Pastel de Choclo

This past weekend Ellen and I were in definite need of a quiet evening to our selves. I did some checking around trying to find a fun recipe for the two of us to cook together. Cooking has always been something we enjoy doing together. I decided to look into some Chilean dishes that I had read were popular.

That's when I discovered Pastel de Choclo. Ellen and I shopped for the fixings and on Saturday evening we enjoyed this authentic Chilean cuisine.

Choclo is Spanish for clog but Mapuche for corn. I guess the latter is a better translation since it is a Mapuche dish. So a good English translation might be Corn Cake. It's basically a corn and chicken casserole, but it has lots of other interesting additions that make it very unique, like raisins and boiled eggs.

The Mapuche are Indians that still inhabit parts of southern Chile. Similar to the history of many other Latin American countries and the United States for that matter, native Americans (or native South Americans) have played a significant role in the development of national culture.

We proudly present to you our very first homemade authentic Chilean dish . . .







Here's the recipe.

The Farm

Here are some pictures from our 4th of July weekend. We were able to spend it with three of our teammates, Chad, Sara, and Deanna. It was a blast! It was really awesome to share with them my family, my hometown, and the farm.

Chile and Global Peace

As reported recently by our fellow teammate, Deanna, our team recently decided to shoot for next June for our next journey into the beautiful country of Chile. This will only be a "survey trip", research gathering in preparation for our move that will begin just a year and a half later.

It is exciting to have made this unified decision about the timing of this important trip. Together we will be surveying more extensively the physical and spiritual characteristics of Concepcion and the nearby cities. Hopefully with the research we will gather then we can strategize more intelligently, leaning heavily on the Spirit for lots of guidance along the way.

The other day I stumbled on these interesting findings. I thought some of you readers would take special interest in this since you are either, currently living abroad, wanting to eventually, or do/will have children living abroad (neither Ellen or I currently have children living abroad).

Thanks Vision of Humanity for composing this very interesting list ranking the worlds' countries by their peacefulness.

#1 Iceland
#5 Japan
#12 Switzerland
#19 Chile
#34 Costa Rica
#56 Argentina
#90 Brasil
#97 United States
#100 Ecuador
#113 Philippines
#140 Iraq

I am proud of our dear Chile for coming in 19th as the most peaceful of all the Central and South American countries. Mom and Dad, I am terrified by the fact that you are even considering the thought of continuing to live in the United States.

You can see the full list here.