Spaghetti for Breakfast

The food here is almost 100% imported – which kind of blows my mind. Haiti is about 70% deforested so there is little production of food staples like rice and grain here. To make up for it, rice is imported from the US, people eat wonder bread style white bread, and lots and lots of pasta. We typically eat spaghetti or oatmeal or sometimes cereal for breakfast. The spaghetti usually has but up hot dogs in it, which pretty much still cracks me up. Breakfast of champions. For lunch, the main meal of the day, we eat the meal prepared by the school cooks for the kids (even though there are only small groups of kids here right now, not the full 350.) That meal has been a big pile of rice, topped with some vegetables and occasionally meat, and drizzled with some kind of vegetable, meat or bean based sauce. It’s pretty delicious – but so greasy. I think they use vegetable oil not just for sautéing veggies, but actually as a cooking liquid. For dinner we don’t eat nearly as much as I’m accustomed to. Last night we had French toast with peanut butter and syrup – seriously, try it. So tasty. One night we had lasagna. Another night we had hot tuna sandwiches. There’s no salad or side dishes or dessert at all – just the food and some juice. It is absolutely enough food to eat and feel full, but I realize how much more I am accustomed to eating in a day. No surprise, there are no obese people here!

NEWS FLASH: After I wrote this, I went downstairs for Saturday lunch and had the most delicious food we’ve had yet. About three people worked for three hours to prepare a huge bouillon, a stew with potatoes, yucca, carrots, plantains, and homemade dumplings. AND MEAT! It was absurdly delicious. On top of that, we had freshly made juice a local fruit, and brownies. It was heavenly.