To each his Lechón

Warning: this post may not be suitable for herbivores, vegans, vegetarians... read at your own risk!

One of the most delicious foods of Puerto Rico is lechón, a whole pig that is slowly roasted over charcoal. Scattered along rural roadsides, you are likely to come across something called a Lechonera. This is where they prepare and serve the delicious slow roasted pork. 

Ethan and I first noticed these restaurants on our way to El Yunque one afternoon. As we were driving down one of the back roads, we noticed a huge line of people outside a building with someone out front furiously chopping up cuts of pork served alongside amarillos or sweet plantains, and arroz con gandules, also known as rice served with pigeon peas. And the cooks are there bright and early 6am to get ready for the day! 

After asking our landlords about these restaurants, they recommended a place nearby - Los Piñones - and we had to go check it out. When we first got there, it was not so easy figuring out where to place our order, where to pay, or where to pick up, since they display their food outside right next to the front door. However, this makes it easy to point at what you want because we didn't know the names of the dishes! Most of the Lechoneras also have a dining area, but we wanted to takes ours home since it was just around the corner. 

We also enjoyed some lechón at a different location after exploring the Camuy caves outside of Arecibo. Ethan overheard a tour guide informing his group that an excellent place to have lunch after visiting the caves was at "Rancho T" just down the road. We heeded his advice and it was quite delicious indeed. We even caught a glimpse of one of the cooks preparing to serve up some pork, hot off the skewer. Check out his sweet machete!

For more information on this famous Puerto Rican specialty, this article describes eating lechón in Puerto Rico quite eloquently: http://travel.nytimes.com/2011/07/03/travel/eating-roast-pig-in-guaynabo-puerto-rico.html

¡Buen Provecho!

The holidays continue in Puerto Rico...

Just because Christmas and New Year's have passed does not mean that the holiday celebrations are over here in Puerto Rico. They celebrate another holiday, Tres Reyes or Three Kings on January 6th. This is actually quite a common holiday in Latin and Spanish cultures that celebrate the arrival of the three kings that came to visit Jesus after he was born and brought him gifts. For Puertorriqueños, it means getting more presents and candy - a much-loved holiday, especially for the kids. The night before, children put grass in shoe boxes and place them under their beds and the following morning, they find candy and small gifts in their shoe boxes. Kind of reminds me a bit of getting an Easter basket! :)

In Cupey, where we currently live, they have something extra special for the neighborhood kids: Los Reyes Magos where three men dress up like the Three Kings and ride horses down the street and hand out candy for the kids! This was also accompanied by a float full of people singing and playing typical Puerto Rican instruments including the Güiro, the Cuatro, and Palitos. It was quite fun to see this happening on our street! It was especially nice to see the kids (and Ethan) getting all excited to get candy from the Three Kings!

¡Feliz Día de los Reyes!

Everything falling into place

We finally got a car!!!

After another full day of searching, we came across this cute 2009 Toyota Yaris Hatchback with very little mileage! It was a bit out of our original budget, but we soon realized we would have to modify our budget to get something reliable and cost effective. Hopefully, we will keep it in decent shape and be able to sell it at a decent price when we leave the island.
To celebrate, we spent today at the beach, just relaxing! We drove by our future apartment again and snagged a picture to show you:

At the front gate, you see the cute little patio area with lots of tropical plants and then you take some stairs and you can see the fence at the top near where the front door is. We can't wait to move in!

And to sign off tonight, here is a fun video we took while driving from our current house on the hill in Cupey:

Bienvenidos a San Juan

Our voyage to San Juan was uneventful. Unlike many trips Ethan and I have made together in the past, everything went as planned. We were lucky and had no problems with our flights or luggage, and our new landlords were kind enough to pick us up at the airport to show us to our new home. The ride to our new house was quite entertaining … very long, narrow, and winding roads. I’ve been on these types of crazy roads before in Colombia, Spain, and Italy, but glad that I wasn’t the one driving! Once we got to the house, we unloaded all our baggage and started to get settled in. Since we were a bit tired from the flight, we just wanted to grab a quick bite at Bebo’s Café, a local chain restaurant that specializes in Puerto Rican food or better known as comida Criolla. 

I had arroz con pollo y platanos (chicken with rice and plantains) and Ethan had ossobucco (in the back of the photo). This was our first chance to start practicing nuestra Español. It’s actually pretty amazing what you can understand about what a person is saying to you with only a few words. I would only catch the last couple of words and would get the jist of what the waitress was saying. Nevertheless… we still have lots of practicing to do! Over the next few days, we ventured out into San Juan. We just wanted to explore the area, figure out how far it would be from the house we rented to the place where I will be working, and to find some good grocery stores. Unfortunately, there is NOTHING that comes even close to Wegman’s… but there is a lively market (El Mercado in Santurce) from what we have heard and read. We tried going on Sunday, but that is the only day that it was actually closed! :-/ Next time we go, I will be sure to post photos and tell you all about it!

View from our front porch... the city and the ocean in the distance...