Welcome to my home! Bienvenido!
The flower market provided a wonderful selection of plants for gardens and containers.
People are always sitting around this central park in Barranco: a good meeting place and people watching opportunity.
I love this dog. He looms over the passersby in my neighborhood. He has a noisy buddy who yips and annoys, but he just sits there and smiles down at you as you walk by.
The view out one of our windows. Roof tops seem to store junk and the water cistern.
When Ian and I walk to the Pacific Ocean from our apartment, we can look down onto the fishing boats in nearby Chorrillos. We walked down there one day and looked at the fish market. Since it was afternoon, the early morning catch looked a bit tired, so we did not buy any fish or octopus.
When we headed up from the beach into Chorrillos, we looked back at the beach and downtown Lima in the distance. We then walked back along the top of the cliffs to our apartment.
It was cheery to come into the apartment and see the Norfolk Island Pine we had bought for our Christmas tree. It is decorated with Peruvian straw ornaments.
We loved having our son Joe and his girlfriend Virginia visit for Christmas. Ian helps out at the cathedral in Miraflores, so we celebrated Christmas morning there: La Catedral de Buen Pastor.
At our local artsy gift shop, Dedalo, the creche scene is very crafty and charming!
I bought four rocoto peppers at the market and some rubber gloves to use while I cut and seeded them. They are very hot; don't rub your eyes! I had had the dish Rocotos Rellenos in the local restaurants and loved the spicy peppers, ground meat filling and cheesy sauce. Potatoes gratin provided a complement to the heat of the rocoto peppers.
After seeding and boiling the peppers, I stuffed them with the ground beef, onion and spice filling. I used a local "fresh cheese" for the topping. Boiled sliced potatoes provide a base and help keep the peppers standing. The sauce is milk, eggs and oil and it sets like a custard around the peppers and potatoes while the casserole cooks for 45 minutes in the oven.
The cheese melts into the meat mixture, the peppers topple over, and the custard holds the peppers and sliced potatoes together in a mild gratin.
The recipe I used needs work. I am thinking mozzarella would be a better cheese, and I would adjust the filling with herbs, red wine, and spices. Some restaurants add raisins to the meat mixture and add some olives. My recipe added chopped hard boiled eggs and peanuts. That makes it very high protein! Look up Rocotos Rellenos on the web for various recipes and try it out! These peppers are probably not available in the States, but try something spicy as a container for the meat mixture.
