E’k t’u’y=chicken in pot

I asked my teacher if I could start break a little early so that I could begin prepping for the cooking later that day. I had to figure out how to say it in K’iche’ before I could do this…I ended up only starting 5 minutes before break. The dilemma of the day was how to make the chicken soup. I have always made it with left over chicken. Put it in with the bones and all the veggies and let it boil on low for a long time. Both the other student and my host mom insisted that the way to do it was to boil the chicken. I have never boiled any kind of meat in my life! But they are both mothers and their children have survived. I had never thought so much the night before about cooking. I ended up deciding to do it both ways. I baked the chicken. I then boiled it so that the meat would fall off the bone easily and then let it cool so that the fat would rise to the top and then scoop it out. Then placed all of the vegetables and let it boil for an hour and a half. The salad of cucumber, tomato, lemon, salt and pepper, is eaten a lot here. Many foreigners are afraid of any type of salad (especially with lettuce) because it’s a good way of catching a bug. A trick we were taught if you don’t have the special store-bought disinfectant is to put the salad makings in a bowl with warm water and salt for 5 minutes. I cooked platanos (banana looking but bigger) for dessert. Cut into pieces and boiled in water with sugar for 5-7 minutes. Our meal of course was accompanied by bread from Xelapan (my favorite bakery!), cookies, pan dulce (bread but has yumminess of sugar), and tortillas to die for made by one of the teachers. Oh…and I’m forgetting the CABRO. The Cabro is the most popular beer here, and probably in all of Guatemala.
Although Cerveza Gallo is the best known one as the Guatemalan beer (aka Famosa in U.S.) Cabro seems to be the favorite among locals--not to mentioned it’s brewed in Xela. The meal was a success and there was plenty for the 16 of us! (reminded me of cooking for/with the intentional living community I lived with in college).
After the meal we pushed the chairs aside and began to dance! I had a fabulous time with the teachers, their spouses, the students in the university program, and the children! It’s the teachers’ turn to cook next week, already looking forward to it.