Here’s a quick insider’s tip to our Globalist trips: We are always thinking about food. While it may seem like our days are spent snapping pictures of street art or meeting cool people around the city, the truth is that our days actually revolve around our stomachs. Every day, we eat breakfast in the hostel (they offer us bread, delicious jam, and the ever-necessary cup of coffee), lunch on our own, and dinner as a big group in a nicer restaurant. So that means that the majority of each day is filled with decisions about meals: Street food or restaurant? Ensalada or sandwiches? Desserts in the restaurant or gelato at an ice cream store? Pisco or cerveza? Sometimes, life is just filled with such tough questions…
Fortunately for you dear readers though, after only 3 short days in Santiago, we have our first food update! What follows is a shorty food diary filled with mouthwatering pictures of our daily sustenance.
When we’re hungry for a nibbly little something while we’re walking to and from meetings, we’ll usually head into a panaderia. Panaderias are bakeries filled with racks and racks of delicious-smelling bread products of all kinds! We usually will treat to ourselves to a savory empanada for a light lunch. (Zhang/TYG)
We’ve also been experiencing Chile’s amazing produce! While avocados are usually a special treat at home, in Santiago they are as abundant as apples and also freakishly large! In fact, all produce is large–in the 2 photos below, you’ll see just how big the avocados and carrots are here. Here’s a salad showcasing the best produce that Chile has to offer, and also a glimpse of the amazing salmon! (Zhang/TYG)
Giant carrots at Mercado Central (Zhang/TYG)
Giant avocado at Mercado Central (Zhang/TYG)
The giant produce was awe-inspiring enough, but what Mercado Central is most famous for is its incredible selection of seafood! Here’s a fun picture of some recently-caught and soon-to-be-tasty fish! The wonderful people of Foody Chile took us on a food tour of the market and we all sat down to some delicious local food afterwards, as you’ll see in the pictures below. (Zhang/TYG)We all sat down at Don Victor, a small food stand in Mercado Central, to eat a hearty lunch. Some ordered the ajiaco soup, which was a delicious brothy soup filled with hearty carrots, potatoes and beef. (Zhang/TYG)Others had the poroto soup, which was a soup dish based on beans, noodles and even the occasional pig foot. I had the poroto, and can attest that it was absolutely fantastic! Not pictured was the bread dipped in pebre that we had as a small appetizer. Pebre is this delicious semi-spicy mix between a salsa and a pico de gallo that was absolutely addictive! We’re hoping to cross paths with it again the future. (Zhang/TYG)The fine people from Foody Chile (Collin and Steven) also were kind enough to introduce us to our first sip of the infamous Chilean Terremoto. We headed to La Piojera, a restaurant famous for the drink, to try it out. To our best knowledge, the Terremoto consists of a layer of artisan wine, some sort of hard liquor that was described to us as “jager-like” and then a scoop of delicious pineapple ice cream. You then mix all the layers together and sip it from a straw. Seth (pictured above) describes it as a “pina colada, but with wine.” It was a very polarizing drink–some of us loved it, others despised it. Dear readers, you’ll have to try it! (Zhang/TYG)We’ve also been gelato hounds on this trip, topping off every night with a healthy dose of interesting-flavored gelato. Don’t be surprised if all of us come back from this trip a few pounds heavier! (Zhang/TYG)
A special thanks to Collin and Steven from FoodyChile for taking us around Mercado Central today and for showing us such a fantastic time! Check out their wonderful website here!
