La Comida

I am sure you are curious about the type of food I am eating here. It's surprisingly not that weird. I am a picky eater, but I'll try something if necessary to "assimilate."

Back in Madrid, our breakfast food was supplied by the hotel, so it was a continental breakfast style meal. They offered cocoa puffs, Smacks, and corn flakes for cereal, then water, juice, coffee, tea and milk (whole) for drinks, then toast and jam/butter, then some deli meats and cheese. I have never had the desire to wake up early and eat salami, so I would usually pass on the latter two offerings.

Above: A group of us USAC students the last breakfast we had in Madrid. I am not sure who the two girls in the foreground are, but the back row is me, Tyler, and Josh, and the middle row ignoring the two I don't know are Adam, Kyle, and Katie.



When I arrived here last Sunday, my host mom had leftover noodles for me to eat from their lunchtime. It was very much like Pesto Cavatappi from Noodles and Company, no joke. It was DELICIOUS. They also, of course, had baguettes.
For dinner that night she made hamburgers. I don't know if it was because I mentioned I liked them during lunchtime, or if it was because she had stacks of frozen patties in the freezer. The most curious part of that meal was the "hamburger sauce" which looked like either 1000 Island dressing or ketchup and mayonnaise mixed together. I stuck with the mayonnaise that was already on the burger and that's all.

The following night she made "vegetable puree" that I thought would be a sauce for something when she was describing to me what we'd have for dinner that night. However, it ended up being soup, and it was a mix of spinach, broccoli, potatoes, carrots, and other veggies, and looked much like pea soup. It was great. I thought that'd be it, which I was fine with, then she brought out pot roast with mushrooms. Twas DELICIOUS.

Her husband, Francis, came in from out of town on Thursday, and we had a dinner with the four of us, which I think was the most odd thus far, but I ate it. We started with cucumber soup, then moved on to what looked like tuna salad spread on top of bread. I ate it, and it was great. Then came the main course, which was chicken with some kind of beer sauce. It was good, except Elena, the mom, kept putting more on my plate when I was basically finished, including the pieces of chicken that, to this day, I have no idea what part of the bird it came from. There were so many bones in weird directions that I couldn't determine where it was from. I only enjoyed the chicken breasts. THEN, even after this, they had more, and Francis was explaining that this was some kind of special cheese that was smoked for more flavor. Let me tell you, I'd hate to know what flavor it originally had since the smoked aspect didn't help it's foot-like qualities of flavor. It was a hard cheese that looked like Parmesan, and they served it with some kind of candied fruit and walnuts, and you were supposed to pick up all three with your fork and eat it at once. Good thing they served this last so I had the "I'm full" excuse to not eat any more. The candied fruit hid some of the disgusting flavor, but not quite enough. I wonder if the family noticed my extreme desire for water during this part of the meal.

Then, yesterday, I ate hamburgers again but only Francis was home for lunch. I didn't realize this the first time we had hamburgers for a meal, but the fries they made were in their very own FRENCH FRY FRYER. Homemade. They were delicious.

As for breakfast, I usually have been eating alone, since the family is usually up and out by now. Even though I've said I'll eat some cereal and a muffin, the mom usually leaves out an entire kitchen's worth of breakfast food. This includes, but is not limited to: 3 types of juice (punch, peach/grape combo, pineapple), coffee, tea, toast (little crusty bread cracker things), pears, apples, oranges, grapes, bananas, donuts, jam, nutella, milk, corn flakes, and muffins. I usually eat only the cereal and a muffin and I'm good. Yet every morning, it's the same. It's great. And the presentation is 5 star, reminding me a bit of the scene in A Little Princess when the girls wake up to a feast of every imaginable breakfast food.

Today, since it is Sunday, the breakfast fare was a bit different. I woke up and Francis and Elena made eggs and some meat. The table was filled with food, including what looked like grilled ham slices, salami, scrambled eggs, juice, baguette and jam, yogurt, dates, and warm tomato slices with olive oil. Elena told me it was their version of an "American breakfast." As you can probably tell from the offerings, I was RIGHT AT HOME.

And I think it's especially cute that the host family has a different napkin ring for each member of the family. Therefore, I have my own little napkin ring with a flower-type design. That way I know which one is mine when I grab it out of the drawer, and I know where to sit at the table if it's already out. I think it's still a little weird though that we use the same napkin practically all week, but also at every meal we have paper napkins. It's different.

Oh, and if I haven't already mentioned it above, every meal is served with baguettes. EVERY MEAL. I have eaten my body weight in baguettes since I got here. I bet the Spaniards measure their yearly expenses in gas, heat, water, groceries, clothing, and baguettes. Yesterday when we ate soup at Luke's and Dave's place, Katie offered to buy the baguette for dinner because she's always wanted to walk down the street with a baguette sticking out of her grocery bag.

And, since living with a host family permits 2 meal offerings a day, I can ask Elena to pack me lunch (since walking back home for lunch would take too long). I have only done this once, and when she asked me what she should pack, I said I would eat whatever. I was pleasantly surprised with cookies, a ham and cheese sandwich with the crusts cut off, a juice box, and an apple. It was so cute!!!