Couchsurfing - Guayaquil style

Couchsurfing ambassador, Kahyda, was our host in Guayaquil for 2 weeks.  She's an awesome cook and a dancing machine.  And if she knows how to speak English, she's keeping it a very big secret.  As soon as we arrived she showed us our room and had something cooking in the kitchen for us.  Definitely worthy of one of our favorite quotes, "I could get down with a place like this."   She served us an excellent carbonara pasta dish.  Even though we had just eaten lunch, I killed my plate cuz it was just that good!.   

And with Wi-Fi, ESPN, a kitchen, and shelter from the BLAZING HEAT outside, we sometimes would forget to visit the outside world.

ESPN: SNF, MNF, NBA wed & frid.

Kahyda's cooking inspired us to do some of our own magic in the kitchen.  We would look up recipes online and then walk to the supermarket which was about 5 blocks away to gather ingredients.  Of course we started with the classic Chicken Adobo but we also cooked some World Premieres:

Classic American dish: Loco Moco w/ Macaroni Salad and Rice

When you have 2 rookies in the kitchen, you hear a lot of this:

"you think this is enough ....?"

"hey, i'll leave that up to you."

"how big is a 'dash' of..."

"uhh, yeah.  that looks about right" (shoulder shrug grin)

Now for the tricky part.  How much food should we put on Kahyda's plate?  We don't wanna put too much cuz we don't want to insult her.  But if we put too little, she might finish the plate faster than us and look like a pig.

Here's a fun fact.  We never taste what we cook before we serve it.  Just full trust.  So far so good.  Loco Moco was deliciousioso and it knocked me out.

World Priemere #2 - Taco salad bar

No beans, no sour cream, & no shredded cheese at the supermarket so we had to work with what we got.  I wanted to make Spanish rice and I figured I could just toss a bunch of the ingredients into the rice cooker, press down the button and see what happens (thanks Melissa).  It turned out pretty good.

Ground beef, Tomatoes, Lettuce, and we even made some Fresh guacamole.

Again, without sampling it first, we all just ate up and it was another Smash Hit!

Now here's someone who has more confidence in the kitchen.  Excellent lasagna on the way.

We even did some remodeling in the house.   We moved furniture, installed a new lamp and put up vinyl contact paper.

BEFORE

AFTER

AND MORE AFTER...

But enough of the inside comforts world.

Occassionaly, we would see what the 'outside world' version of Guayaquil had to offer. Check it  out here:

GUAYAQUILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!