Market Days in Cuenca

It took us 10 days to write about the piles of beautiful vegetables and fruit in (and spilling out of) the Ecuadorian markets.

In a country straddling the equator where you can drive from the coast to 14,000 feet above sea level in less than 4 hours, each elevation is finely tuned to growing its ideal produce from juicy mangoes to crisp lettuces to plump blackberries and beautiful globes of red and yellow plums. The market ladies spend their downtime bagging the products in $1 dollar portions for easier sale. Examples of what $1 gets you:

  • 1 pound freshly shucked brilliant green peas
  • 8-10 perfectly round and bright red tomatoes
  • 25+ limes (we lost track)
  • About 100 tiny pink and white speckled potatoes

If not pre-bagged, the sellers generally ask you if you want $1 or 50 cents worth. Unless you really like bananas, get the 50 cents!

We would also like to write about the blenders of fruit juice and golden cooked pigs causing joy and then concern in our daughter. “Pig?”

We spent most of our 10 evenings in Cuenca cooking, playing with Alice, and going to bed early. The sun rises early near the equator, and Alice doesn’t have blackout curtains. Maybe we’ll have another blog post in 10 more days.


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