We spent Navidad in Santiago de Chile, while getting ready to leave South America.
It was without a shadow of a doubt the hottest Christmas in our life so far!
It was without a shadow of a doubt the hottest Christmas in our life so far!
We needed to buy each others Christmas gifts and prepare for the holidays – that had been the last thing in our mind in our go-to-Patagonia-frenzy!
All malls were incredibly full, I guess the Chileans are like us Portuguese when it comes to buying gifts last minute!
All malls were incredibly full, I guess the Chileans are like us Portuguese when it comes to buying gifts last minute!
It was the 21st December when we landed again in Santiago. Our time in the windy and cold Patagonia was great but here we were back to the heat. It was our first flight since we got to Buenos Aires in the very beginning of our trip. It was good to fly instead of endless hours and kilometers by bus! On the flight we've meet a nice chilean, who was a retired commercial pilot and always chose the same seat on flights, but the best was definitely the views over the mountains of the Andes.
Christmas was out of the ordinary with 30 degrees Celsius and away from our family!... We were wearing t-shirts and sandals and laughing while looking at each other just to the thought - It is Christmas!
We still did a really good dinner and lots of sweets to be in the Christmas mood! We brought a bit of Portugal to Chile, by cooking portuguese food - no, we did not cook codfish, unfortunately no salted codfish was to be found in Santiago.
Instead we did Rolo de carne (meatloaf), leite creme (our own Crème brûlée) and filled the table with sweets!
It was not easy to cook in the midst of the 30 degrees out!
We still did a really good dinner and lots of sweets to be in the Christmas mood! We brought a bit of Portugal to Chile, by cooking portuguese food - no, we did not cook codfish, unfortunately no salted codfish was to be found in Santiago.
Instead we did Rolo de carne (meatloaf), leite creme (our own Crème brûlée) and filled the table with sweets!
It was not easy to cook in the midst of the 30 degrees out!
One of the Chilean cakes we became fan of was Brazo de Reina (Queen's arm) whose name we found very interesting because in Portugal in Christmas you eat Bolo Rei (King's cake) but it is completely different!
As you can see in the pictures above, the Brazo de Reina is a rolled caked with dulce de leche and nuts!! (Dulce de leche is condensed milk or Gezuckerte Kondensmilch). It is overly sweet and we loved it!
Bolo Rei, on the other side, is a dry cake with dried fruits - not sweet at all! Maybe we can replace the Bolo Rei with Brazo de Reina in Portugal
We skyped with our family and could therefore feel a little bit at home!
Our german flatmate at the time spent Christmas with some Chileans and told us that the particularities were:
- they had dinner really late (23h)
- Christmas dinner was a barbecue outside
- they were playing the guitar together and singing up to 4 am
- the gift exchange was only done at 4 am!
This was already different, for us portuguese, so I imagine for her! Anne told us she did miss a "white Christmas", the Adventskalender and all German traditions, but she was happy to be experiencing a new kind of Christmas!
For us too it was a new experience, but I think in the future we will be happy to spend Christmas with ALL of our loved ones ! :)
The day after Christmas was time to go to the beach for us and to the pool for Anne!
Oh oh oh!
As you can see in the pictures above, the Brazo de Reina is a rolled caked with dulce de leche and nuts!! (Dulce de leche is condensed milk or Gezuckerte Kondensmilch). It is overly sweet and we loved it!
Bolo Rei, on the other side, is a dry cake with dried fruits - not sweet at all! Maybe we can replace the Bolo Rei with Brazo de Reina in Portugal
We skyped with our family and could therefore feel a little bit at home!
Our german flatmate at the time spent Christmas with some Chileans and told us that the particularities were:
- they had dinner really late (23h)
- Christmas dinner was a barbecue outside
- they were playing the guitar together and singing up to 4 am
- the gift exchange was only done at 4 am!
This was already different, for us portuguese, so I imagine for her! Anne told us she did miss a "white Christmas", the Adventskalender and all German traditions, but she was happy to be experiencing a new kind of Christmas!
For us too it was a new experience, but I think in the future we will be happy to spend Christmas with ALL of our loved ones ! :)
The day after Christmas was time to go to the beach for us and to the pool for Anne!
Oh oh oh!