Mal del Estomago y Medicinas and Fruit and Juice

Mal del Estomago y Medicinas

So I got hit last weekend with some stomach problems. Nothing too serious so don’t any of you start worrying. They have a million recipes for what works to fix stomach problems of which I’ve been given several over the last few days. I thought I would share some of these with you because they are a little different that what we use as medicine.

First I was given café con naranja agria (coffee with sour orange juice), which is a bitter, sour drink that my host mom told me to chug so I wouldn’t have to taste it so much. In fact, I’ve had about 5 glasses of this over the last few days. Then I was given té de roble (oak tea) which is awful as well. I’m not sure what part of the oak tree they use to make it. If I had to guess I would say it was the bark, but who knows. After that I was given té de dos oreganos which was a little better, but still a tad bitter. They use the traditional style oregano that we’re accustomed to and then a wild variety that grows around here. And finally yesterday a neighbor gave me some té de manzanilla (chamomile) which was super yummy.


Juices and Fruits!!

I have been loving most of the juices that I’ve had since I arrived here in the DR. I usually get a glass of fresh juice at least once a day if not more. This morning for instance, I had a big glass of fresh squeezed orange juice (they called oranges chinas here because the first trees that were brought over were from China) which, as you would imagine, is awesome! I have also been drinking naranja agria (sour orange) juice sweetened up with a lot of sugar which tastes kind of like an orange lemonade. Another favorite juice of mine, which I haven’t had up here in the campo but I drank a lot in Santo Domingo is guayaba (guava) juice. They boil the fruits and then blend them up and add sugar. It’s so good, although I have to say I’m not a fan of the fruit by itself. I’ve also had a lot of piña (pineapple) juice which is super yummy as well. The chinola (passion fruit) juice is yummy as well. The only fruit and juice that I haven’t been a big fan of is zapote (which doesn’t translate). I have a feeling there’s other juices I’m forgetting, but I think you get the idea.

In addition to all the juices there’s also the fruits!! So far I’ve had pineapple, orange, cantaloupe, papaya, passion fruit, oranges, guavas, zapote, guanabana (chirimoya in most Spanish speaking countries, I don’t know the name in English) and some others I’m sure I’m forgetting here as well. Guanabana is a big fruit with little thorn looking things all over them, although they’re not very sharp at all. When you cut it open there’s all this white slimy flesh surrounding these big black seeds which looks gross but actually tastes super good. You just grab a chunk and pop it in your mouth and suck on it. It tastes kind of like a Sweet Tart. Then there’s the cacao fruit. It’s a lot like the guanabana fruit. When you crack open the cacao pod it is filled with the white stuff and seeds like the guanabana and suck on the white flesh. Although you wouldn’t do that if you were going to make chocolate out of it. Unfortunately I don’t know the process well enough to be able to explain it well, so you’ll just have to wait until I figure out how it works.