Monday, November 3, 2008

A little knowledge of Spanish can be dangerous...


...to your expectations.

These are enchiladas, right? At least to someone familiar with Mexican cuisine.

Well, last Thursday I took a coworker to a lobster dinner and could not make up my mind how I wanted my lobster, since I have had almost any variation of it in that particular restaurant, El Galloway in Boqueron, where lobster is always "just right".
But I haven't tried lobster enchiladas, so I ordered them (or so I thought) expecting something like above. A succulent lobster meat wrapped in a tortilla, with some sauce, cheese and sour cream on top.

Boy, was I in a wrong country. Lobster enchilada in PR is something else entirely. Care to guess what? (hint: it looks like the dish in the photo below)

And what is the dish in the photo above? Gazpacho, right?
At least that would be gazpacho in Spain.
In Puerto Rico a gazpacho is .... a salted fish salad.
Something I really like, but not when I expected a gazpacho of the Spanish variety.

But this culinary linguistic confusion is not limited to Puerto Rico. After all a Spanish tortilla and a Mexican tortilla are two very different things, as well. :-)

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