Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Fungus for Lunch


Today, I was lucky enough to have been invited to the home of an American couple who've lived in Oaxaca for several years and are part of the expat community here. First, it was neat being able to see what they had done in remodeling the house. Spectacular! With a interior courtyard backed by a full length mural. An orchidarium on the roof. Mahogany staircase. And exceptional Mexican art. I love looking at other people's homes to see what they've done with them. I'm still at the rental stage in Mexico and probably will be for a very long time. But you can always dream....

My hosts' cook made a tasty and typically Oaxacan lunch for the group--chicken stuffed with huitlacoche. This is corn smut or a fungus that naturally grows on corn. In the U.S., it's considered a pest. In Mexico, it's a great delicacy. So I ate it. No complaints. Kind of looked like black spinach. Flavor, hard to say since there was a tomato salsa that went over the dish. Here's more info from Wikipedia on huitlacoche:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corn_smut
It could be worse. They eat grasshoppers and a type of ant here, too. For those, I'll pass, thanks.

This evening, I had plans to go see 2 movies at the free cine-club Pochote, "Dream Girls," and "Tommy." Both have terrific music. I walked the 16 blocks from my apartment to the movie place. Only once I got there, the projectionist told us that the movies never got delivered....sorry. (This is pretty typical for Mexico.) He was going to show an old Mexican movie instead. I wasn't interested, so I got up and left and walked the 16 blocks home. Back in my misspent youth, I would have been mad as hell. Tonight, I just chalked it up to a nice evening stroll.