Dan Perlman's Blog, page 12

Crystal Spout

There’s an area in the southern part of Colombia in the province of Meta, called La Macarena. It’s a small town, but it’s famous as the gateway to a several square kilometer area called Caño Cristales. Basically a series of streams that cascade down from the mountains, with mineral rich and crystal clear waters that are noted for a plant that grows nowhere else on earth, the Macarenia clavigera. Although known about for a long time by locals, this plant has only recently come to the attention...

A Glimpse of Bogotá

Mostly I’m going to leave this to a little video of sights and eats and all that on our six days in Bogotá, Colombia. I don’t know that it will give a real feel for the place, but, as the title says, it’s a glimpse. I recommend clicking on the icon in the lower right corner and watching it full-screen.

http://www.saltshaker.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Bogota.mp4

Thoughts. It’s a fairly big, noisy city, with snarled traffic – in many ways it reminded us both of Lima. Ostensibly, it’s laid...

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Last Bogotá Eats

Roundup of the last few meals in Bogotá, leaving out the breakfasts, which didn’t change significantly from my previous posts, a couple of dinners in the hotel when someone just refused to budge from it, and our one day trip to Caño Cristales, which I’ll cover in a post all its own.

A solo lunch at Mini-Mal, which specializes in a more Caribbean style Colombian cuisine – I suppose I should have stuck with places that focus on this and surrounding regions, since we’re off to Cartagena next,...

To Market, To Market…

A little different today – only one restaurant eaten at, and I’ll save that to blend in with tomorrow’s post. Instead…

Trying an oblea on the street. I mentioned them the other day at one of the restaurants that we had lunch at, I didn’t mention how ubiquitous little stands are around the city for getting one. As you can see here, there are a whole lot more toppings to choose from – you get to design your own. I think she thought we were crazy not to put arequipe, or dulce de leche on our...

Meh-mories

I realize that there’s an impetus to take advantage of an included breakfast in a hotel, and of course, breakfast is supposed to be the most important meal and all that, but I’m just not used to eating it. Normally, a cup of coffee, maybe a yogurt or fruit. Maybe. But, fruit, yogurt, juice, coffee, cheese and meat started the day. We are doing a lot of walking, particularly in the early part of each day, so it’s probably not a bad idea.

Recommended by our new chef friends for a real, authe...

Bogotá Tradition and Fusion

For the moment, I’m only going to be doing food posts. My current plan in regard to sightseeing is to do up individual city videos for each place we visit the way I did last year in the US. We’ll see how that goes… at least you’ll know we’re eating well.

My breakfast in the hotel – a little fresh fruit, cheese, coffee, juice… and a small tamale and a small bowl of beef and potato soup, both traditional local breakfasts.

Moving on to lunch time, we met up with a couple of new friends, Jorge...

Checking Out #49

Welcome along on the start of this year’s vacation! We began our journey yesterday morning with alarms (I hate alarm clocks) at 4 a.m., showers, a pickup at 5 a.m., to the airport, all the usual check-in stuff, and on a plane shortly before 8 a.m., heading first for Lima. Four plus hours later landing there, more of the usual stuff, an hour and a half wandering the terminal, then back on another plane heading to Bogotá, the first time for both of us to visit Colombia. Around 4 p.m. local time...

Plate by Plate: All Prawn All the Time

Pretty as a picture, no?

Basically, prawns/shrimp, five ways.

Risotto of shallots and dried baby shrimp, made with broth from some prawn shells. Finished with a little butter.

Ají de langostinos – the same yellow chili sauce we use to make ají de gallina, with prawns sauteed at last moment and then tossed with the sauce, then arranged on top.

Sous vide 64 egg in the center.

Crispy prawn head crumble – fried the prawn heads in oil until crispy, then drained them and blitzed them with toasted...

The Sentinel of Villa Crespo

Roughly three months ago I had dinner at Paladar Buenos Aires, one of the other well regarded closed door restaurants here in town. I had a delightful dinner and enjoyed all the food, loved the ambiance… all the good stuff. Pablo and Ivana were warm and welcoming, we were all taken care of well, it was a great experience. Pablo had hinted at a new project in the works, and quite recently, the wraps came off the mystery with the opening of Kon Kon, Ramirez de Velasco 942 in Villa Crespo. Pala...

Ay Sea Phood

Several people have complained that I no longer do full write-ups of our Casa S dinners, having opted for a scattering of more detailed, individual recipes of dishes that have been particularly successful. On the other hand, when I was doing full write-ups, roughly the same number of people (possibly the same people, now that I think about it) complained that it was boring to read through descriptions of each week’s dinners, particularly since a couple of years ago we stopped doing the, more...