así es….de mi punto de vista, pues

There was an earthquake yesterday.  I sat in a doorway for about a minute or so until it stopped.  Nothing really happened…the curtains swayed and light covers shook.  But the electricity stayed on, which was a relief as last week it went out on average once a day.

On another note, I know of one person who has swine flu.  However, I won’t come into contact with her as she hasn’t been in Mexico for the last six months and is living in Washington State.  I find it a little ironic (and fairly amusing) that the only case of swine flu I know about is not actually in Mexico.

PS Why do people from the States not dance more?

Here are some websites I check on a fairly regular basis (in case you’re wondering what I do in my free time):  http://www.aldaily.com/  This website has lots of different articles pulled from lots of different newspapers and magazines.  I thought this article: http://www.slate.com/id/2218650/pagenum/all/  was rather interesting.

I also check this one: http://www.motherearthnews.com/  It’s a back-to-the-land, nature-y type website which I quite enjoy just perusing, but it also has very practical tips for all sorts of things, from composting to how to build a greenhouse out of recycled materials to seasonal recipes.

And I’ve just found this magazine online and I think it’s pretty awesome: http://www.geezmagazine.org/issue13/  Its subtitle is “Holy Mischief in an age of Fast Faith.”

Also, I really liked this salad dressing.  I’ve only made it once, but I got pretty excited about it:

Japanese Salad Dressing

Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant

Yields about one cup

1 sm garlic clove, minced

1/4 med onion, minced (about 2 T)

1/2 med carrot, grated (about 1/4 C)

1-1/2 T grated, peeled, fresh ginger root

1/4 tsp powdered mustard

1 tsp tamari soy sauce

1 tsp apple cider or apple juice

1/2 tsp dark sesame oil

1/2 C veg oil

1/4 C mild rice vinegar*

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

In a food processor or blender, whirl the garlic, onion, carrot, and ginger for about 30 seconds.  Add the rest of the ingredients, except the salt and pepper and process until thickened.  Stir in salt and pepper to taste.  Japanese Salad Dressing will keep for four or five days refrigerated in a tightly sealed jar.

*Note: If you can’t get mild rice vinegar, use apple cider vinegar, but first bring it to a boil and then let it cool.

**My notes:  I have great faith in my blender, so I didn’t bother mincing the garlic clove or the onion or grating the ginger.  I happened to have grated carrot on hand, but I do not anticipate grating that the next time I make this either.  Also, I just used the rice vinegar I had, which was not labeled ‘mild,’ so I assume it was just regular.  I don’t know much about rice vinegars.  I refrigerated the dressing, but in a…what is that called?  those small jars that you can pour out of?  anyway, it had no lid.  It got thicker as the days passed, but tasted fine.

I was asked a few questions about a couple of the previous blogs, so I will answer them straight away:  

No, I did not wear a mask.  I…um, this is a little vain, but I think they look ridiculous.  And as I was not sick, I was not too worried about infecting anyone else.  Of course, if I had gotten sick, I more than likely would have infected people because I wouldn’t have started wearing the mask until it was too late.  So pretty much it comes down to vanity and a probably unjustifiable faith in my immune system.

Books I’m reading:  I’ve just finished Pride and Prejudice for the umpteenth time.  I do enjoy that book.  At the moment I am currently involved in a number of books.  More than usual, really.  A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry.  Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard.  Seven Weeks for the Soul by Gerard W. Hughs.  Home Economics by Wendell Berry.  And, last but not least, My Grandfather’s Blessings by Rachel Naomi Remen.  One reason I can read so many of these at one time is that Seven Weeks for the Soul, Home Economics and My Grandfather’s Blessings and, kind of, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek are all short stories or essays, so they don’t need to be read on too regular of a basis in order to keep up with them.  So far I highly recommend all of them.

And, um, yeah…I suppose you can put the red food coloring in the strawberry soup to make it more red.  Without, the soup is a lovely pinkish color.  I suppose it is a little Pepto-Bismal-ish now that I think about it.  But you can ignore that and just focus on the taste, which is delicious.  Speaking of strawberries, I bought a kilo of strawberries for 15 pesos yesterday!  That’s 2.2 lbs of strawberries for $1.13!  So I made strawberry bread…that recipe is also in Simply in Season.  It’s good, but I like it more in muffin form.  No cutting involved.

Though the general population seems to be getting bored with the flu here, the school systems are not.  There are all sorts of new regulations for schools.  The daughter of my reps goes to a pre-school and the faculty (by mandate of the feds) took the temperatures of every student that entered the school yesterday and today (yesterday was the first day back at school after a two week break).  Many students wear face masks and some parents were not satisfied with just a face mask.  There was a picture in today’s paper of a kid who, unfortunately for him, had a piece of clear plastic over his eyes in addition to the face mask.  Luckily his hair was not disturbed by the plastic eye wear (which do not resemble glasses in the least…more like a windshield) and he could apply hair gel in the normal fashion.

There was an interesting article, also in today’s paper, of how lack of water affects schools, particularly rural schools.  This is the end of the dry season for many parts of Mexico; the rains will hopefully begin at the end of this month or the beginning of June.  As a result of not having a reliable source of water for the last eight months, many schools are out of the water that they would use to clean bathrooms and wash hands.  So what do you do when you don’t have enough water to even wash hands after using the bathroom and following a flu scare?  Cancel school.  You don’t want your entire student body to get sick, however important you think education is.  There isn’t any other option when you can’t afford anti-bacterial hand gel for everyone and kids (though asked) can’t afford to spare water from their homes to bring to school to wash their hands and clean the bathrooms.  It’s scary to think how much water affects every single part of our lives and how little we care for this basically free (financially speaking) resource in the States.

Following is another random photo from my hike in Guatemala.  

We weren’t really too lost…I mean, the path is obvious, right?

The flu scare imposed on many people a forced vacation.  Unfortunately for many, in addition to the loss of income, they were also not able to enjoy their unexpected freedom as everyone else also was not working, meaning, of course, that nothing was open.

 Although I did not experience a loss of income (as I don’t have one to begin with), I was also not able to explore Mexico City as I had been intending.  The flu scare started the day after I arrived in DF, so everything has been closed basically since I’ve been here.  On Sunday I was able to go to an artisan’s market in Coyocan and it was a relief to get out of the house and just wander a bit.

As a result of being in the house so much lately, we also have an overabundance of food.  I tend to cook and bake when I have time and I’ve had lots of time lately.  I’ve got a couple Moosewood cookbooks that I brought from the States, but I’ve also taken advantage of the internet in the office and been perusing sites for recipes.  Here are a few that I’ve made and liked (the website where I got the recipe is at the bottom of the recipe followed by any changes I made, if it’s from a cookbook, the name of the cookbook is at the top.  If there are questions about the cookbooks, let me know and I’ll answer to the best of my abilities.) :

Sven’s Salsa


makes about 4  1/2 pints

2 28-oz cans diced tomatoes, drained*


2 4-oz cans diced green chiles**


1 small/medium onion, chopped fine


1/4 c. fresh cilantro, chopped fine


3 cloves garlic, skinned


3 pickled jalapenos


¼ c. tomato juice*


1 T salt


1 tsp cumin

1
Put the chopped tomatoes in a large mixing bowl and add the chiles, chopped onion and chopped cilantro.  Stir it up.


2
In a blender or food processor, combine the garlic, jalapenos, tomato juice, salt and cumin.  Blend until smooth.


3
Add everything to the bowl.  Stir for a couple minutes.


4
Cover and refrigerate overnight. The flavor definitely improves overnight.


5
Enjoy!

* I just used reserved tomato juice from the canned tomatos to use as the tomato juice the recipe calls for.

** I had problems finding diced chiles, so I just just a combination of the jarred jalepenos and fresh jalepenos and diced them fine.

http://eatmakeread.com/2009/03/09/svens-salsa/

Really good!  I used one fresh red jalapeno instead of the diced green chiles, water instead of tomato juice, fresh tomatoes instead of canned and didn’t chop anything, just put it all in the blender.

Potato-Chickpea Curry

6 LARGE russet potatoes, peeled and cubed (use more if they’re small)

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 medium yellow onion, diced

3 cloves of garlic, minced

4 teaspoons curry powder

4 teaspoons garam masala

1 inch of ginger, grated

2 teaspoons cumin

1 1/2 teaspoons cayenne pepper

2 teaspoons salt

1 14.5 oz can diced tomatoes

1 14 oz can of coconut milk

1 15 oz can garbanzos, rinsed and drained

1 15 oz can peas

To get started, put the cubed potatoes in a pot, fill with just enough water to cover the potatoes, and boil until soft (about 20 minutes). Drain and set aside.

Warm oil in a skillet over medium heat. Stir in onion and garlic, and cook until the onions are soft and translucent. Stir in curry powder, garam masala, ginger, cumin, cayenne and salt. Cook for 1 or 2 minutes, stirring. Mix in potatoes, garbanzos, and peas, then stir in the tomatoes and coconut milk. Simmer 5-10 minutes.

Done!

http://imperrfections.blogspot.com/2008/04/this-is-better-than-any-curry-ive-ever.html

Chilled Strawberry Soup

Simply in Season

1 C apple juice

3/4 C water

2/3 C sugar

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/8 tsp ground cloves

Combine in saucepan and bring to boil over med heat.  Remove from heat; cool.

3 C strawberries

1/4 C water

Puree until smooth in blender.  Pour into a large bowl.

2 C plain yogurt

1 tsp vanilla

2 drops red food coloring (optional)

Add to pureed strawberries with apple juice mixture.  Cover and refrigerate until well chilled.  Garnish with additional strawberry halves.  The soup freezes well and is especially good with small ice crystals left in.

I haven’t changed the background to my blog since coming to Mexico and they’ve created all sorts of new options!  So I’ve decided to switch it up.

In response to Jennifer’s comment about the Canby Herald, what I should have done was taken a picture of myself with a mask on in the metro surrounded by people with their masks on and emailed it to our fine local paper to let them know of immediate danger one of their own was in.  Darn.  Missed my chance to headline.

Here is a random photo from my hike in Guatemala:

Girls playing

As we were hiking, we came upon an enormous open field with a couple hundred people playing soccer and hanging out.  A nearby community was having a field day.  It was pretty awesome.

I went for a walk this evening (I am allowed such luxuries here in DF because a) it’s cool enough to do physical activity in the evening and b) I don’t know anyone here so I can walk uninterrupted for as long as I want) to see if the gym had opened after the flu scare.  It still has not, unfortunately.  There was a sign on the cultural center around the corner, however, that announced its re-opening will be on May 11th, the same day all primary kids go back to school.

Aside from the gym not welcoming the public yet, things are, in general, getting back to normal.  There was much more traffic on the road today, the metros were closer to their usual capacity and the juice guy right outside the metro is open again.  Restaurants were allowed to open again for the sit-down service and there were more kids in the park.

The most exciting part of my walk this evening was a family selling strawberries out of the back of their truck.  We get strawberries year-round in Olinala, but they are usually they type I term ’steroid strawberries,’ otherwise generally known in Oregon as ‘California strawberries.’  Or, put simply, flavorless.  These back-of-the-truck strawberries, on the other hand, are small and smell like strawberries and are quite sweet.  I think I’m going to make either the strawberry soup or strawberry bread out of Simply in Season.  Or maybe both…