Usually when I’m on vacation, I whip out the credit card to dine on tasting menus with wine pairings at the most expensive and luxurious of restaurants. This situation is a bit different. First of all, Montevideo is not really a food city. Secondly, I’m trying to save money. Finally, Amparo cooks me breakfast and dinner every day. This I paid for.
A typical Uruguayo breakfast consists of bread and crackers with various spreads – some unidentified spreadable cheese, butter, marmalade and dulce de leche, which is my favorite. I love that it’s totally normal for the first thing for me to put in my mouth everyday is a cookie smothered in caramel sauce. She also heats up milk for me in this huge mug and gives me Brazilian instant coffee. It’s not that good, but I drink it anyway. When she asked what I usually eat for breakfast, I told her eggs or cereal to which she replied that no one eats eggs for breakfast in Uruguay. The next day, though, there was a bag of corn flakes on the table.
At school, they have this thick, dark coffee free for the taking and drink my weight throughout my four hours of class, which fly, by the way. After school, I get lunch with the German at some place close to our school. The other day we walked to the Mercado del Puerto and got empanadas at a counter. I ate one with carne, queso and olives and one pollo, jamon and hongos and had a coke for a total of about $4.
Dinner is around 9pm and pretty common, but always delicious – stuffed zucchini, pasta, chicken with rice. Amparo doesn’t eat dinner, but she sits and talks with me. Every night, she makes me dessert, which is the best part. One night, it was fruit salad, which tastes much better down here. She makes flan all the time and sometimes, she even brulees the top.
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