Rooftop dining in Cuenca offers 15 options as culinary map expands; Avianca begins Cuenca-to-Guayaquil service; Classic cars rally; Election observers picked
Bored? –
(De El Mercurio del miércoles, 4/11) Los clásicos vuelven a rodar (The classics roll again) – <You’re getting this article from the Sports Section which I usually don’t translate only because I’m a gearhead.> The Rally de Autos Clásicos will be
este sábado, 7/11 with close to 100 vehicles. The event is a fundraiser for the Fundación al Servicio del Enfermo de Cáncer (FASEC). It will start with a registration and a show at Plaza 8 el viernes, 6/11. The vehicles are in 5 categories including classics from different eras, sports, convertibles, pickups, and all-terrain.The rally will start a las 7:00 el sábado. The route of about 65 km. will go to Uzhupud where the first vehicle is expected to arrive after 12:30. This is not a race, but a rally with vehicles arriving at predetermined locations with controlled times. A new thing will be an electronic dispositivo (device – gizmo – your word for the day) which will allow following the times and locations of the vehicles live.
Rooftop dining in Cuenca has taken off in recent years and currently offers 15 options.
Hungry? –
(De El Mercurio del martes, 3/11) Special Section C for the Independence of Cuenca is titled “Innovar es el sello de cuencanos” (Innovation is the hallmark of Cuencanos) – Each page features a different aspect of innovation, and most of them involve food.
Page 2C – La ciudad de los ‘rooftops’ (The city of rooftops)- There are at least 15 rooftop restaurants in Cuenca; more than the 11 in Guayaquil and 10 in Quito. <The article announced that comparison in a burst of civic pride.> These include Negroni Rooftop, Cúpulas Azules, Zaza Lounge 360, Zielo City View, Cuenca Rooftop, Terra Rooftop 360, Terracoto Rooftop, Tinta Rooftop, The Terrace, Popular Terraza, Los Techos Rooftop, Seiva Rooftop, Bógoli Rooftop, Saya Hotel Rooftop & Restaurant, and Nila Rooftop. <Have fun eating your way through these rooftop restaurants. And maybe send in reviews.>
Page 3C – Nuevos sabores tiene el mapa gastronómico (The culinary map has new flavors) – In the last few years, different flavors have gained space in Cuenca from desserts to sushi to bolones and tigrillos. Go to Gaby Lazo Atelier de Postres for high end desserts on Benigno Malo across from the Parque Calderón. For the holiday, they have a cake shaped and painted like one of the blue domes, and another shaped like a vaca loca. Bolones y Tigrillos de la Negra at av. González Suárez y calle Carpenti is owned by Glenda Sevillano from Esmeraldas, and her husband Manuel Cueva from Loja. Their Esmeraldeño recipes include caldo de bola, bollos de pescado and other seafoods. For sushi, go to Mocagi-San Bar-Restaurant near the estadio. The map shows it at Luis Moreno Mora y Roberto Crespo. <The location I’ve eaten at is on 1° de mayo less than a block from the 3 Puentes redondel.> The main chef, Edwin Sánchez, worked more than 2 decades in food service in the US. The menu includes classic and special rolls, nigiri, sashimi, <and corn dogs!>. You can get pizza from Casa Hermanos, owned by brothers Daniel and Diego Narváez who have two locations — one in the Plaza 33 and the other on Ordóñez Lasso in the Santa Maria sector. The dough is masa madre and they make breads, cured meats, smoked bacon, salchichas and chorizos as well as growing some of the products they use.
Page 4C – Juegos se ‘toman’ las cafeterías cuencanas (Games ‘take over’ Cuenca’s coffee shops) – Cuenca has hybrid spaces for food and games from chess to board games to videogames. These include the home of the Cuenca Club de Ajedrez (Cuenca Chess Club) in the Café Austria at Simón Bolívar y Hermano Miguel. Games start a las 17:00 on los martes y jueves and a las 15:00 los sábados. Cosmos Coffee and Drinks offers beverages such as their own “Magnum Cappuccino” in combination with a lego kit as part of their “Café y Legos” package. Located at Luis Cordero y Juan Jaramillo, their hours are lunes a sábado from 9:30 to 19:00, and domingos from 10:00 to 13:00. VRooms is a restobar gamer on Calle Larga between Benigno Malo and Cordero with consols from all epocas in the history of videogames. An hour of play costs $5.75. It also has a cafeteria serving fast food and is open 7 days a week from 13:00 to 21:00. <Sounds like videogamers aren’t morning people.>
Pages 5 & 6C have articles on bread and coffee. Featured bakeries Include the Horno de Leña (wood oven) in the Complejo Patrimonial Todos Santos. Antojo Morlaco has bread and traditional dairy products such as nata, colostro, dulce de leche and cheeses as well as innovative fermented products such as kombucha, Greek yogurt and kéfir. <If I Googled it correctly, it’s on Mariano Cueva, south of Honorato Vazquez.> Panadería Internacional uses indigenous flours such as mollete, rye, and whole wheat; a 24 hour natural fermentation for the masa madre; and baking in a traditional wood burning oven. They have one location at the corner of Juan Jaramillo y Mariano Cueva, and the other in the Zona Rosa sector. Coffee grower Juan Peña exports his award winning coffee to the US and countries in Asia and Europe from his Hacienda La Papaya in Saraguro. <I didn’t see a retail location.>
Curious? –
(De El Mercurio del martes, 3/11) Avianca inicia los vuelos de Cuenca a Guayaquil (Avianca starts flights from Cuenca to Guayaquil) – Avianca started direct daily flights from Cuenca to Guayaquil with the inaugural flight 83% full. The flight takes between 48 & 50 minutes with departures from Guayaquil a las 12:40 and the return a las 11:05 <the next day?>. This new route increases the alternatives for travel between the 2 cities and to international connections offered by Avianca from Guayaquil. One allows US bound passengers a connection from Cuenca to NY.
(De El Mercurio del martes, 3/11) Iluminación en vía a Guayaquil (Street lighting on the road to Guayaquil) – <This is for those of you who are still going to drive or take a buseta to Guayaquil rather than flying.> Centrosur is working on a $483,851 lighting project on the vía Molleturo-El Empalme in the stretch between San Pedro de Yumate (km. 68) and Hierba Buena (km. 75). The 8 km. long project is 45% complete and will have 184 posts, 398 two hundred watt LED light fixtures, and 15 kVA transformers. The completion is planned for el 31/12.
(De El Mercurio del miércoles, 4/11) 491 observadores electorales (491 election observers) – The Consejo Nacional Electoral (CNE) approved the accreditation of 491 election observers to bring the total to 1,394. The observers are taught about the polling places, voters, and infrastructure; interviewing election officials and political organizations; and monitoring election expenses and logistics. On election day they observe the formation and installation of the Juntas Receptoras del Voto (JRV – poll workers), verify the election materials, and monitor the flow of voters with respect to the secrecy of voting and access for disabled persons. After the voting they observe that the systems for transmission and processing of the results are working; and follow up with processing the votes with inconsistencies and the challenges from political organizations. <I hope there won’t be a lot of “the election was rigged” and “the election was stolen from me” BS that’s been spreading from the elephant up north to the world in general. If you’ve noticed, the “true” president of Brazil has set himself up in the US. Now that’s taking remote work too far.>
________________
Information in this column, including dates, times and locations, is courtesy of the El Mercurio newspaper. Comments between the carrots, or guillemets (< … >), are the personal opinions of the author and not part of the news translation.
