Four minutes to read.
So much of daily life occurs at arm’s length—passive, detached, distant. Like watching my life through frosted glass windows. Vending machines feed me processed, pre-packaged food. In numbered theater rows, I watch stage actors emote for me. I teach history from books I did not write. I ride in taxis, even driverless cars. My money is banked by mail.
Inversely, travel is participatory. Nothing secondhand. Nothing vicarious.
Years ago, while googling the world from afar, I happened upon the LaGuardia Community College food and culture course. The Ecuadorian professor’s syllabus captivated me. Masa, a corn-based dough, made my mouth water.
A country’s cuisine is my chance to sit at the dining table of history. More than critical dates and famous deaths, buildings or battles, as some wag must have said to someone somewhere, the way to a country’s heart is through its restaurants.
In Cuenca, Ecuador, I start my day in the hotel banquet room--an airy, spacious, high-ceilinged wood-paneled dining hall with potted indoor palm trees. The traditional Ecuadorian breakfast is humitas, rich black coffee and the comforting aroma of cooked corn.
Humitas is corn, onion, garlic, cheese, eggs and cream tucked into a corn husk and steamed. I linger to savor each bite. I know in my head the corn’s nutritional value needs time to nourish my body, but in my mouth the pleasure is instantaneous.
Maize, or corn, was developed and cultivated in Mesoamerica 10,000 years ago. It is the world’s first fully engineered plant—a kind of GMO before horticulture. Remarkably, no one has a clue about how cobs of corn were invented—or evolved—into existence.
My waiter Santiago wants to practice his English, so we share stories about our families. His nine-year-old boy lives with his mother in New York City. I don’t ask why, but I sense the reason is economic, not marital. The family talks on the phone every week. “My son corrects my English,” Santiago boasts. When I ask if they Skype, Santiago replies, “Without Skype it’s easier to hide my tears.”
Boiled corn kernels the size of fava beans and chunky potato slices are typical side dishes for another Ecuadorian delicacy—spit-roasted guinea pig, or cuy. Served whole—legs, paws, tail and head included—the actual quantity of eatable meat is meager, maybe the equivalent of a medium-sized turkey leg. The taste is akin to braised rabbit. Mild, not gamey.
From the earliest times, Ecuadorians have raised guinea pigs as livestock. Pushing the image of cuddly, caged pet shop guinea pigs from my mind and unshackling my cross-cultural blinders, I am freed to be a culinary voyager, a seafaring Columbus.
When Columbus arrived in the Americas, he discovered Ecuadorians and their neighbors farming, harvesting, cooking and eating foods that were brand-new to Europeans. Potatoes, corn, sunflowers, pineapples, papaya, pumpkins, vanilla, beans of all sorts, squashes, chilis, chocolate.
By some accounts, sixty percent of the world’s crops originated in the Americas. For Italy, tomatoes. For the Greeks, eggplant. For Southeast Asia, peanut sauce and curries. For the African continent, cassava. For my kitchen, corn chowder, cornbread, corn salad, corn risotto, corn casserole.