More time spent with Luciano and Geneci meant more delicious food and family time! Here are a few more of my favorites:
Brazilian Chicken Fried Steak
Slice beef into thin steaks Add salt, lots of crushed garlic, and a few splashes of vinegar. Lets it for a few minutes. Prepare two plates, one with a few eggs, beaten, and one with farinha (flour). Dip the steaks into the flour, then the egg, then flour again. Fry in hot oil on the stove. Yummmmmmm! We ate our with lots of beans, rice, and ketchup.
Fresh Beet Salad
Geneci makes this colorful side dish that is delicious and healthy too. Just grate one beet, and add salt and vinegar. I was surprised at how much I liked this. You could probably add some sugar too, if desired.
side note: brazilians don't eat a lot of fresh veggies, just pickled in vinegar
German Cuca Bread
I was really excited for this recipe! I want to make it for Zacky when he gets home. This recipe is for pineapple cuca, but you can substitute whatever you want for the topping (pineapple, orange, apple, guava and cheese, and chocolate are some popular varieties)
2 eggs
100g margarine
2 c sugar
1.5 c milk, warm
Spoonful of yeast
1 spoonful lime zest
4-5 cups flour
Topping
1 med. pineapple, chopped
2 c sugar
1 c water
Tb amido de milho
Farofa (sugar crystal topping)
6 spoons sugar
6 spoons flour
3 spoons margarine
Beat eggs with the sugar and margarine. Add a little milk, a little flour, a little milk, a little flour until its all mixed. Pour in yeast and zest, mix. Put dough in big casserole type dish. Put on the topping (instructions below) and farofa. Bake in the oven for 40 min at 180 Celsius.
To make the topping: add pineapple, sugar, water to a saucepan and cook on med heat for 10 to 15 minutes. Add the amido de milho and cook for 2 more minutes. Let it cool before adding it to the dough so as not to kill the yeast.
Hope this turns out!
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Thursday, November 22, 2012
Visiting Teaching
I went on my first Brazilian visiting teaching outing on Sunday. Geneci invited me along as she visited a sister that lived nearby. I have to be honest, I was terrified. I was going alone with someone who spoke no English to visit someone who spoke no English. It ended up being a fun experience and reminded me again of how worldwide our church is.
Here we are:
On our way home, we both tried desperately to have a conversation.... I discovered that if I keep the topics to colors, food, or animals, I can kinda make sense in Portuguese. Kind of.
:)
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Here we are:
On our way home, we both tried desperately to have a conversation.... I discovered that if I keep the topics to colors, food, or animals, I can kinda make sense in Portuguese. Kind of.
:)
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It's not all fun and games...
You know you married the right person when you can get through crazy days and not want to kill each other... We have had some funny hiccups in our trip that have reminded us that patience is a virtue. Here are some things that we have learned:
- Bank of America does not have an agreement with the banks in Brazil. Even though I double checked over the phone with a customer service person and found out all the details, we had some MAJOR problems with our cards while we were there. Only certain ATMs would accept our card, and even then we would just have to hope and pray that it would dispense the money :) we finally got it all worked out, but it was a frustrating 2 days. It's so weird to feel so poor even though you have money in the bank!
-getting directions from someone in a different language is hard.
-sleeping on a plane is impossible and makes one grumpy.
-missing a bus is one of the most frustrating things!
-traveling makes my stomach go crazy. Between the long plane ride, the walking, and the different foods here I got really sick! Glad that only lasted one day!
- my feet blister easily. Boo.
I read a card once that said "I would rather be nowhere with you than anywhere with someone else".
Through all of our ups and downs this trip, I realized over and over how much I love Grant and wouldn't want to have experienced this with anyone else.
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- Bank of America does not have an agreement with the banks in Brazil. Even though I double checked over the phone with a customer service person and found out all the details, we had some MAJOR problems with our cards while we were there. Only certain ATMs would accept our card, and even then we would just have to hope and pray that it would dispense the money :) we finally got it all worked out, but it was a frustrating 2 days. It's so weird to feel so poor even though you have money in the bank!
-getting directions from someone in a different language is hard.
-sleeping on a plane is impossible and makes one grumpy.
-missing a bus is one of the most frustrating things!
-traveling makes my stomach go crazy. Between the long plane ride, the walking, and the different foods here I got really sick! Glad that only lasted one day!
- my feet blister easily. Boo.
I read a card once that said "I would rather be nowhere with you than anywhere with someone else".
Through all of our ups and downs this trip, I realized over and over how much I love Grant and wouldn't want to have experienced this with anyone else.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
City Day
On Monday (19th) we took the Metro all the way from Esteio to downtown Porto Alegre. There is a HUGE mercado there that I had been dying to visit. We had some souvenir shopping left to do, and it seemed like the perfect place to get that done.
What a bustling city! I definitely felt like I was in a different country, as fashions were a bit different, there were different smells and people all around yelling in Portuguese to advertise their product(most of these were advertising places where you could buy gold as well as get a tattoo, all in one shop. Classy.)
We saw a cute pet shop:
We stumbled upon a beautiful cathedral, with a hand painted ceiling that was unreal:
We saw cool buildings:
And lots of pigeons:
On our way back, we stopped in Canoas, another one of Grants mission areas. I loved this city! There were lots of shops and tall buildings , but it was cleaner and quieter than Porto Alegre. I could totally see myself living there!
Grant found the chapel building:
And the cereal shop (see previous post) which made me sooooo happy:
Another fun day here... Can't believe it's almost over!
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What a bustling city! I definitely felt like I was in a different country, as fashions were a bit different, there were different smells and people all around yelling in Portuguese to advertise their product(most of these were advertising places where you could buy gold as well as get a tattoo, all in one shop. Classy.)
We saw a cute pet shop:
We stumbled upon a beautiful cathedral, with a hand painted ceiling that was unreal:
We saw cool buildings:
And lots of pigeons:
On our way back, we stopped in Canoas, another one of Grants mission areas. I loved this city! There were lots of shops and tall buildings , but it was cleaner and quieter than Porto Alegre. I could totally see myself living there!
Grant found the chapel building:
And the cereal shop (see previous post) which made me sooooo happy:
Another fun day here... Can't believe it's almost over!
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Gramanda Gremistas
What's a Gremista, you ask?
A Gremista is a tried and true fan of Gremio, the futebol team based here in Porto Alegre. You all know that futebol is no joke here- it's more like a religion that a sports team :) they take it very seriously:
here we are in our jerseys
There is a crazy rivalry between Gremio and Internacional, another futebol team based in Porto Alegre. Their fans are called Colorados, sporting their team color, red.
Luciano, a gremista himself, explained that the rivalry is so fierce that some gremistas won't have red Christmas decorations, as to not defile their home with the Colorado spirit!
With the choice of blue or red before us, I was reminded I another similar rivalry, and it was a clear choice:
Go Cougars! And go Gremio!
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A Gremista is a tried and true fan of Gremio, the futebol team based here in Porto Alegre. You all know that futebol is no joke here- it's more like a religion that a sports team :) they take it very seriously:
here we are in our jerseys
There is a crazy rivalry between Gremio and Internacional, another futebol team based in Porto Alegre. Their fans are called Colorados, sporting their team color, red.
Luciano, a gremista himself, explained that the rivalry is so fierce that some gremistas won't have red Christmas decorations, as to not defile their home with the Colorado spirit!
With the choice of blue or red before us, I was reminded I another similar rivalry, and it was a clear choice:
Go Cougars! And go Gremio!
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Tuesday, November 20, 2012
We FOUND IT!
Remember how I was sad that we couldn't find the cereal shop in Novo Hamburgo? Well Grant saved the day and remembered where one was in Canoas... It's a just tiny store with several different cereals all in bulk. You get to choose which kind and how much you want. I love cereal so much so this is basically my dream come true. Why don't they have these in America? I am SO HAPPY!
Tchau for now!
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Tchau for now!
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Churrasco
Churrasco, Brazilian barbecue, is a big thing here, especially in the state of Rio Grande do Sul. We had the privilege of having it two times while here in Brazil, each time homemade by friends.
Best. Food. Ever.
Marcos made it for us the first time while we were in Canela. He made calebresa, chicken, and beef ribs. He put all the meat in this huge wooden bowl:
We ate it with homemade potato salad, lettuce, picked veggies, fresh pineapple, and of course chimarrao. We all sat outside in the family's barn. I was super sick that day, so I didn't get as many pics as I had hoped, but it was a great experience.
Our other experience was with Luciano. He made a churrasco pit on his front porch with bricks. I took a lot more pictures this time so you could see what a true churrasco experience is like.
First, you light the coals and let them sit for a while while you skewer the meat onto big swords.
Grant being awesome
the swords
putting on the coraçao de frango (chicken hearts), and the cats watching intensely
Next, you put the meat in the fire. Once one side starts to brown, you flip it and rub coarse salt all over it.
thankfully Luciano was in charge of this part
Little Jar Jar waiting so patiently
Then you enjoy!
The meat is especially good with farofa, a mix of flour, oil, herbs, salt, and other goodness. We also had potato salad, rice, and roasted onions with salt and vinegar. Oh, and chimarrao :)
Muito bom!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
Best. Food. Ever.
Marcos made it for us the first time while we were in Canela. He made calebresa, chicken, and beef ribs. He put all the meat in this huge wooden bowl:
We ate it with homemade potato salad, lettuce, picked veggies, fresh pineapple, and of course chimarrao. We all sat outside in the family's barn. I was super sick that day, so I didn't get as many pics as I had hoped, but it was a great experience.
Our other experience was with Luciano. He made a churrasco pit on his front porch with bricks. I took a lot more pictures this time so you could see what a true churrasco experience is like.
First, you light the coals and let them sit for a while while you skewer the meat onto big swords.
Grant being awesome
the swords
putting on the coraçao de frango (chicken hearts), and the cats watching intensely
Next, you put the meat in the fire. Once one side starts to brown, you flip it and rub coarse salt all over it.
thankfully Luciano was in charge of this part
Little Jar Jar waiting so patiently
Then you enjoy!
The meat is especially good with farofa, a mix of flour, oil, herbs, salt, and other goodness. We also had potato salad, rice, and roasted onions with salt and vinegar. Oh, and chimarrao :)
Muito bom!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone
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