Things are different…not better or worse

We recently went to one of our favorite little markets in town, Escondido.  They have a great selection of meat so we decided to pick up some hamburger on a friend’s suggestion.  The young man went back to a freezer and pulled out some cardboard patties.  We were dumbfounded.

                We reached out to our friend to confirm we were at the correct market.  She said yes but the meat we wanted is called carne molido.  We went back and this time asked for a kilo of carne molido.  The young man pulled out some lean meat and threw it into a meat grinder.  The meat came out very fine and had no fat.  It definitely was not what I was expecting.  It also did not have the expensive price tag of a US meat market.

                After a few days of contemplation, I came up with a game plan for the meat.  I cut up an Italian sausage to add some fat to the meat.  I also added bread crumbs along with my standard seasonings.   The meat now had a consistency a bit closer to what I am accustomed to back in San Diego but was super lean.  I guess I could live with steak burgers for our Fourth of July dinner.

                I fired up the smoker and put the lean patties on at 180 degrees for about 40 minutes.  I removed the patties and raised the heat to 350 degrees.  I finished the burger patties at a higher heat hoping the meat would not be too dry due to the lack of fat.  

                The burgers turned out wonderful!  In fact, Gabriel is working on burger number two as I write this. And of course nothing goes better with a burger than an ice cold home brew.  

This experience is another reminder that we shouldn’t look at things as better or worse.  Living in Bahia Asuncion is a constant reminder to accept things for what they are instead of ranking them against what we had before.  I am already looking forward to tweaking our next round of burgers.  Cheers!