The Peruvian Diet

Ooh! I got the lucky chicken foot!

Mark and I love to sample local fare wherever we can find it, partly because it's cheap, and partly because it's delicious. In Argentina, we loaded up on steak and red wine. In Bolivia, we ate our share of soup, llama, and pizza. In Peru, we've been stuffing ourselves with Chinese food, Pisco sours, chocolate submarinos (hot milk with a melted chocolate bar inside), and fried everything. That's right, fried EVERYTHING. It's like someone came through Peru and made a law that nothing can be eaten unless it's dipped in a fryer and loaded down with salt or sugar... which can be delicious... anyone who has sampled a churro knows that.

Fondue, at the Chocolate Museum in Cuzco, Peru

Before I left the mainland, my mom was diagnosed with diabetes. Mark's family has high cholesterol. By my calculations, at our current trajectory, we may not make it through the summer (well, I do tend to estimate conservatively... and, truth be told, I can be a bit of a hypochondriac... full disclosure and all of that business...). The point is, the last thing we need is to dip our meals in sugar and pork grease, but I swear there's not a day that goes by in Peru where a doctor wouldn't be horrified by our meals. Everything fried... squash, yams, fish, yucca, potato, eggs, rice, pork- yeah, as if pork isn't harmful enough by itself; we gotta fry that too.
All this to say, it was so refreshing when we discovered the seafood in the seaside town of Paracas. It was a like a seafood buffet of ceviche mixto, pescado, sea bass picante, parmesean clams, crab, squid, shrimp, mussels, clam soup. Granted, we had to wash them down with a Pisco sour (gotta keep our machines in tip top condition, you know, don't quit the good stuff cold turkey). Yep, totally refreshing. We even succeeded in luring our favorite breakfast gal to toss a couple of tomatoes into our morning scrambler of eggs and cheese and ham (#win).

Ahh, but I'm not going not going to lie, we're now in Lima, and today's eats consisted of:
Breakfast:
Fried eggs with cheese and extra salt
Latte with added sugar
Morning snack:
Honey and yogurt covered mixed fruit platter
Lunch:
Chicken soup (with lime and salt)
Shrimp and vegetable plate on noodles (broccoli and bok choy for the win... but it was covered in a sugary/salty sauce)
Afternoon snack(s):
Two scoop ice cream cone
(Your nutritionist has probably had a full on heart attack by this point)
Giant churro loaded with chocolate and dipped in sugar
Supper:
Pizza with sausage and cheese
Manzanilla tea (something healthy had to make it in there today... I just couldn't sleep if I knew I hadn't even made any effort at all... no literally, I don't think my body could process any more anything without the tea).

So, if we get home with what appears to be a spare tire around our mid-sections, I'm sure you'll understand. But, until we can work it off, how about not feeding us any sugary, salty, fried foods?

Mark has discovered a different weight loss strategy :-)

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