-so-well prepared mutton. Or as someone on Facebook corrected me, it tasted “gamey” not “smelly”.

Alpaca is definitely not on my list of Best Meats to Eat (TM) and is probably down at the bottom somewhere with crocodile meat.

After my meal, as I walked back to my home stay, I saw two alpacas grazing casually by the roadside. That’s insane!

Back to school!

I’m taking Spanish classes again in Arequipa. Lessons and accommodation here is definitely cheaper than Buenos Aires. Plus, I get to have one-to-one lessons instead of group lessons.

I was supposed to walk to school (2 freaking miles!) today but the school coordinator and her husband picked me up from my homestay place instead. The morning traffic in Arequipa looked horrible from my view in the car.

I had two different teachers for my lessons. For the first 2 hours, I had Senorita R, the next 2 with Senor J and the last 1 hour with R again.

I think I spoke more broken Spanish in these 5 hours than the whole 1 month and a week that I’ve been in South America. Most of the time, I spoke like this: “I loves to eats Japan food.” “I have a journalist.” or something grammatically, vocabularly incorrect.

Of course it’s all about learning and I’m learning a lot. In fact, I felt like I was learning too much after 2 hours but got into the groove by the 5th hour. I hope that by the end of the week, I’ll be rather good at Spanish. Hopefully.

#FoodFriday Piscola in Chile

Welcome to YQtravelling’s FoodFriday–the day of the week when I show off some of the lovely eats I had while travelling.

Today’s post is not a food but a drink. Salud!

I used to be allergic to alcohol. I would break out in angry rashes whenever I drink wine or anything with more than 5% alcohol.

However, I treated this allergy by introducing a bit of wine into my body slowly. Now, I don’t break out when I drink glasses of sparkling wine but I still cannot drink too much alcohol.

Piscola--Pisco and coke — Piscola–Pisco and coke

While I do not drink during meals, I discovered the very delicious Piscola (pisco with Coca Cola) which I do not mind having with my food.

I’ve heard alcohol drinkers call this combination “like rum with Coke”. I don’t know what rum tastes like so I’ll take their word for it.

Besides Piscola, I like Pisco Sour a lot. It’s pisco with lemond and limes (some of my favorite fruits!) and egg white. It’s sour but sweet.

I always finish drinking it before I can take a photo. Drats.

What alcohol do you like to add Coca Cola with?

#FoodFriday: How to cook steak in a hostel

Welcome to YQtravelling’s FoodFriday–the day of the week when I show off some of the lovely eats I had while travelling.

Today’s post is a special feature where I give you tips on how to cook yummy steak in a hostel. Let’s eat!

When travelling, eating out at restaurants is a good treat. But if you need to save a few pesos/dollars, cooking will save you more money.

Since I’ve been in Argentina, I’ve cooked steak in my hostel kitchen for about 5 times. My hostel-cooked steak usually costs around 25 peso (S$6) while eating out costs a minimum of 45 pesos (S$11) to more than 100 pesos (S$25).

For this recipe, you will need…

Salt and oil, the only other things you need besides the meat

Steak: Preferably Argentine steak. I choose mine base on how pretty it looks.
Coarse salt: Larger grains of salt make it easier to see
Oil
Frying pan/ Grill
Watch
Plates to dirty and plates to serve

Step 1: Season the meat

Rinse the meat and pat dry with kitchen towel (the paper kind, not the cloth).

Pour some oil into the plate and lay the meat on it. Pour more oil on the meat. Sprinkle the oiled meat liberally with salt so that it looks like it’s Edward Cullen under the sun.

If the meat was refrigerated, this is a good time to allow it to be less cold and more room temperature.

I’m not very sure how long the salt should be on but I give it at least 10 minutes.

Step 2: Heat up the pan

If you are using an iron grill, make sure it heats up nicely before you start. I like frying pans too and these don’t take long to heat so I wait about 30 seconds before I cook to heat it up.

Step 3: Cook one side of the meat

Lay the meat in the middle where the fire is. Afterwards DO NOT TOUCH the meat or it will turn out burnt in strange places.

I usually wait about 6 minutes for my one side to be done. The meat usually turns out well done if I do 6 minutes on one side and 4 minutes on the other.

Step 4: Check if your meat bleeds

If your meat starts to ooze blood from the part that is exposed to the air, you are doing a good job.

Step 5: Flip the meat and cook more

When the 6 minutes is up, flip the meat to the other side. The cooked part of the steak should be easily separated from the grill/pan.

Wait another 4 minutes for this side to be done. Then take out the steak.

Step 6: Leave the steak

This is the most difficult part of this meal. After cooking, leave the steak for about 4 to 6 minutes. I read that this allows the juices in the meat to redistribute evenly so the steak is tastier.

I usually distract myself by cooking the other piece of steak because it’s hard not to swallow the hot steak whole when it comes out of the pan.

Step 7: Eat, drink and be merry

After the waiting period is over, it’s time to dig into your meal.

Red wines supposedly go well with steak but it’s your meal so drink whatever your want.

Is someone judging your rose? Tell them to buy their own drink.

Do you have other hostel recipes to share? Share them in the comments.

#FoodFriday Empanada in Buenos Aires

Welcome to YQtravelling’s FoodFriday–the day of the week when I show off some of the lovely eats I had while travelling.

Today we’re visiting Buenos Aires for some deep fried South American curry puffs.

I have been talking about empanadas for far too many times without showing you what it actually is.

For those of you in Malaysia and Singapore, I imagine a curry puff that is 2 times bigger than the regular puff you have. Now imagine that the skin is not rock hard but baked to just the right texture.

Now imagine that this curry puff does not have lame potatos but meat with a few vegetables. Take a bite of your imaginary curry puff and you have just eaten an empanada.

Food for the eyes

By the way, the guy who’s in charge of the empanada area at the restaurant downstairs looks very much like Thomas in Downton Abbey but with green eyes.

However, take my words with a pinch of salt. A schoolmate indignantly told me that the guy DOES NOT look like Thomas.

Well, he looks like a chubbier version of Thomas. Who can blame him, with all these yummy empanadas around.

Have you ever had an empanada? What’s your favorite filling?

Lamuko’s Lokanta: A delightful Japanese restaurant in Pamukkale

Is it still Friday at where you are living? Welcome to YQtravelling’s FoodFriday. The day I show off some of the lovely eats I had while travelling.
Today we’re going to Pamukkale in Turkey for some Japanese food.
Itadakimasu!

While in Pamukkale, I found out through Foursquare that there was Japanese restaurant–Lamuko no Lokanta–near the hotel which we were staying at.

My mom who was not used to Turkish food said we must visit the place so we had dinner one night. The food was so good that we went on the second day just for its desserts.

Lamuko no Lokanta

Lamuko's Lokanta in Pamukkale — Lamuko’s Lokanta in Pamukkale

Lamuko no Lokanta, or Lamuko’s Lokata, is run by a Japanese lady. From my eavesdropping, I found out that her name wasn’t Lamuko as the shop name suggests but was Noriko.

Outside of the shop, you will see a banner with photos of different Japanese food. The sign in Japanese advises people who are not customers not to take photo of the banner, but why it was in Japanese was a mystery.

The restaurant looks like the front yard of someone’s house but with a few tables out for guests. The eating space is cosy with about 6 tables that can sit about 4 to 6 people each.

There is also a small section of Turkish seats.

Turkish seats at Lamuko's Lokanta — Turkish seats at Lamuko’s Lokanta

What’s most amazing about the setting is the grape vine ceiling.

When we were there in end-May, the grapes were just growing. It would be amazing if the grapes were ripe and everyone could pick them off their vines.

Lamuko no Lokanta’s menu

Since this is not a post about the setting of Lamuko, I’ll get on talking about the food.

The restaurant’s menu is decorated in the Japanese-cute style with little speech bubbles above hand drawn animals.

Lamuko's Lokanta cute menu — Lamuko’s Lokanta cute menu

Apart from Japanese meals, the menu includes Turkish food and simple western dishes such as spaghetti.

The pasta section warned that spaghetti is a dish everyone must avoid in Turkey, but it’s ok to order it at Lamuko’s because they cook it nicely. (Mom did order a spaghetti Bolognese at another place. It was too squish and quite gross.)

On the menu, the ginger chicken rice bowl is the most popular dish. Mom got this for dinner.

The chicken was fragrant and did taste of ginger. Mom even felt that the rice serving was too much.

For me, I ordered an omurice. I absolutely adore omurice, going to the extend of travelling to an omurice speciality restaurant in Tokyo.

The omurice was alright at Lamuko. The egg omelette blanketed the tomato sauce rice, instead of the usual egg wrapping. It was tasty enough that I finished the whole thing.

While we were eating, the owner brought over a plate of dark cherries. This turns out to be a complimentary dessert. Yums.

After our meal, we ordered Today’s Desserts. It was a banana cake. Mom’s favorite cake is banana cake so she happily ate it.

When we went back the next day, Today’s Desserts was still banana cake but we ordered it anyway because we loved it so much.

We sipped apple tea at the restaurant. It was 1.50 lira each, a reasonable price compared with other restaurants.

Modelling Clay, the dog

When we were dining at night, a large golden lab came in. It picked up a squished mineral water bottle and brought it to me and my mom.

Even though it showed big puppy dog eyes, mom and I were not dog people so we only gave it sad glances and ignored the bottle.

The owner called the dog “Nendou”, which means “modelling clay” in Japanese. That is just the most adorable name for a dog.

Where was the strangest place you have eaten Japanese food?

Chinese food by weight in Buenos Aires [YQrtw Day 66 Jun 12]

Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina

Today was one of the most uneventful day of my time in Buenos Aires. The school didn’t have any after school activities and I had to finish my transit visa application for the US.

Even though it was the third day of Spanish class, it felt like I’ve been doing this for a long time. It’s probably because having 3-hour lessons at a go isn’t very healthy but time does fly when we’re in class.

After class, I popped into one of the supposed “All-You-Can-Eat” places. It turned out to be a Chinese place and sold food by weight.

I picked some of the lighter food: chicken parts with less bones, squid and fried rice. This whole plastic bowl of food was for A$22 (~S$5.50).

It’s not that cheap when compared to Chinese food back home. But here in Argentina where a cheap steak meal would set you back A$45, it’s kind of a miracle that you can find something filling at this price.

The side dishes were quite alright and were quite authentic Chinese cooking. However, the fried rice was a little on the tough side. Maybe Argentinians are more used to not fully cooked rice.

After lunch, I continued filling in the online form for my US visa. There were pages and pages of spaces to fill in. My page kept logging itself out, claiming I had not saved the form for 20 minutes. I had to clear my cache before everything went back to normal.

After I had done the online form, there was still payment of my US$160 visa fee. It was either a choice of paying by cash at the branches of two different banks or paying by credit card.

The only catch for the credit card payment was that it required a 20% charge on top of the transaction due to some rule set by the Argentinian government.

So that makes paying by cash the only option for me. By the time I was done, it was past 3:30pm. I hurriedly packed my things, hoping that I could find one of the Rapigogo branches and pay my fee fast.

Off to pay my visa fee

I set the bank on my Google Map and went off to find it. I assumed that it would be a large bank but it turned out to be something that was smaller than a post office.

At that time, I didn’t have the A$880+ on me. I was terrified of being robbed so I didn’t want to withdraw money before I know where the bank was.

Unfortunately, all the ATMs I went to that were near the Rapigogo branch couldn’t give me the money I want. I decided that I would make the payment tomorrow.

On my way back, I got a few groceries from Carrefour, including two cans of cheap corn in cream. The can turned out to be a hell lot more cream than corn.

Dinner was still brocolli soup but with a can of terrible corn. I also learned the hard way that I should not wash pasta before cooking it. (I assumed it was like rice and need a good rinse.)

How was your day? Did you have good soup?

Glutton in Egypt

I spent 2 days in Egypt with a tour group, visiting Giza and Cairo. Unlike Chinese tour groups, we were brought to local restaurants for our lunches (dinner was not included in the package).

I fell in love with Egyptian food when I took the first bite of a well seasoned barbeque meat at our first restaurant.

Egyptian bread is fluffy and has an empty air pocket in the middle. I love tearing off bits of bread and stuff them in my mouth. Mmmm.

At one of the stops, we had vine leaves with something inside. I couldn’t remember what it was, it could have been meat but it might have been something else.

i also ate falafel for the first time in Eypt (yep, I didn’t have any in Paris or Dubai). It was nice but I do prefer my balls of food to contain meat.

The honeydew that we were served at lunch was pure sugar.

The roast chicken that we had was delicious. Even though I was stuffed with bread and falafel, I tore through the well-seasoned poultry and gobbled its tender meat. (I’m very hungry just remembering it.)

Hibiscus tea

I first heard about this exotic drink on a Jamie Oliver cooking show. He was preparing a meal in under 20 minutes or so and whipped up a batch of bright red hibiscus tea from tea bags.

I bought a box of hibiscus tea when I found it on the shelves of an Egyptian Carrefour. The drink I made was really sour and I didn’t have that great of an impression.

When I was on the tour, I found out that hibiscus tea is served cold and sweetened. I love this formula.

The taste is a mix of sweet and sour. I overheard someone describe it as “cranberry juice” so you can imagine what it tastes like.

Other interesting observations

The two of the restaurants that we went to were open air. Even though this made the location even more exotic, it’s kind of crazy sitting in the hot open air under the desert sun.

While meals were included in our package, we had to paid extra for drinks. (This was the same in Jordan.)

The two places that we went to had a section where ladies made bread. It was quite fun to watch them pound dough and bake bread but it felt more like a zoo which made me uncomfortable.

Not actually something very interesting but here’s a can of Coke in Arabic.

What is your favorite Egyptian food? Share them in the comments below!

You might have missed:

Glutton in Italy
Glutton eats with Florence Food Tour
Glutton on a cruise

Glutton in Italy

[Every Friday is Food Friday here at YQ travelling. Let’s feast.]

Last week, we had a taste of food in Florence in the Glutton eats with Florence Food Tour.

Today, I want to show you the other food I ate while in Italy. Before I went to Italy, the only Italian food I know of was pasta, pizza and Italian-named coffees. I never ate much gelato back home because it’s always more expensive than ice creams.

Italian coffees

Italian breakfast of cappucino and cornetto

Italians don’t seem to drink bad coffee–the coffee at the breakfast buffet of my mid-priced hotel in Pisa was rather good and even the cappucino served at IKEA (famous for its burnt coffee) was excellent.

IKEA Italy's coffee bar. How awesome is that? — IKEA Italy’s coffee bar. How awesome is that?

While in Florence, I had a favorite coffee shop right at the Palazza Duomo. The place serves good coffee and has a view of one of the walls of the very beautiful Duomo.

In Italy, coffee is usually drank at the bar. It seems to me that only tourists sit at tables, and are charged more for it.

Gelato

I have to confess. I cannot actually tell the difference between gelatos of different shops. Apart from the flavors, they all taste the same to me: milky and cold.

I did have an extra nice pistachio-flavored gelato while in Rome. It really tasted of green pistachios.

Strawberries

Strawberries were in season when I was in Italy. For my first two nights, I ate only strawberries for dinner because I was too tired of going out and deciphering menus.

Pizza

Pizza used to be my favorite western dish back when I was growing up. We only had Pizza Hut but I loved it anyway.

I had the most amazing pizzas when I was in Rome. I was walking around the neighborhood of my AirBnb place, trying to look for the restaurant recommended by the houseowner. I didn’t find the restaurant but I found a pizzeria.

Pizza there sold by weight, not slice as I was used to. On the first day, I ordered a small slice. But the next day, I ordered double the volume because it was just too tasty.

Special dishes in Florence

I spent 5 night in Florence, making it the city I spend the most time in. The Chinese hostel owner brought me to the streets on the day I arrived, even before I put my bags in the hostel, and showed me a Florence street food.

Lampredotto

The lampredotto is made from the fourth stomach of a cow. It’s cooked in a sauce and served either on its own or squished between a hard bun.

The taste was alright but I always appreciate entrails (even though my cholesterol is on the higher side). The bread that came along was a tougher challenge and made me feel like a cow that have grazed too long and hurt my jaw.

Porchetta sandwich

Porchetta at Florence's Tuesday Market — Porchetta at Florence’s Tuesday Market

At the Tuesday Market, there were food trucks selling lampredotto and porchetta. How do you know if the truck sells porchetta? It’s easy. They have a whole roasted pig on display.

The porchetta sandwich I ate had a hard bread. The meat wasn’t moist so it felt like I was gnawing through tough cardboard.

Florentine steak

I had this special dish in Florence one rainy evening. It’s less of a steak and more of a great slab of meat cooked crispy on the outside and bloody in the inside.

Even though I was feeling melancholic during that meal, I must say that the meat meat tasted great. However I wasn’t able to finish my 700gm slab of steak so I took it back to my hostel where the hostel mates polished it off.

That’s what I call team work!

Odd one out: Chinese dumplings

This is a rather odd entry in my Italian food list. Since I was staying in a Chinese-run hostel, I had the chance to have dinner there for an extra 5 euro.

One night, the owner served Chinese dumpling but it had a strange filling. There didn’t seem to be any meat and had glass noodles and cabbage instead.

Italy day 7: Defeated by a Florentine steak [YQrtw Day 33 May 10]

Location: Florence, Italy

I was a little depressed at dinner today. I felt like weeping but I told myself that I am in Florence and I damn well should not cry.

I suppose it was a mix of the cold rainy weather and my hormones. But mostly it was the gigantic piece of beef steak that caused me to feel sad.

I could not finish my 700gm beef steak. Unlike David who defeated Goliath, I was crushed by a (roughly 350gm) piece of uneaten meat.

Conquering Florence-style steak: Bistecca alla fiorentina

The Bistecca alla fiorentina (beefsteak Florentine style) is a famous dish in Florence. The meat is grilled on wood and served rather rare.

I knew I had to try the dish before I leave Florence tomorrow. I headed to one of the restaurants where I previously had lunch. It was still too early for dinner so I was one of the few customers.

The restaurant waiter told me that the smallest serving for bistecca alla fiorentina was 700gm. I decided to go ahead even though they have a set meal with 550gm steak and a few sides.

The meat that arrived was gigantic. The only company to the meat was one piece of purple lettuce and a wedge of lemon.

I knew I couldn’t finish the whole serving but I took the advice of how to eat an elephant (one bite at a time). I squeezed some lemon juice on the whole slab of meat and started with my first bite.

The skin had a nice burnt salty crispy taste while the meat was tender. Further away from the sides, the meat became rarer and rarer, pinker and pinker.

The dish was quite good since the meat was tender. However, by the time I finished half of it, my body told me to stop or everything else might come back up.

So I stared at the steak for a while. I wasn’t sure if asking for a doggie bag was polite in Italy. I didn’t want the dish to go to waste neither and started plotting ways I could take the piece back.

As I plotted, I felt depressed. The meat that was about a two-hundredth of my weight taunted me, “You call yourself a glutton?”

In the end the waiter was very understanding and helped me get a takeaway box.

I walked in the rain back to the dorm with the steak. In the end, the others in the dorm helped me conquer the slab of meat. That’s where you’re going Mr Meat!

Today’s summary: Natural Museum, Pitti Palace’s various museum, lunch + gelato, Basilica of the Holy Cross, Palazzo Vecchio.

Glutton on a cruise

After the teaser post last week, I’m ready to show you some of the things I ate on my 15-night cruise.

It’s very dangerous to put a Glutton on a cruise, especially a 15-night cruise. I think all the imagined fat that I’ve burnt off getting lost cycling in Sri Lanka were replaced by the food I had been eating everyday on the cruise.

First off, I want to share that I’m quite disappointed that food on board is not free-flowing for 24 hours.You still have room service throughout the night (free food but please tip the delivery person) but that doesn’t really count, does it? Of course, no midnight buffet is actually a good thing as it avoids food wastage and overeating.

By the way, food on board is not fantastic. It’s a bit like plane food (but you know that I love plane food)

On board the Legend of the Seas, there are three main eating places I go to: Windjammer Cafe, Romeo and Juliet Restaurant and Park Cafe.

Windjammer Cafe has buffets for three meals while Romeo and Juliet has sit-down meals for the same three meals. Park Cafe serves snacks and opens when Windjammer is closed but only until around 1:00am.

Windjammer Cafe food

I prefer Windjammer over the dining room of Romeo and Juliet because you get to pick and choose only what you want to try.

At breakfast, you can order omelettes with fillings of your choice. My favorite types are ham, bacon, mushroom and cheese.

For lunch and dinner, I usually eat like a carnivore with loads of meat on my plate.

Generally speaking, the ship doesn’t do Asian food well. All the Chinese-inspired soups were filled with MSG.

Romeo and Juliet restaurant

For the dining room, there’s fixed seating at dinner and free seating at lunch and breakfast. For free seating, you’re usually guided to a shared table and everyone makes small talk.

I met a lot of new people at the free seating which is really good since I don’t go out and mingle about too much.

The dining room offered a menu with food that appeared more than once each week. The main dishes were alright but the desserts were usually rather good for cruise food.

During dinner, everyone has fixed waiters for the table. My two waiters were Jenny and Valent who keep the conversation going when I sit alone. There were two Indian couples who now live in the US at my dinner table too.

On the last night, the staff stage a singing show to bid us farewell. It made me a little sad to leave the ship.

Self-squeezed orange juice

I found out about self-squeezed orange juice from a blogger who was on a transalantic cruise. She made her own orange juice because freshly squeezed orange juice was too expensive on the ship.

On Legend of the Seas, freshly squeezed orange juice is US$4. There is also juice made from concentrate–which I love–but it’s different from drinking orange juice just freshly squeezed.

I make mine by cutting the orange with cutlery snagged from the buffet table. The inside can be crushed easily using a spoon. It’s a rather messy business by the end is worth all the effort.