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| Dutch lunch at Clivia's, best host ever! |
Who would have thought to find a little piece of home in Uruguay! Of all countries in South America, it is the one that spontaneously brought my mind to the flat green Netherlands, to the hills of Tuscany and to the lungomare (seaside) in Cefalù...As usual, I didn’t want to have any expectation of Uruguay beforehand, so to let myself be surprised by whatever came across...this is why to find here a little piece of home made me feel warm and jumpy inside!
Travelling across the Uruguayan countryside feels like taking that typical yellow train from Maastricht to somewhere in the north of the country: a peaceful scene of green flatness and grazing cows, gifted by some lonely windmills and gentle artificial creeks. Certainly, there are no windmills in Uruguay, but instead there are gauchos, isolated rural schools and police stations which are just normal countryside houses. As the landscape changes and gets drier, it starts to look like those gentle hills of Tuscany with some tree every here and there.
Enchanted by this landscape I paradoxically realised that I miss Holanda! But since the country is now covered in snow, I better wait for the spring time, when cows and sheep will be grazing outside more happily! Being in this homy mood, today we felt like cooking something typically Dutch for our host. Of course we ended up preparing stampot and meatballs, which turned out to be delicious and Clivia complimented us happily! Maurice is definitely improving his cooking skills ;)
Squeezed in between its big neighbours, Argentina and Brazil, the world is unaware of the richness of this country and of its contribution to some of those things we think of as ‘South Americans’. In many occasions the neighbours got the credits for things Uruguay created or contributed to, as for the Cumparsita, queen of all tango’s, co-written by an Uruguayan and an Argentinian...Who knows that Uruguay had anything to do with it?! Or what about the birth place of Carlos Gardel? Uruguay is always a suspected ‘partner in crime’. Same case about the paternity of the dulce de leche, made of milk and sugar and here used as much as nutella in Italy or whipped cream in the Netherlands, it cannot miss! Uruguayans will say it's their thing. Argentinians will say the same.
Small Uruguay doesn’t seem to put much effort in defending its merits...maybe it does, but its voice remains unheard and obscured by the counter opinion of its more famous neighbours, or perhaps it is because Uruguayan are such simple genuine people that wouldn’t waste their energy in fighting for these trifles! What a lovely people!
Travelling across the Uruguayan countryside feels like taking that typical yellow train from Maastricht to somewhere in the north of the country: a peaceful scene of green flatness and grazing cows, gifted by some lonely windmills and gentle artificial creeks. Certainly, there are no windmills in Uruguay, but instead there are gauchos, isolated rural schools and police stations which are just normal countryside houses. As the landscape changes and gets drier, it starts to look like those gentle hills of Tuscany with some tree every here and there.
Enchanted by this landscape I paradoxically realised that I miss Holanda! But since the country is now covered in snow, I better wait for the spring time, when cows and sheep will be grazing outside more happily! Being in this homy mood, today we felt like cooking something typically Dutch for our host. Of course we ended up preparing stampot and meatballs, which turned out to be delicious and Clivia complimented us happily! Maurice is definitely improving his cooking skills ;)
Squeezed in between its big neighbours, Argentina and Brazil, the world is unaware of the richness of this country and of its contribution to some of those things we think of as ‘South Americans’. In many occasions the neighbours got the credits for things Uruguay created or contributed to, as for the Cumparsita, queen of all tango’s, co-written by an Uruguayan and an Argentinian...Who knows that Uruguay had anything to do with it?! Or what about the birth place of Carlos Gardel? Uruguay is always a suspected ‘partner in crime’. Same case about the paternity of the dulce de leche, made of milk and sugar and here used as much as nutella in Italy or whipped cream in the Netherlands, it cannot miss! Uruguayans will say it's their thing. Argentinians will say the same.
Small Uruguay doesn’t seem to put much effort in defending its merits...maybe it does, but its voice remains unheard and obscured by the counter opinion of its more famous neighbours, or perhaps it is because Uruguayan are such simple genuine people that wouldn’t waste their energy in fighting for these trifles! What a lovely people!
Stamppot met gehaktballen, typical Dutch winterfood. So guess what was our meal a quarter ago?? Yet, we have our 5th (or is it 6th?)period of snow. A very, very long winter this year. I hate it! I want to have the sun, 25 degrees and a pavement to enjoy that sun. Unfortunately I have to wait a few month. So stay where you are....
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I think a hundred years ago this typical Dutch meal was still deliciou...or maybe it was even better than today?! ;-)
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