I've just returned from two and a half weeks in South America, a vacation with my husband and his family. We spent five days in Buenos Aires, then five days in Patagonia, south of the Lake District, and the final five or so days in Rio de Janeiro -- leaving, shamefully, just days before Carnevale.
Though currently thoroughly enveloped in the fog of a cold, a reliable post-vacation ailment, memories of food flit through my addled head. Oh, the stories I could tell! Of dulce de leche, of empanadas. Of soft, cheesy tamales, rich feijoada, and vibrant tropical juices. Good god, the membrillo! These are a few of the obsessions I returned with (along with this snotty virus).
But the abiding obsession I keep coming back to is cachaca, the Brazilian liquor distilled from sugarcane. (An aside: we had fresh sugarcane juice at this market in Ipanema -- the vendor pushed the long, fibrous stalks through the juicing machine and produced a cup of pure joy -- or, as he called it, Brazilian Viagra.)
(Further aside: our Rio trip is short on photographs, since we were strongly warned not to take the camera out, especially when sitting outside. I regret this, since Rio was much safer than people made it out to be, and while being aware of our surroundings was important, we could have relaxed a little and taken more photos.)