Buying “natural” yogurt, just in flavor people, where I live can be a challenge at times. Acquiring plain natural yogurt without high amounts of sugar or high-fructose corn syrup is down right impossible. Although I’m sure times have changed, it was no easy feat when I lived up in Buenos Aires either. I’m not going to delve into the intricacies of why because, well, I’m not sure. But, I will say, do find it odd that yogurt-based products practically have their own aisle in the refrigerated food section of supermarkets yet plain natural yogurt is not one of them. Just as I find it odd that there are probably hundreds of thousands of sheep on this island yet products with sheep’s milk are not to be found. Oh well.

The weekend before last I took a little 3 day/2 night trip over to Ushuaia with some friends to meet other friends. I had a plan of putting together a little travel guide based on notes from previous trips and this one, but I’ve changed my mind for now. So, I’ll just post the observations I noted down on the day after I returned.

I wish that I had more photos to display or perhaps a better selection. A snow storm that moved on a day before left some spectacular scenery. Stupidity and overconfidence got the best of me and my camera’s battery died early the next day after arrival. After noticing the low battery warning blink on the screen while taking the first shot, I took as many as I could, as quick as I could, while fumbling through different configurations.

For this surprisingly smooth, yet flavorful, chimichurri, I take some of the fresh ingredients that one might find in their favorite Chimichurri and roast them in the oven. It’s almost like a romesco sauce without the nuts and bread.

La Anonima, a large Patagonian supermarket chain, has this great promo going on to help celebrate their 100 years in business. For 100 days, one out of every 100 shoppers receives whatever they are going to purchase for free. When we first heard about the promo, my wife and I joked about how it would [...]

Not much of an explanation is needed for these beauties. Note: In Argentina, miga, or translated as crumb, primarily refers to the internal part of bread.

1. Take a super large pullman loaf (pan de miga gigante); white or whole wheat. Height and width average around a sq. foot (30cm x 30cm) and length of about 18in. to 22in. (45cm to 50 cm) in size.

2. Trim off crust so that non of the browned part remains.

3. Cut into thin slices. 1/3 inch (1 cm) thick.

Walk past any dry spice stand in Argentina and you’ll have a hard time missing the adobo para pizza sitting right beside chimichurri mixes, oregano, parsley, and other common herbs & spices. For chefs or home cooks, who see no need in purchasing a commercial blend, this mixture may be custom made before or at the last minute by sprinkling here and there a few simple ingredients. Either way, adobo para pizza is the go to seasoning for adding a spicy herbal kick to pizzas when parsley, oregano, or basil just won’t cut it by themselves.

I’ve been meaning to write up a little list on the use of herbs and spices in Argentina, and I’ll get to that eventually, but aji molido came up twice about a week ago so I’ll get it out of the way first. First, there was a comment on the chimichurri recipe post and then one through e-mail; the latter a request for retailers that sell it in the U.S and I listed a couple at the end of this post.

This just caught my eye yesterday but it seems to have been playing for a while. (I don’t watch much TV except for documentaries and a few cheesy serials here and there.) Hellmann’s, the mayo people, have a set of 3 commercials promoting the use of their ketchup as a subsitute for any other form [...]

Soy is such an awesome crop. Soy can fuel our cars, feed our bellies, and be the clothes on our back. I’ll bet they’ll even be able to make soy charcoal so that we can grill soy turkey legs. All of those minerals, vitamins, and proteins. Soy hamburgers taste just as good as the real thing. Soy milk with calcium carbonate. We won’t even need cows anymore. Soy can replace wood so we won’t need trees anymore. And what’s good about that? With all of the forests gone we’ll have more room to plant soy! But we need forests for water you say? Pfft, I’m sure we can easily filter the exhaust of our cars running biofuel in order to gather our daily water needs. Soy is the future.

You can’t go wrong using carrot salad to accompany many different types of vegetarian fare. Today I’ll be using it as a side to a delicious tofu burger I’m making that will be topped with alfalfa sprouts, portabello mushrooms, and cherry-pecan soy mayo.