I lived with a host family for my first seven months in the country and sampled some things that I wouldn’t have chosen to try normally, like guatita. Guatita is a popular, traditional Ecuadorian stew made from tripe (cow's stomach) in a creamy peanut-sauce. This is something I never would have tried on my own. Also, due to less hygeinic food preparation practices, I have gotten food poisoning twice, plus a few stomach infections.
However, my experience here has expanded my palate, and the food is so tied to the culture here that I am pleased to have truly immersed myself in the community in that way. There are some foods, including humitas, yucca (a root vegetable, like a potato), the fresh produce, and grilled chicken, that have become favorites.
Cooking in Latin American culture can be quite the production; my host moms would often spend the entire day cooking dinner for the family, as it's a way to show love. This means that the stove is often covered in multiple pots at all times, and each dish has a multi-step preparation. We had a 'cooking class' during training in Quito in which we learned to cook Llapingachos (a traditional Ecuadorian meal of cheese and potato cakes, beet salad, fried egg, and a salad of onion and tomato). The preparation included peeling and mashing the potatoes, chopping all of the produce, forming the potato cakes, and frying each one. All in all, we spent over four hours in the kitchen!
It is worth noting that in the full scope of Ecuadorian cooking processes, there are also more traditional ways of cooking food practiced by the indigenous people here.
