Friendo y Comiendo: Issue 04

Whenever PCV's get-together one thing is guaranteed to happen: food will be made. In larger get-togethers this usually means either burritos or one giant pot of some kind of pasta, be it mac n cheese or something tomato-based. I've been to my fair share of PCV gatherings and have noticed a pattern with these big meals: when there are 7 or more PCV's present, amounts will usually be underestimated and people will still be hungry after all the food is gone. When there are 6 or less PCV's, a ridiculously large amount of food is prepared and there ends up being enough leftovers for at least one or two extra meals.

So the other day I had a PCV over, and we decided to make lentil burritos (because they're super quick and easy to make with the ingredients here in Azerbaijan). We bought a bunch of things from the vegetable guy earlier in the day: cilantro, onions, peppers, spinach, carrots, and a pumpkin. These were not your ordinary burritos. We sprinkled some garlic pepper and olive oil on the carrots and pumpkin and roasted it in the oven; for the lentils we sauteed some onions and cooked them with a packet of taco seasoning; the spinach we just washed and left fresh. Our burritos ended up being lavash (tortilla-like flatbread) filled with lentils, mashed roasted pumpkin, spinach, sauteed onions and peppers, and crispy roasted carrots. It was delicious.

That was a week ago. Today, my dinner consisted of those same lentils that I STILL had over some white rice. I also needed to do something with all the leftover pumpkin...and so I looked up recipes online and found one for pumpkin gingerbread. I have no idea how it tastes, but I hope that the garlic pepper that was in the pumpkin is overshadowed by the ginger in the gingerbread... or else that is going to be one funky tasting bread. (It just came out of the oven, I am waiting for it to cool off a bit before I take the first bite.) The recipe for the gingerbread required about a cup of pumpkin...which means I STILL have leftover pumpkin from a week ago. At this point I don't even know what to do with it. (I'm not going to throw it out -- I'm a Peace Corps Volunteer, that would be soooo OLMAZ!) Maybe tomorrow I'll try some pumpkin pancakes...although I will still have the garlic-pepper-taste dilemma.

(Update: The pumpkin gingerbread is delicious. There is a hint of garlicky-pepperness, but its definitely overshadowed by the other flavors, thank goodness!) Look at it: