Agustins cooking class

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Putting our faith in our trusty rough guide, we took ourselves and our bags (now heavily laden with woollen garments) straight up the hill. A sweaty hour later, we were not impressed with the rough guide. Having rather ungraciously done our first bit of exercise for the year we were relieved to find a hostel, any hostel in which to recooperate.

Discovered that the rough guides eagerly awaited vegetarian buffet restaurant was not where it stated it was and was also closed. Disheartened we trudged to an alternative restaurant. And we are really glad we did.

Dinner was an experience. Having been seated at at a small table with a light fitting at eye level, the dialogue went as follows.

waiter (whilst throwing things down on the table, pacing around and generally knocking things), "you want to drink wine"

us, "err, no thank you"

waiter, "good, because we have none. beer?"

us "..." (trying to make eye contact through the light fitting)

waiter, "corona? we only have corona"

us, "corona then please".

We immediately took a liking to him and his hap hazard style and watched his crash around throughout our meal.

Making the most of his good english and inquiring what the majority of the menu consisted of, it was obvious to him that we needed help. We were discretely handed flyers under the table and told to meet outside the church at 12pm the following day where our culinary curiosities would be cured.

Our tour of the market was more of a game of cat and mouse, with us chasing the nimble bugger, catching him only when he stopped to sample tasters on his quest for cheese, chilli, chocolate and a combination of the latter two, known as Mole´.

Running out of the market, hailed a bus. It drove past. Jumped in a taxi. Could have walked. Arrived at a house where the stairs were to small to have more than one (slim) person on at a time, with a doorframe too low to walk through. Within seconds, had a Corona in hand, which did nothing to help us deal with the hilarity of the situation.

Not only did we have to admire his dried chilli collection, he was adamant that we had to write all their names down. We got round this, Lexie instead wrote a list of reasons why not to write the chillies down whilst Emily took a photo (much quicker) of the extensive collection.

Our second lesson was the importance of consuming Mezcal which is a type of unrefined tequila favoured in this region by the glassful. Apparently it aids digestion, but this is something we cannot confirm.

As the afternoon progressed, the cooking got more haphazard and messy.

Highlights :-

- blending unpeeled garlic cloves (too much effort to peel apparently)

- using a stick to light hob and leaving it alight on the draining board

- making a really hot salsa and pouring it liberally, which caused him to hurt himself laughing

- making a point of washing the corriander for hygiene, then picking up the unwashed one and using that instead

- cooking and eating 12 dishes

- being filmed for a promotional video

- graffiti the walls of his house with praise (he asked us to)

9 hours later, Emily learnt how to cook. Though neither of us can work out is comparison of these newly aquired skills to the foundations of the english language, it was a very enjoyable day.

Next day neither of us ever wanted to see a mexican dish ever again. Just wanted some hummus.

x

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Photos

shopping
vital for quality ingredients

cooking
vital for quality food

eating
quality lunch for the energy

mole
of the best quality

evening meal
more drink than quality cooking