Jetzt geht's los, Spätzle mit Sooooß'!

So before I go on with another weekend trip of mine, let’s have another episode of “Caro eats her weight in delicious Uruguayan food”.  Oh wait! Not only Uruguayan, but also GERMAN! Yes, that’s right. Since my mom sent me the wonderful kitchen tool called “Spätzlehobel” I was itching to make some “Kässpätzle”. Kind of hard to explain what that is to non-Germans but for starters let me tell you that there’s looooots of cheese and onions involved. Except when your name is Lucía. But more about that later on.

First up I was very excited when I got mail from Germany. From my family to be exact, who among other things sent me loots of German goodies. Well, most of it was chocolate. But there was also one of my favorite kitchen appliances in the mail: a “Spätzlehobel”. Of course I had to try it out ASAP.

Danke, Mama!

And since it’s way more fun to cook with and for other people and because I like introducing non-Germans to the very delicious meal called “Kässpätzle”, I of course couldn’t just make some for myself. So I asked myself: “Who should be my guinea pigs?” [insert evil laugh here]

And I selecteeeed… [drumroll here]… the Maceiras family. Well.. and whatever else their last names are. I’m still confused about the whole “not-all-family-members-having-the-same-last-name”-thing. Anyway. That means Pablo’s family. Though really they had nothing to fear since by now I am an expert on Spätzle-making. And I have plenty of references.

So last Saturday was the day of choice for good food. And I mean the whole day because in the evening we ate an incredibly great chicken dish that Pablo’s dad made and together with the “Kässpätzle” we also had the world’s best rice pudding a.k.a. “Milchreis” a.k.a. ”arroz con leche” for dessert. And since my dear friend Desi and I have a special history with that dessert, I of course had to learn how to make it, so I can let her try it as well once we are united again in Germany.

No need to deny it. I eat way too much and way too good here in Uruguay. Maybe my parents should get one of those softwares where you can morph a picture of a person into a fattie so they know who to look for when they are picking me up at the airport. Kidding. I skype with them all the time. They will recognize me. Hopefully…

Anyway, for lunch we had “Kässpätzle”. First things first, there really isn’t a recipe for it. I know how to make it so I make the dough by rule of thumb. And I was quite challenged when Pablo’s family told me they don’t eat that many eggs there. Well.. I reduced the amount of eggs. And I negotiated a bit. And ultimately I got them to agree to five eggs. And it turned out great so everybody’s happy. 

 So anyhow I prepared the dough and had Pablo, Lucía and their mom Brenda do the minion jobs. Cutting and frying onions and grating cheese that is.  And eventually everything was ready for me to show them  some Spätzle-making magic. I’m not gonna explain how it works here. Either you are familiar with it, or you can hit me up and I will prepare it for you. Of course you will have to cover for any travel expenses that might incur.

Me and my kitchen-minion

Pablo being all skeptical

So eventually the Spätzle were done and ready to be covered with onions. 

Wait.. STOP!! No onions!!

Why?

Because Lucía hates onions. Not sure how the poor little onions deserve that hatred but since I have a little brother who is also a little particular about food, I of course knew what had to be done. Take some Spätzle out for Lucía and then go on with the process. And that includes lots of fried onions on top of the Kässpätzle. Et voilà! Lunch is ready. And I think now it is officially Uruguay-approved.

Lucía doesn't know what she is missing out on... 

...more onions for the rest of us!

The sweet smell of onions and cheese

Handsome cooks, delicious food

And since you can’t ever eat too much Spätzle, my friend Johanna and I decided to cook some together this Wednesday as we had a free day due to Artigas’ birthday. No if you are wondering who Artigas is… He’s Uruguay’s national hero and there are about a gazillion statues of him on his horse around Montevideo/Uruguay.

Anyway we had a free day and “ganas de cocinar” (= we really wanted to cook something spectacularly and fantastically delicious). So we invited some friends and decided to cook Spätzle with “Blaukraut” (=red cabbage) and “Schweinebraten” (=pork roast). That was quite the ambitious goal as the Schweinebraten itself takes about 2 hours to prepare. Actually, the hardest part was finding the right piece of meat in Spanish. But with the help of my friend Anna and some gesturing I eventually ended up with a piece from a pig’s shoulder (or at least that’s what I think). And with the great instructions my mom had given me before and Johanna’s knowledge about pork roast, we ended up with hands down the most delicious meal I have ever made.

So altogether it was Johanna and I, our two German friends Julia and Sebastian H. and Pablo who came over for his (extended) lunch break. And while us girlies were cooking, we handed over the  simple task of opening a bottle of red wine to the guys. They eventually got help from my roommate Fanny and her boyfriend Sebastian and with joint efforts and by completely destroying the cork they somehow opened the bottle. Don’t ask how long it took them… but to be honest it was one of those very sh*tty plastic corks.

Sebastian and the cork

The guys and their only responsibility: a very stubborn bottle of wine

Pretty cooks

But it didn’t matter anyway because we had food. Incredibly delicious food. German food. That tasted like a Sunday meal. And home. It definitely tasted like home.

¡Buen Provecho!

Semana Santa Travelogues: I heard it through the grapevine

Or: Bicicletas & Vino

I have mentioned here, Mendoza is particularily famous for its wine. So obviously we could not spend a week there without getting acquainted with some of its fine grape juices. And since everyone at the hostel recommended us to rent some bikes and tour some wineries that offered wine tastings for a small amount of money (30 pesos each = ca. $1.50), we set out for a little bike adventure the day after we arrived in Mendoza.

Since that meant we had to get out of the city center, we had to take the bus to a darling place called Chacras de Coria which is a small town outside of Mendoza city. And even though half of the bus was empty, of course Rachel and Erin sat on the reserved seats on the bus that are actually meant to be for old, disabled or pregnant people. Now they are definitely not old... 

Rachel and Erin enjoying their "special seats" *

Once we got there we found the bike rental place and got ourselves some bikes and helmets. Because after all it’s safety first, when you’re plans include riding a bike while intoxicated. Plus, it made us look all nerdy and tourist-y.

I want to ride my bycicle...*

At the bike rental place a nice young lady named Mariana planned out our route for us and sketched it on a map. Which was quite helpful because the wineries all had different opening hours, and by knowing them we were able to schedule our bike trip accordingly.

The route Mariana had planned out for us

So we set out for the first winery of the day, which was called “Bodega Pulmary”. It was a rather small, family-owned winery where we got to see the wine making process in a small format. I also liked this place a lot because they had put up a lot of artwork of local artists. And all of you who know me well enough know that I kinda have a weakness for art. It was also quite good in my opinion, though very expensive since the artist was apparently like a local celebrity. That winery was also where I had my “favorite wine of the day” – a very tasty vintage of Malbec.

Degustación: Our guide handing out my favorite wine*

Girls in the wine cave*

Favorite piece of art

After that we sat outside under a sunshade made up of grapevines and ate the sandwiches we had brought. Which would have tasted a lot better if it weren’t for the Asado (=BBQ) that was offered by the winery to its guests. Unfortunately you had to pay quite a bit for it, so no Asado for us.

I heard it through the grape vine..

The girlies under the grapevines*

After some troubles with the map we then went on to the next winery which was called Alta Vista. That place was a lot bigger and you could actually see the vinyards surrounding the winery. Normally you are advised to schedule a tour there but since we hadn’t done that we had to wait for a bit. So we sat down on the front lawn and enjoyed the sun. And some wine which they offered to us while waiting. Even though I don’t mind waiting, I sure did enjoy having a glass of wine to pass the time. While waiting we met some fellas from Australia, the UK (which also stayed at our hostel) and even one from the beautiful region of “Franken” in Germany. Since half of my family is from that part of Germany and thus talk in a distinct accent that is spoken there, I did enjoy chatting with that one quite a bit.

Twisted vision*

So we passed some time enjoying the sun and finally got to go on the tour of the winery. Which was very large compared to the previous one. Now this winery was more commercial and sold wines for ridiculously high amounts of money. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to try the really expensive vintages so I cannot tell you whether or not they are worth their money. Pretty much we got to see the wine making process again, but this time in a much larger scale. We then went on to the caves where they stored the wine barrels during the ripening process and the owner’s collection of fine wines. Ultimately we came to the bar, where we got to try some of their wines which were all very tasty, but didn’t make it to my favorites list.

I definitely enjoyed their harvest...

...however not so much their prices! 

(divide by 5 to get the Dollar amount)

Me, Bridget, Rachel and Erin in the vineyard at Alta Vista*

Beautiful scenery

We then left and had a winery and a Absinth/Pesto/Dulce de Leche/ Jam/Chocolate place to go. We were a little short in time for the winery so we decided to skip that one and go straight to the other place.

There we first got to try the pestos and hearty bread spreads. They mostly contained olives or similar things. Though one was a mixture of blue cheese and olives, which was particularly delicious. I had to think of my sister because I’m pretty sure she would have loved that one.  

Next up were the sweets. Which meant we got to go round a wine-barrel/table trying lots of different kinds of jam and Dulce de Leche. Up until then I have only had plain normal dulce de leche (which I could probably eat with every meal) and I was very fond of two of the offered flavors, Coco and Coffee. I decided to buy a jar of coffee flavored dulce de leche to bring home to my family. Let’s hope it will survive the next few months and actually make it to Germany!

Sugary goodness!*

Last but not least we also tried some of their Absinth/Liquors. I stuck to the sweet and delicious ones, dulce de leche & banana and hazelnut chocolate. But Izzie was as brave as to try the “Muerte Rusa” which translates to "Russian Death" was a sort of absinth that was made of green pepper, I think. Though she was as kind as to shar. Curios? Well I was and luckily I got to try since Izzie was in a generous mood she shared it with us (or she wasn’t “man enough” to drink the whole thing haha). Anyway, I got to try that one as well and I have to say I have never tasted anything like it. It was sweet but really spicy at the same time. Such an interesting flavor! It kind of made me regret my decision to only pick sweet liquors.

Preparing the "Russian Death"*

The Liquor Selection* 

After that it was time to get back to the bike rental place. But since we enjoyed the landscape so much we made some detours just for the detours’ sake to take in some of the beautiful scenery before we handed our bikes back over to Mariana.

And to those of you who are concerned about my alcohol intake on that particular day, let me assure you that we had long pauses in between the wine tastings and for my part I didn’t feel like I was drunk or tipsy at all.

We then took the bus back to the hostel a girl there asked us if we wanted to join a movie night with wine and cheese. And what would be a better way of ending a day of wine-drinking than drinking some more wine? 

One of the best food&drink combinations: 

Wine + cheese + crackers + grapes*

So we joined her for an Argentinian movie named “Un Cuento Chino” (=A Chinese Tale) which was one of those odd yet amazing movies. It starts out with a proposal of a Chinese man to his Chinese girlfriend on a little boat when suddenly a cow falls from the sky and kills the girl. Did I get you curious there? If you are into movies with extraordinary and odd characters you should definitely watch it. I’m not sure if they have it in English though. Well, whatever… go learn some Spanish. That’s what I’m doing ;) 

On another note, I would like you to know that the pictures marked with a * have not been taken by me. Which is why I would like to give a big shout out to my friend Izzie Atkinson because she so generously supplied me with those pictures after my camera battery had died that day. 

Thank you, Izzie!*

Also, this is the third part of my Semana Santa Travelogues. I have already written about the trip and my company and my first impressions in case you have missed those posts or want to re-read them while waiting for the next one. Though that one is already written and only needs some pictures and fine-tuning and it's good to go online. So keep checking in!

Semana Santa Travelogues: First Impressions of Mendoza

I would like to use this blogpost to introduce the beautiful city of Mendoza to you because I am guessing that most of you haven’t heard of that place before. So let's start with map to show he geograhical location. 

Größere Kartenansicht

Mendoza is the name of a province in Argentina as well as its capital city where we stayed during our trip. And from the beginning on, I couldn’t help but adore the city with all its charm. It has kind of a southern European vibe and at the same time it’s very adorable. To me the whole city felt like vacation. And not just because I actually was on vacation, but because I kinda felt like it would just be too odd to live there because it’s such a vacation-y place. Very unreal. In the most positive way.

Plaza Independencia

And our hostel fit perfectly into that vacation-y flair. I am fairly sure that it is the best Hostel in all of Mendoza. And the fact that it was completely booked kind of underlines that. When we got to said Hostel, our room wasn’t quite ready for us to move in yet and so we just hung out outside on the patio for a while.  We met two girls, one from England and one from Belgium (and altogether it was a pretty international crowd there), who shared their experiences with us and we found out that you could just take a ladder and pick your own grapes from the grapevines that grew all over the patio to provide shade. They also recommended that we do a bike and wine tour where you rent some bikes and then cycle from one winery to the next and try some of Mendoza’s wine. So we added that to our to-do list. After all Mendoza is Argentina’s most famous wine growing province.

If you ever go to Mendoza, I can only recommend you to stay at this place

Part of the patio

After a little while, our room was ready and we moved in. Typical hostel room so nothing too fancy here. Bunk beds and lockers. Though we had a room with direct access to the patio which was pretty sweet. However, we also had the room with the worst wifi signal. But location tops internet connection anyways.

Following that we went to check out the city for a while and found a square named Plaza Independencia near our hostel. It was super pretty with lots of trees and a fountain in the middle. And that fountain combined with the brightly shining sun resulted in a beautiful rainbow. 

Not sure if that little boy running in the way ruined the picture or made it way more awesome

After checking out our surroundings we decided to  have some ice cream and coffee. And let me tell you, the ice cream was good! I had pistachio and super dulce de leche. It was divine! We pretty much spent all afternoon hanging out in that café, talking and enjoying our vacations.

In the evening the hostel organized a Pizza party and we decided to join it. And that was a wise decision because we were hungry and there were almost unlimited supplies of pizza with all kinds of different toppings. We also got to know some of the people that stayed in the hostel. It was a pretty mixed group but mostly it was people who spent half a year in South America, travelling around, going on adventures and enjoying life.

In the end most of the people went to bed and the only ones remaining were a guy named Patricio from Buenos Aires, another one named Daniel from Canada and Rachel, Izzie, Erin and I. At some point we decided to ask for a deck of cards at the reception and play some card games. After an unsuccessful attempt to explain a game that only one of us knew we decided that poker would probably be the best option, because everybody kind of knew how it works. But then we encountered a new problem : What should we use as a currency? We didn’t want to play for money and strip poker was also out of the question, so what should we do?

Izzie, Rachel, Patricio, Daniel and Erin

Eventually we found a creative solution to our currency problem. Since it was nice weather we were sitting outside beneath a sky of grapevines. So why not use grapes? After all, the hostel encourages their guests to pick their own grapes.  So we pokered for grapes.  Which is kind of weird when you think of it. But then again grapes are the biggest capital of the province of Mendoza. The only problem here was that we couldn’t snack on the grapes because that would be like eating our money. But since we had incredible amounts of pizza earlier we weren’t exactly hungry anyway. And after many rounds of “Uva-Poker” (uva = Spanish word for grape) we went to bed in order to get some sleep so we would be well-rested for the next day’s adventure.

A nice game of Uva-Poker

P.S. This was the second part of my “Semana Santa Travelogues”. If you haven’t read the first one yet, go check it out HERE.