cuisiner

recipe for gallo pinto:

Gallo pinto is a traditional dish of Costa Rican and Nicaraguan cuisine. Though many variations exist, the dish at its most basic is composed of pre-cooked rice and beans fried together. It is considered the national dish of these two countries, and is eaten as a part of any meal, although mostly for breakfast.


Cook the beans, reserve 1/2c of the bean juice, then sautee some onion and pepper with a smidge of garlic, then add in the beans and cook them for about 5 or 10 minutes, then add in cooked rice
it's REAL simple! all you need is a a few tablespoons of oil to fry.

This will bring me back to the Nica days, ate that every day multiple times a day. It got old, but it was delicious and I definitely crave it. Can't wait to try it out! :)





I was researching Cameroonian cuisine a bit. Food, like (it seems) everything else in the country is varied and quite diverse, one of the most in Africa.

Merci "Wikipedia":

The national dish of Cameroon is ndolé, a stew consisting of fish or beef, nuts and bitter greens.[1] Staple foods in Cameroon include cassava, yam, rice, plantain, potato, maize, beans, and millet. The French introduced French bread and Italian pasta, which are not as widely consumed, however, due to their price. The main source of protein for most inhabitants is fish, with poultry and meat being too expensive for anything other than special occasions. Bush meat, however, is commonly consumed, some of the most sought after species being the pangolin, the porcupine and the giant rat. There is also a thriving trade in such exotic bush meat species as chimpanzee and gorilla."

Bushmeat... that alone will be an adventure!

There is very fertile soil throughout Cameroon so that means gardening will hopefully be successful (unlike my peppers and squash here- damn heat... this is WI!). There is a large variety of vegetables and fruits.

"Wiki" encore:
Among Cameroonian specialties are brochettes (a kind of barbecued kebab made from either chicken, beef, or goat), sangah (a mixture of maize, cassava leaf and palmnut juice) and ndolé (a spicy stew containing bitterleaf greens, meat, shrimp, pork rind, and peanut paste).


I've read vaguely about the Peace Corps diet and although everyone tends to lose weight during training; males lose weight throughout service and female volunteers tend to gain. Can anyone speak truth to this and if so, why does this phenomenon occur?