-
1
ANDEAN SPECIALTIES: Aji de trigo, empanadas saltenas and lauchas, and fricase.
-
2
Lilian Zamorano is grinding maroon aji panca in the blender when the oven timer rings in the kitchen of her Kendall condominium.
-
3
Out comes a cookie sheet of cunapes, puffy little breads made from yuca starch, Large eggs and cheese.
-
4
'I miss Bolivia, but not cooking at 12,000 feet,' she says, scraping down the chili puree.
-
5
Born in La Paz, Zamorano is from the highland region known as the Altiplano, one of the highest inhabited areas in the world.
-
6
Landlocked Bolivia, named for its liberator, Simon Bolivar, is surrounded by Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina, Chile and Peru.
-
7
It was once part of the Inca Empire and called Alto Peru.
-
8
Zamorano left in 1971 with her two young sons, arriving in Washington, D.C., as an attache with the Bolivian embassy.
-
9
Newly divorced, she was ready to start a new life.
-
10
When a revolution back home knocked her out of a job eight months later, she decided to stay.
-
11
She worked for the next 25 years at the World Bank.
-
12
'I had never cooked before - when I first arrived I didn't even know how to boil a potato, I only baked as my mother had,' she said.
-
13
She learned from food columns and cookbooks, including a Bolivian one.
-
14
Her sons encouraged her and soon she was bringing her creamy peanut, chili and cheese huancaina dip to parties.
-
15
After retiring five years ago, she returned to La Paz, but missed America and her sons.
-
16
She sold everything but her books and art collection and moved two years ago to Miami, where one of her sons lives.
-
17
Bolivia's food is influenced by its Andean neighbors but has distinct specialties in each of its nine states.
-
18
Staples are potatoes (there are over 300 varieties), chuno (freeze-dry white and black potatoes), sweet potatoes, pork, beef, the super-grain quinoa, trigo pelado (hulled wheat kernels), aji amarillo (yellow chili) and aji colorado (also known as the panca chili).
-
19
The cheese puffs are a typical breakfast food often eaten with api, a thick purple corn drink.
-
20
Llauchas, from Bolivian friend and caterer Susy Murillo, are a breakfast empanada made from a yeasty pizza-like dough stuffed with cheese sauce.
-
21
Empanadas saltenas are plump and yellow, the dough tinted with aji amarillo and stuffed with a mix of seasoned minced meat and gelatin.
-
22
It coagulates and melts when baked, creating a juicy filling which bursts in your mouth.
-
23
At the stove, Zamorano is sauteing onions for aji de trigo, a hearty chupe
-
24
(stew).
-
25
Cubes of sirloin, minced celery, carrot, parsley, red chili puree and tomatoes go in next, then boiled wheat kernels and potato chunks, cumin, oregano, salt and pepper.
-
26
This is served with hot rolls and fricase, a pork stew in a warm aji amarillo sauce thickened with bread crumbs.
-
27
Dessert is walnut cake iced with dulce de leche and decorated with walnut halves and an unusual quiona pudding studded with slivered almonds and currants and topped with a hot, sweet, wine sauce or possibly meil de chancaca (fig-flavored cane syrup).
-
28
It tastes all the sweeter cooked at sea level with a view of palm trees.