I love good food. Do I even have to state it? I love good food. I like to say it’s my Frenchness coming out, but I think that the importance of good quality and taste in food is something that every culture values and every person can appreciate. I was told that I would love the food in Chile (“You will eat a lot of meat and a lot of fish.”). I say, yum! I love good food because of its intrinsic value (i.e. I love good food because eating yummy things makes my stomach happy), but also because eating is an experience that is best when shared with other people. I can think of so many good memories that are centered around sharing or cooking a meal with special people, and I would like to share two Huinay food moments that stand out in my mind among many great meals over the past four weeks. The first one happened shortly after I had arrived at Huinay, and the second one happened a few days ago, but both show how important food has been in making me feel like part of this community.

Termas y curanto

My second evening at Huinay, I was invited to go to the Porcelana termas, which are thermal pools on the other side of the fjord, about 20 minutes away. I was both excited to be going as I had never been to thermal pools before, and nervous about going because no other English speaking person was going and it was only my second day and everything was still super new to me. But I went anyways. The group consisted of me, Belen and Yessi, two students from Valdivía studying forestry engineering, Dennis and Veronica who are the kitchen masters, Reinhart who’s in charge of admistration, and Helena his daughter. We left after dinner, at 8:30ish. It was a 25 minutes boat ride to Porcelana, and we pulled up to a pasture-like hill. Veronica’s niece lives in Porcelana (it looked like this “village” was about as big as Huinay; a collection of two or three houses tasked with the upkeep of the termas), so there was happy chatter all around. After a 15 minute walk through the forest we arrived at the much-awaited bunch of natural pools. These pools are filled with heated water, courtesy of Nature, as a result of the geothermic activity in the area. Indeed, there are geysers nearby and many of the surrounding mountains are in fact inactive (hopefully) volcanoes. Reinhart never tires of telling the story about how he was hiking around Huinay 4 years ago and was the first person to spot El Chaiten exploding.

My first terma experience was very enjoyable. You sit in a pool of silky water that is a little muddy, but in a good way. At first you can’t stand the heat of the water, but then it becomes pleasant, and you can sit back and relax and take deep breaths of air that smell of mulch and sulfur. And when you get too hot you’re supposed to take a plunge into the freezing river, just a few steps away beyond the trees. I wasn’t too keen on this part but everyone insisted that I do it because it’s part of the experience, so I let Dennis hold my glasses as I quickly submerged my head and all. It was SO cold! We moved between pools of different temperature, my nerves and shyness dissolving in the hot water as everyone attempted to speak with me, and Belen repeated sentences slowly when she sensed I had lost the thread of the conversation. We stayed there for hours, the sun set, and from the pools we could see that small patch of sky above changing from pale blue to navy, so gradually and slowly that it was barely noticeable, and the first stars came out while the sky still felt light. It was a night without moon, and I was able to sit back, listen to the buzz of Chileno, and see our Milky Way galaxy splashed against the trees.

At around midnight we gathered our things to leave. Others with more foresight than me had brought flashlights with them, and we stumbled along the path until once again we came out onto the pasture-like hill. Yessi, Belen, and I lied down on the grass to look at the stars while Veronica went to speak with her family. The three of squealed in delight as shooting stars blazed overhead. Veronica came back and we got up to go. She was holding a huge plate in her hand, which was covered by another one. I realized that I was very hungry. Dennis, Yessi, Belen and I gathered around her, and she uncovered the plate of curanto and the most amazing smoky smell reached my nose. Curanto is an important dish that is typically Chileno, typically Chilote (from the island of Chiloé). Helena explained to me that it is cooked in a hole in the ground, where shellfish and meat are piled in layers underneath huge leaves from the narca plant. Later when we came back to Huinay she pointed out the plant that looks like an enormous land lilly pad. Veronica told us to go head and dig in. Yessi and Belen and Dennis all grabbed one of the mussels. Veronica motioned to me to do the same. They were enormous, about the length of my hand. I took one gingerly with my fingertips; the outside was all slippery from the juices. The mussel was delicious, juicy, seafoody, and smoky, the best one I had ever had. I learned that ¡Que rico! Is the appropriate thing to say when enjoying good food, and I said it many times. Everyone exclaimed how good it was, and I was handed more mussels, more meat, which were accompanied with approving nods and smiles when they saw how much I liked it. We walked down the hill, back to the boat, Yessi steering me away from the cowpats, our fingers sticky from being licked. I felt full, happy, and we silently watched the stars from the boat on the way back. I noticed that the shapes of the mountains were darker than the sky.

Los Haivas

After a few weeks I had made it habit to visit the kitchen and say hi to Dennis, Veronica and Camila before sitting down to eat. I spend most of the day with my fellow science staff and it is nice to catch up with the others; exchange a few words and see what delicious food I was about to eat, and maybe nibble at something around the corners. I can think of many a day when upon entering the kitchen Veronica handed me a pancito (mini bread) fresh from the oven because she knows that I love them and that I’m always hungry.

One day, about two weeks ago, a group of “VIPs” from Endesa (the electricity super-company that built Huinay, remember?) were here to use the facilities as a summer retreat. This meant that the kitchen was working doubly hard to produce a gourmet meal for them on top of our food. I was early and didn’t know where Katie, Annika, and Uo were, so I went to the kitchen to see what was going on there. I chatted with Dennis for a few minutes, peeking around, trying to see what we were going to eat today. Dennis knew what I was after and showed me this huge pot on the stove, filled with these enormous crabs, easily twice the size of the crabs we had in Baltimore where crab is considered a local delicacy. They were for the VIPs though. He broke off one of the enormous forelegs with the pincer on it, smashed the shell with the heel of a carving knife, and handed the meat to me. I ate it, it was steaming and sweet, so delicious and there was so much of it. Veronica and Camila came back upstairs from the store room, and they huddled with us around the kitchen table. I asked what the Spanish word for crab is (jaiba) as Veronica cut up a couple of green lemons to squeeze over the meat and showed me how to sip the briny juice that is left in the crab leg once the meat is removed.

The four of us happily smashed the crabs with the heels of the knives, without a care about the noise, spilling juice all over the cutting boards and metal table-top. It was a simple treat; but an impromptu, almost illicit one, which is partly what made it taste so good. Over the growing pile of empty shells and smiles at each other’s enthusiasm about the task at hand, I felt a great fondness for all of them. As others started to stream in the dining room I left the kitchen, and sat at the table, already a little full but undaunted by the prospect of a second delicious meal.