Corned Beef: Product Of Uruguay

It is a little-known fact that diminutive, rabid Uruguayan chipmunk Luis Suarez can open a Fray Bentos pie tin with just his teeth.

He honed this skill as a feral youth, roaming behind the meat factories of the ironically named Rio Negro district, before realising his dream of playing football amongst the cheese shops of Holland.

Although we won't be visiting Fray Bentos, or Holland, we should spend a few moments discussing the foods we have scoffed so far on our trip.

Whoever said you can never have too much ham or cheese had never visited South America. It has become a staple for us, served up everywhere on white bread, pasta, pizzas, etc, and we are getting a bit sick of it.

When they are not eating ham and cheese, Argentinians are eating mixed grills, or Parrilla: piles of steak, lamb, sausages and black pudding.

As a snack, they eat empanadas, small, soggy pasties, largely filled with cheese and ham or other meat.

Sweets, biscuits and chocolate are in plentiful supply, especially a huge range of alfahoras, 3- or 4-layered biscuits, sandwiched with jam or chocolate and coated with chocolate. Dulce Leche, basically thick condensed milk, is poured liberally on anything that is not savoury.



Drinks-wise, there is lots of nice, cheap wine (from a quid a bottle) so we are drinking a lot of Malbec; Argentinian Quilmes lager or stout is everywhere.

But mainly they drink mate (ma-tay), a sort of tea held in a small gold or silver gourd and drunk through a silver straw, often shared between them. It's kept topped up with soggy leaves and always seems to me they are sucking on a blocked plughole. Disgusting.

It would be interesting to know the incidence of coronary heart attacks in South America.