Farmers markets, TV interviews and ice cream

So I said on my last post that we were due to meet Cecilia and Sol again at a local produce market at midday on Saturday.  Having only got to bed at 5am ourselves and knowing that they would have been even later, we figured midday was optimistic, so we got there at about 1pm.  They hadn't arrived yet.

The market was indoors and had about 40 stands where local producers were selling their organically produced foods, drinks, wools, clothes, jewellery and pottery etc.  In London such a place would be pretty busy, but there were relatively few people around, and most of them seemed to be regulars.  There was a film crew interviewing people which we declined as we didn't fancy putting our still rather dubious spanish on display on national TV.  However shortly afterwards they asked us if we would be prepared to be interviewed in English and they would add subtitles.  They were doing a documentary trying to encourage people to support these markets (I think) and liked the idea of showing that foreigners would support it too.  So we agreed.  Now just have to hope the subtitles they put on don't translate what we said into something really stupid!

Shortly after, the others arrived, Cecilia being somewhat more tired than we were, and we had some of the one of the local specialities being sold - locra.  It is a stew with meat and beans mostly and was nice enough, although you did have to take care to avoid the bones.  It turned out that the cook was Sol's dad so just as well we'd said we liked it! We also tried out his pastelitas - light pastries filled with a quince paste and fried; they were really nice.

As it was the independence day holiday, they had a few people playing the guitar, singing and Sol and a partner dancing.  They also dragged up Cecilia, who only realised afterwards that the whole things was also being filmed by the TV crew.  It was a really good way to spend a few hours, and gave a glimpse into how the porteños spend some of their time.  We left there with some cheese, chutney and a couple of bottles of beer.

After that the two of us wandered around the area a little and found a fantastic cake shop where we couldn't resist buying a little selection of their various tiny alfajores [we ate these on Sunday and they were very tasty too!].  When we stopped off for a drink they were showing the Brazil -v- Paraguay match and most other customers were Brazilian.  In case you read my early blog and are wondering, yes they were fairly noisy.  Though not sure they were too impressed with it ending in a 2-2- draw.

We were still fairly stuffed from the locra, so figured a light meal in a bar was the best option followed by an early night.  However we happened to be very close to an heladaria - an ice cream bar - so we succumbed for the first time since we've been here.  Given Nic's general liking for ice cream it is a miracle it's taken this long, so we didn't feel too bad about having two scoops each.  And it was very good.