Aboard the USS Underwood

June 21, 2012 By Laura

Only in Chile…

Katherine, Me, Julia, and Captain Pete

…would 3 American women end up aboard a US Navy ship.

Our officer-friends, Pete and Michael, gave us a tour of a their ship, the USS Underwood. This was not your boring 5th grade field trip tour. We were privileged to a ~3 hour behind the scenes view of the ship. Touring the ship was certainly a highlight of our trip to Chile. SO cool!

The USS Underwood was commissioned in 1983 (an excellent year, if I may say so). This thing was HUGE. I would get lost on there. The guided missile ship is 453 feet long and houses a helicopter! It also has machine guns and torpedoes. I felt like I was in a 10 year old’s fantasy land. 🙂

Here are a few highlights:

Clockwise, Left to Right: Captain’s coffee mug, the surf board the Captain keeps in his office/room, radar room (in additions to enemies, they have to watch for whales!), the Chilean ship parked next door, view of Valparaiso from the deck, look out, weights so they can work on their fitness, us posing with a machine gun, staring down the barrel, the on-board helicopter, us IN the helicopter, the flag in the back of the boat

Fun fact of the day: Navy men are fans of Beachbody. During our tour we ran across a group of guys doing one of the Insanity DVDs! I wanted to join them, but didn’t have the right attire. *sigh*

The Captain knew about my food obsession and offered to let us take a peek into the ship’s kitchen. It would be so hard to live on their diet – they can’t keep a lot of fresh fruits and veggies on board because it goes bad after a few days at sea. The chef, Livingston, was nice enough to let us intrude as he was preparing for dinner.

We finished up the tour at the front of the ship.

One fun fact: the bell you see in the middle-left pic below doubles as a baptismal pool. If you are assigned to a ship when your child is ready to be baptized, the bell is turned upside down and filled with water for the baby to be dunked in. Afterwards the baby’s name is engraved inside – it remains there for the life of the ship!

To our friends aboard the USS Underwood: Thank you so much for your hospitality, and for your service. We wish you the best on the rest of your journey!

Please ignore the fact that I look sickly in a baseball cap.

The ship’s motto:

“Whensoever hostile aggressions . . . require a resort to war, we must meet our duty and convince the world that we are just friends and brave enemies.” -Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Andrew Jackson, December 3, 1806

On an entirely different note, please click here to hop over the Lindsay’s blog, The Lean Green Bean, today and check out my guest post. While she’s vacationing in the sunshine, I’m home baking these no-sugar-added, gluten-free Banana-Maple Zucchini Muffins:

There is a vegan option, of course. 🙂

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Recaps = over! Back to your regularly scheduled food blog.

What is you favorite type of muffin?

Can you imagine trying to find something to eat aboard a ship for months at a time? Poor guys!

Chilean Cooking School + WIAW

June 20, 2012 By Laura

It took several days, but we located Chilean food.

As I said in my first recap post, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of Chilean food in Chile.

Determined food-lovers, my travel mates and I did mange to find some more “authentic” eats after making our way to the Chilean coastal towns of Valparaiso and Vina del Mar.

For What I Ate Wednesday this week, I am jumping ahead in our travel story to share some tasty Chilean treats with you. The highlight was an amazing cooking class with the fabulous Boris. This may not be true snacking, but I eat more snacks than meals when traveling so I can try EVERYTHING.

Check out my Chilean eats below; then click here to hop on to Jenn @ Peas and Crayons to see what the rest of the blog world else ate Wednesday!

Breakfast:

We stayed at a lovely bed and breakfast in a neighborhood that was right in between Valpo and Vina. It was built in 1934, and has since been restored to a fabulous accommodation. Doesn’t this looks like a Crate & Barrel magazine?

Casa Olga provided us breakfast each morning. We were served strawberry yogurt, pears, passion fruit, bananas, kiwi, cereal, toast, jam, ham and cheese (I passed on this – too much for breakfast!), coffee, and – best of all – freshly squeezed orange juice.

Here is the view we enjoyed every morning:

Their dog, Shay, wanted a seat at the table too!

Funny side note: when I asked for water at breakfast, they asked if I drank too much… they are not accustomed to drinking water in Chile!

Lunch:

This is the experience I have been most excited to share with you guys!

Katherine had to leave early, so Julia and I kept ourselves entertained by taking a Chilean cooking class. The company, Chilean Cuisine, offers hands-on cooking classes in Valparaiso. Our charismatic Chilean instructor, Boris, took us to the kitchen to choose the menu before escorting us to the local market to purchase the ingredients.

Much to my surprise, Boris had found my blog via my email signature and read up on it in advance! He even read the “About Me” section and learned that I do NOT like white potatoes.

“Today we are NOT going to eat potatoes” was written on the board. How cool is that?

Boris lead us through a cookbook to help us choose the menu. We decided on making cheese empanadas, Chilean pebre (salsa), hake fish terrine with avocado carpaccio, pumpkin and cranberry bean stew… and green chili and basil pisco sours. 🙂

First up, the market. In the rain. I don’t take public transportation often (Atlanta isn’t conducive to that)… and I especially don’t take it in the rain. However, Boris kept us so entertained and energized that I hardly minded! He also hung our wet jackets and shoes by the fire place to dry while we cooked – thank you, Boris!

Left to right, clockwise: Boris with a fish head, the market, Calabaza pumpkin, Calabaza trash (it was everywhere!), fruit stand, a massive bucket of CHIA, eggs for sale, drying my jacket, and thawing our feet

Back at the kitchen, we began to prepare the ~~meal~~ feast.

A few fun highlights:

See my socks in the first pic? Those were borrowed from the owner, Martin, because our shoes were soaked and it was too cold to cook barefoot. Thank you again, Martin!
I love empanadas. I cannot wait to try some fun combos here at home, and to try them baked. Boris wasn’t amused when I started adding ingredients to the cheese… but the chilis and some cumin were really good additions!
We used a lot of merkén. Merkén is a unique spice blend native to Chile consisting of dried and smoked red chilies (ají cacho de cabra or goat’s horn), toasted coriander seeds, cumin and salt. I loved it and brought home a couple of bags!
The fish terrine was cooked like a poor man’s sous vide. We wrapped the fish mixture (fish, onions, bread crumbs, egg, spices) in plastic wrap and placed it in simmering water for ~10 minutes. Very cool method – I can’t wait to try it with other items.
I was in charge of seasoning the stew. You all know how I love heat… I added so much merkén that is made Boris tear up… I thought it was perfecto. 🙂
Boris surprised me with beets – he saw me admiring them at the market and snuck them into our bag. They were wonderful simply boiled with olive oil and salt.

We took a ton of this food to-go to share with our Navy officer-friends. We were told it was a nice break from ship food. 🙂

Clockwise, Left to Right: Boris (a classically trained dancer) teaching us a dance while shaking chili-basil piscos, raising a glass to surviving the dance, Julia rolling out empanada dough, empanada pre-fry, frying empanadas, the final product (plus some sopapillas), eating our delicious empanada (topped with salsa), fish terrine (pre-slicing), terrines and avocado salad, salsa and beets, pumpkin bean stew (one of the most delicious things I ate on this trip), taking a bite, mas vino, Boris with dessert, dessert – lucuma ice cream with meringue.

Dinner:

I lied. The Chilean food ends here. For dinner we met up with the Navy boys for a final farewell. Dinner was at an Italian Place called Pasta e Vino. This was the #1 spot recommended to us – by travelers and Chileans alike!

It was quite good! Those Chileans know their Italian food.

Clockwise, Left to Right: Restaurant window, beautiful candle in the window, the dining room, menu, wine of the evening – a big 2007 Chilean red blend, amuse – pumpkin soup, bruschetta topped with prosciutto, bell pepper filled with goat cheese and prawn and wrapped in phyllo, my entrée: the eggplant gnocchi in goat cheese sauce with toasted almonds, Captain’s entrée: pumpkin ravioli with sun-dried tomatoes and goat cheese (my favorite of the night), Julia’s entrée: spinach fettuccine with ham and walnut (spelled “wall nut” on the English menu) in a cheese sauce, XO’s entrée: fettuccine with ham in a white wine-lemon sauce with parmesan crisps, apple crumble with chocolate ice cream and caramel, panna cotta topped with a berry compote, sambuca en fuego x2.

Snacks:

Like I said, we basically snacked our way through the entire trip. My favorites?

Banana Split Gelato

Never enough empanadas!

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Are you beginning to understand why I had to do a juice cleanse when we returned? 🙂 One more recap to go – the tour of the US Navy ship!!!

Have you ever taken a cooking class in another country?

Do you prefer to stay at hotels or bed & breakfasts when you travel?

Chilean Wine with the US Navy

June 19, 2012 By Laura

This is where the trip got really interesting.

Having had our fill of Santiago, we decided to make our way to Vina del Mar on the Chilean coast. I found a wine guide that would pick us up in Santiago at our hotel, take us to 3 vineyards and lunch, and then drop us at our Bed and Breakfast in Vina.

Al Rameriz is a sommelier (one who studies wine) from Chile that basically grew up in New York City. It was such a relief to find someone who spoke English well. Most Chileans do not and our espanol es mal! Al was quite knowledgeable and has had some incredible life experiences at his young age. If you’re ever in Chile, check him out here.

Al, Me, and Julia

Al and Eduardo, the driver, took us to the Casablanca Valley. We visited 3 wineries: Emiliana, William Cole, and Casas del Bosque.

Me, Julia, and Katherine

The Casablanca Valley is a cooler climate, making it better for white wines. This is where a lot of the more well-known Chilean wine come from, such as Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay. that’s all well and good, but I’m in it for the big reds! We made sure to have a sampling of Carménère everywhere we went. I won’t bore you with all the details of everything, but here were my highlights:

Emiliana

I should preface this by saying that Chile is not Italy. In Italy, they have tons of small wineries and you often do a tasting with winemaker or a member of their family (like these tastings we did with the winemaker and their winemaker’s mother in Barolo last year). At Emiliana the tasting guide was Brazilian and it was his second day on the job. If you ever go to Chile, it is worth the money for a knowledgeable wine tour (such as Al).

Here we tasted a Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay. I likes the Sauvignon Blanc better, but it’s a matter of taste. Crisp, citrus-y young whites are my favorite. the lighter and greener the wine it is in color, the younger the wine.

Our favorites were the reds. Their blend, Coyam (pictured on the far right above), was a hit throughout the trip. We ordered it whenever we saw it in a restaurant! The blend was 41% Syrah, 29% Carménère, 20% Merlot, 7% Cabernet Sauvignon, 2% Mourvedre, 1% Petit Verdot. Normally I’d say that’s too much, but the berries and black fruits on the palate were fabulous. It was a good structure and soft tannins. It was a fun, complex wine that was wonderful to taste.

Tip of the day: Always snack while wine tasting!

William Cole

This was my favorite winery. William Cole founded the winery in 1999, right as the valley was being established. The funny part about the story is that Mr. Cole is an American! He’s from Denver, Colorado, but married to a Chilean woman. The symbol on his wine bottles is the Columbine, Colorado’s state flower.

The wines we tasted were from his Columbine Special Reserve line. They were: Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Noir, and a Carménère. The 2011 Sauvignon Blanc was quite green in color with grapefruit and pepper on the nose. The minerals and acidity were prevalent, but this young white we well balanced with a pleasingly long finish. The Pinot was good,nut the tannis were a little sweet for my palate.

Predictably, my favorite was the Carménère. It had a deep, rich garnet color and was the most complex wine we tasted this day. The nose was filled with tobacco and vanilla, with just a hint of cocoa. In the mouth this wine is layered with dark berries and some oak.

A bottle may have found it’s way into my suitcase. 🙂

It was at this winery that we heard two guys walk in speaking with Southern accents. We struck up a conversation and learned we were all from the Southeast. That is how we met a couple of Navy men that would make our trip 100x more fun. The guys were the top two officers on a US Navy ship parked in Valpariaso. We immediately hit it off, and even exchanged contact information with the thought of meeting up in Valpo. I didn’t think we’d ever see them again, but I was proven wrong! More on that after lunch and the rest of wine tour…

Macerado

At this point it was past time for lunch. Al and Eduardo took us to this adorable restaurant called Macerado. It’s in an beautiful old house on a farm, so most of their food is quite literally locally sourced. If you’re ever in the Casablanca Valley, I highly recommend it.

We shared a huge salad with hearts of palm, olives, and avocado, as well as a grilled fish served with a baked pepper, parsley and abalone sauce and Parmesan husked wheat stew. It was fantastic.

This may not look like much for the 3 of us to share, but they bring out a TON of bread and salsa before meals here. We learned quickly to share entrees if we were going to enjoy the carbs!

Al ordered a rabbit dish that was cooked in an apricot gravy and served with a baked vegetable salad (basically ratatouille) with sesame with fresh thyme. It too was scrumptious (thanks for the taste, Al!).

Casas del Bosque

Unfortunately this was not our favorite winery. It was the most commercial and the wine tasted… more processed, I suppose is the right word. There weren’t the layers and complexity present as with the previous wineries.

They did do one neat thing – on the table there were glasses filled with red and green peppers and coffee. Smelling one of those prior to tasting the appropriate wine further bring out the flavor of the juice.

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The day’s fun had just started to begin. We bid our adieus to Al and Eduardo, successfully checked into the B&B, and checked our email. The Navy officers had actually emailed us! We were to be picked up by their driver at 9:30p. Impressive, no? We got showered, watched some TV (they had E! in English!), and waited. And waited. And waited. They finally showed at 10:30p. It turned out the restaurant was much further than anticipated and yada, yada, yada…

Any annoyance I felt dissipated when the driver turned on the lights and sirens to rush us to the restaurant. I wish I could do that every time I’m starving!

Santa Brasa

Before you get the wrong idea… my 2 friends are married, and one of the officers is married. No inappropriate shenanigans was had with the Navy officers. We were glad to find some other Americans to hang with and I think they were glad to have someone off the ship (i.e. not an 18 year old kid) to talk to. And we would have NEVER gotten in the car with strangers had they not been US Naval officers.

Dinner was at a very nice steak house called Santa Brasa in Concón, which is right outside of Valpariaso. At this point it is nearly 11p and we are starving. Thankfully, Micheal (the XO officer) had empanadas waiting for us.

That was followed by the most gigantic pieces of steak I’ve ever seen (we ordered family-style). It came out smoking! It also came out with a couple of (unpictured) bottles of Carménère.

Its been a loooong time since I’ve had a steak on my plate. It will probably be a long time before I do it again… but OMG this was a good one. Well worth the interesting tummy issues the next day.

I tried to balance it out with a spinach salad and roasted asparagus with mushrooms. Followed by a few french fries.

The 5 of us shut down the restaurant, but we weren’t tired… bring on the casino! ~~(Note to self: you are too old to stay out this late.)~~

To be continued…

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I hope I’m not boring you guys too much with all the recaps. There is just so much to share! 🙂

Have you ever had such random things happen on a trip? Do tell!

Are you a red or a white wine fan?