An Ode to Chilean Salads

..yes, really, no sarcasm.

So, as mentioned in the last post, I am going vegetarian. 6 months of hearty meat and potatoes food has left me feeling like every blood cell in my body is running around with a backpack full of unneccesary building material, and I want out. This food is similar to what my German grandmother prefers, and in both her case and in Chile this diet derives from a farming lifestyle. As in, wake up before dawn, eat as much protein and carbs as possible, hit the fields and work non-stop until mid-afternoon, repeat meal, repeat labor, drop into bed and do it all over again.

When I was working as an apple-picker in New Zealand I had a similar lifestyle, which involved filling 4 or more 1000lb bins a day:



Not to mentiontion placing and climbing up a 12 foot ladder with an awkward load of 25lbs of apples.



Now, I couldn't afford a mountain of meat and potatoes at that point, but I did eat just about as much tuna fish and ramen noodles as I could get my hands on....so I understand the protein and carb heavy diet.

These days, though, the most energy I expend at work is writing on a whiteboard and gesturing like a maniac. While tiring, this hardly constitutes manual labor.

As for the rest of the time, I do a lot of walking, sure, but I don't need a farmer's diet. Yesterday, I mentioned this to the host fam. Or rather, they thrust some chicken nuggets at me and I recoiled with my hand over my face squeaking, "No! No! No puedo! No mas!"

Today I came home with slow feet, heavy hearted, not looking forward to my plate of difficult digestion. When I walked in, host-dad was pointing at a covered plate with a sense of urgency. I sat down, lifted the plate and found....a gigantic, fresh salad.

Pure joy. I broke my fast and introduced nutrition back into my life.

The thing is, in the US a salad means a whole heap of lettuce with a couple of other veggies mixed in, then doused in some heavy dressing. I really don't like them that much, I must confess.

Now I realize that lettuce alone may have been keeping me off vegetarianism for years. What a worthless vegetable--no taste, hard to eat, fills up space. And yet I've gone along thinking it was the basis of any salad apart from the fabulous cucumber-and-tomato mediterranean salad. How wrong I was.

In Chile, a salad is a collection of sliced vegetables laid out in a nice spread on a plate. True, if you go to a restaurant that may be sliced vegetable, singular, such as only celery. However, in someone's home, you are likely to get a nice plate. This evening I was treated to half an avocado, a sliced beet, diced potato with oregano, half of a sliced tomato, some steamed broccoli, and a hard-boiled egg. For dressing, you squeeze a lemon over the top and add, as you wish, olive oil, vinegar, and salt. I generally go for just lemon and a bit of salt.

They may not like them as much as I do, or understand why I want to eat them so frequently, but when Chileans do salads they do them right.