Ecuadorians eat a fair share of rice. And when I say “fair share” I mean that here, rice is not the side dish. Small pieces of meat and little portions of salad take second and third place to steaming heaps of rice. With so much of their diet depending on rice, it’s no wonder that Ecuadorians have given the different states of cooked rice different names. As you probably know, arroz is the Spanish word for rice. Here in Ecuador, there is arroz, and then there is cocolón or pegado – the hard layer of overcooked rice that sticks to the sides of the pot. I know what you’re thinking: Yeah, overdone rice…real bizarre… And you’re right. Hard rice is not the most exotic of dishes. But what makes cocolón so strange to me is that where in the States we generally avoid whatever is left sticking to the side of the pan, many Ecuadorian prefer this part of the pot of rice to the soft, easily digested part. The colcolón is favored to the point that I have seen pre-dinnertime arguments break out between siblings over the last piece. It is favored to the point that when eating out, it would not be uncommon to hear someone order their meal with an extra slab of cocolón.
When I lived with a host family it took me awhile to understand why my host mother would serve me my dinner with a big chunk of overcooked rice. Did I do something wrong? I would ask myself. Is she angry with me? It didn’t take me long to realize, however, that I was being served the cocalón because as the “guest” I was being given what she considered to be the best portion of food. My mother too would always scrape herself out a large piece of hard rice. I marveled at how, despite all of her dental work, she never hesitated to work through those big pieces of tough rice. And after a couple months of always being served cocolón with my meal, I developed a taste for the overcooked part of the rice as well. I mean, it’s tasty and a great option for the modern individual who is craving rice, but on-the-go. My relationship with cocolón ended abruptly though, as I have discovered that eating it is also a great way to detect cavities. My friend Avelina swears that munching on overcooked chunks of rice twice a day does no damage to teeth, but I have to beg to differ. For the time being, I am laying off the cocolón. At least until my next dentist appointment.
If I eat something strange in site, it is usually prepared by Avelina. Avelina is a 54 year-old mother of four (in addition to two young grandchildren) and definitely one of my best friends in San Vicente. She usually keeps her meals simple – lots of soups, fried fish and plantains – but surprises me every once in awhile with something that I never expected to see on the menu. On this particular day, the surprise was in the soup.
“What’s in the soup?” I asked, leaning over the pot.
“We’re having mondongo soup, have you had it before?”
“Don’t think so, what’s modongo?” I asked, mispronouncing the word.
“Mondongo,” she corrected me, “is from the inside of the cow,” she explained motioning towards her stomach.
“Oh right. What part though?”
“The inside!”
I realized that either Avelina was being purposely vague for my sake or I just wasn’t meant to know what was in the soup of the day. I left the conversation there. Avelina moved the large piece of mystery innards from the pot to the cutting board and chopped it up in to bite-sized chunks. As she chopped, I speculated about where inside the cow the mondongo had been taken from. It was long and thick, pearl-colored, and almost cylindrical in shape which automatically made me think intestines. But I know the word for intestines, and it´s not mondongo…it´s tripa…which means tripe…I thought. Tripe is intestines…isn’t it? Dangit. Where is Wikipedia when I need it. I gave Avelina my best “can’t wait to dig in!” smile as she returned the chopped up pieces of mondongo to the pot.
Once lunch was ready all of the kids were called to the table and we said grace. While the rest of the family thanked God for the food in front of them, I said my own prayer asking God to please reveal to me what was in the soup. I squinted one eye open half-hoping to see a message written in salt or the name of the soup floating in the peas. No such luck. We all dug in. As usual when someone is a guest in an Ecuadorian’s home for a meal, I was given an extra healthy serving of mondongo in my soup. The consistency was chewy, kind of how I would imagine pencil erasers to be if boiled for awhile, and I was happy to discover that the mondongo itself didn’t have too much of a taste – it had basically just absorbed all of the flavours in the broth. Hallelujah. This was not going to be so bad.
Halfway through the soup, my cell phone rang. Seeing that it was a good PVC friend, I excused myself from the table. Maybe she knew what was in my soup.
“Hey.”
“Hey, what are you up to?”
“Lunch with Avelina.”
“Oh yeah? What are you guys having?”
“Caldo de mondongo. Do you have any idea what that is?”
*Long pause*
“Yeah…isn’t that cow rectum…?”
*Long pause*
“I mean I could be wrong,” she continued, “but, I’m pretty sure it’s the rectum. Don’t worry though, they wash it out really well with lemons and laundry detergent.”*
We hung up, I returned to the table and picked up my spoon. As I looked down at my soup the pieces of cow insides still floated around, but not innocently as they had been before. Now they bobbed up and down maliciously; laughing at my ignorance and reminding of all the good reasons to brush up on my animal anatomy in Spanish.
There are some times though, when knowing all of the Spanish vocabulary in the world will not help you identify what you are about to eat. Sometimes, when you are out in a small town in Ecuador, without your dictionary, no Wikipedia or high school Spanish teacher in sight (What up, Ms. Fischer!), with a new, unrecognizable entrée in front of you, the only way to learn is to eat. The word rellena in Spanish can be translated to mean “filled” or “stuffed” in English. “Filled or stuffed with what?” you might ask. Great question.
It was another quiet afternoon at Avelina´s and I had shown up à la Eddie Haskell, just in time for lunch. Avelina told me that today for lunch we would be having rellena and rice. I snuck a peek at the frying pan to see what looked like some variation of sausage sizzling on the stove.
We sat down to eat and it took me about a third of a bite to realize that the sausage I had in front of me was a little different than what you’d find in your grocer’s freezer. The consistency was much grainier than I expected and pieces were falling out of the casing. The taste to me was a little bit of a cross between cooking oil and metal.** I tried really hard not to make the face that you make when you take a big sip of your Sprite thinking it’s water, but I must not have tried hard enough.
“You don’t like it?” Avelina looked concerned.
Busted.
“No, that’s not it. I’m just a little surprised. What is this again?”
“It’s rellena.”
“Right. Filled with what?”
Avelina explained to me as everyone else ate that rellena is made when the blood of a cow, pig etc. is chilled to the point of coagulation and then mixed with pieces of rice, plantain, and meat. The mixture is then used to fill sausage casings, fried, and served with rice.
I have to say that as usual, Avelina´s explanation made it a little more difficult for me to get lunch down. But by keeping in mind that there are few gestures ruder than not eating the food that is offered to you, I was just about able to finish it all. I helped with the dishes and headed to the internet to do some research.
I found that as strange of an idea as rellena seemed to me, the dish is not so bizarre to the rest of the world. Nearly every continent has some version of blood sausage, and of course in some cultures it is considered a delicacy (I feel like they can say this about anything though. I mean, who’s really going to know?).
Andrew Zimmern has a motto. At the end of every episode he signs off saying, “And remember, if it looks good, eat it!” I think that it’s a great motto and it obviously works for him. But in some cases (read: cow rectum soup, blood sausage, etc.) what is put in front of you is not always going to seem super appetizing. For those situations, I would like to leave you with a motto of my own that has yet to let me down:
“If it seems edible and you are decently acquainted with the person who prepared it, try to make conversation until somebody else takes the first bite, watch their reaction intently for at least fifteen seconds, and then politely get as much of it down as you can!”
*The mondongo can come anywhere from the stomach, all the way down to the end of the digestive tract. The possibilities!
**But don´t just take my word for it! Get out there and try it for yourself!
Ahhh Noooo! LOL :) I think i would have offended everyone, and starved.
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