Machismo and Soup

Defined as “strong or aggressive masculine pride,” machismo is mostly associated with unsavory or disrespectful male chauvinsm. Examples include cat calls and whistling to women, binge drinking, discrimination by gender, domestic violence against women, and rape, to name a few. Unfortunately, the locals in Cumaná can attest to the occurrence of these examples among men –though certainly not all– inVenezuela. Yet I have also observed a curious and seemingly benign exhibition within the microcosm of machismo Venezolana, an activity well suited to the seafood-laden food culture in this sweaty corner of the Caribbean: male-dominated soup parties. Known as sancocho de pescado, the hearty stew is one unexpected manifestation of machismo.

Though many men claim to be all thumbs when it comes to cooking, they will jump at any opportunity to make sancocho. They take great pride in their ability to make a good soup, and the epitome of this phenomenon entails a six hour soup-making ordeal, during which men sit around a fire and drink shots of Cacique rum while they prepare and devour the sancocho. Then again, this is no ordinary fish soup, for its delicious flavor reflects local Caribbean and Andean ingredients. Most of the volume comes from a class of ingredients called the bituaya, consisting of yucca, pumpkin, a root vegetable called okumo blanco, and a small plantain called zumbi. The second component –and most flavorful– is called aliño, which consists of garlic, onion, and a small sweet pepper called aji dulce. Last but not least, the sancocho would be a fraud without the local catch of the day.

Despite the ferocious pride that some men express towards their sancocho, it is not exclusively male.

For example, my friend Ana –an English professor with whom I work– and her husband Jose Luís both make a delicious sancocho (I have tried the soups that each one makes). However, Jose Luís –and other men– express a more valiant attitude towards the sancocho. This could be explained by his heritage: he comes from a family of fisherman. It could be his connection to the catching of the fish itself: he always goes fishing when he visits his family on the weekends, bringing home the bounty for his soups. Or, he might be proud because sancocho is the only dish that he knows how to cook. Whatever the reason, he also makes a great teacher, which I realized last Thursday as he taught me the art of making soup. The meeting was part of the to-do list before my departure from Cumaná. To complement the occasion, Ana invited seven other English professors – and all of them women. Mostly Jose Luis and I were to be in the kitchen. Upon my entrance, Jose Luís handed me a beer and an apron. “We´re going to peel yucca,” he declared. At this announcement, Jose Luis passed me a knife, sat me down, and demonstrated the proper paring techniques for yucca and the other ingredients in the bituaya.

The whole process took about two hours before the sancocho had reached its point of perfection. At this point, large, deep bowls came out of the cupboard and were distributed to the (most female) guests full of soup. The pot was empty shortly thereafter. Watching the satisfaction of all, I felt confused because I had always considered machismo a bad thing. Yet I could deny neither my euphoria that accompanied my fervent, testosterone-drenched stupor, nor the guests´ praise towards the soup. This is a form of chavinism that I can appreciate: real men make fish soup.

Venezuela on a Plate

I say gracias a Dios every time that Richard, my Venezuelan housemate, invites me to try the food that he prepares. Reticent yet good humored, Richard studies math at the university where I work in Cumaná, but he was born and raised in a small rural town a three hours away called Río Caribe. The best word to describe him in Yiddish would be a male baleboosteh: an excellent and praiseworthy homemaker.* Though Richard has yet to make cholent or kasha and varnishkes,** his culinary interpretations of traditional Venezuelan fare are never less than superb. Richard told me a few weeks ago that he would teach me to make arroz con pollo (chicken and rice) under the condition that I buy the chicken. Who would ever kvetch‡ at the proposition of a cooking class that were to cost only a chicken? Giving up a golden opportunity such as this would be a real shandeh†; I accepted.

Common logic, for better or worse, dictated that we would have to go to a market in order to buy a chicken. Accordingly, off we went to the Express Mall supermarket the previous evening. Before we checked out at the cash register, I decided to go on an extended tour of the supermarket in order to browse and ascertain the scarce food items of the week. There is never an extreme shortage of food at the supermarket, yet there are always a few food items in scarcity. I do not yet fully understand the specific economic mechanisms that influence this occurrence – further investigation is required. For example, a few basic items like sugar fail to appear on store shelves for weeks at a time; stocks of some luxuries like ice cream are often nearly depleted; and, most paradoxically, ground coffee recently disappeared from supermarkets after its price doubled, which is most surprising given the flourishing presence of local coffee production within hours of Cumaná. Regardless, most items in stores are regularly available, including the necessary staples to make arroz con pollo. Richard and I came home that evening with every ingredient.

Richard and I began to cook around noon the next day. As we went through the different steps, I jotted down the recipe, which can be found at the end of this entry. No major mishaps occurred fortunately. The pot of chicken and rice did not explode nor fall down on the ground. Neither of us burned anything.

Our two friends Mery and Albelk stopped by to join our feast, and we began to eat shortly after Albelk prepared fresh squeezed orange and parchita fruit juice. We served the arroz con pollo onto each individual plate, completing each with a garnish of fried plantain. The table was set. Appreciative of the rich plates of food in front of us, we duly exchanged the Spanish phrase buen provecho, meaning “bon appetite,” and the lull in the conversation thereafter indicated the success of the food. I noticed that I was consuming my meal slower than my friends while I struggled to separate the chicken from the bone. Mery soon caught onto my difficulties and stated directly that Venezuelans eat chicken with their hands. Constructive criticism during a meal never hurts when it eases the eating process and harmonizes the etiquette of all at the table. Nervous yet determined, I picked up the chicken with my bare hands and truly joined in on the feast. Not a single morsel was left on my plate soon after.

Click to see the rest of my photos from the cooking lesson.

Recipe: Richard´s Arroz con Pollo

Ingredients:

3 cups of rice
4.5 cups of water
1 chicken breast or 5 thighs
Adobo spice (powder mix)
10 cloves of garlic, mashed
Rum, preferably Venezuelan (optional)
Hot sauce
3 medium-sized tomatoes
1 large onion
1/2 green pepper
Vegetable oil
Salt
One large ripe plantain

1. Remove the skin and fat from the chicken with a sturdy knife, breaking it into small chunks. Leave the meat on the bones, and place into a large pot.
2. Sprinkle the adobo spice liberally onto all the pieces of chicken.
3. Place mashed garlic into the pot along with a few splashes of hot sauce. Add a few splashes of rum.
4. Dice the tomatoes, onion, and pepper into very small chunks. In a frying pan, heat the vegetable oil and sauté the vegetables until well cooked and slightly browned. This is called aliño.
5. Place the pot of chicken pieces onto the stove, turn onto high heat, and add the aliño to the chicken. Cover the pot and cook 15-20 minutes or until the chicken is cooked.
6. Add the rice and water to the pot of chicken. Add salt to the water to taste. Bring water to boil, cover pot, and reduce stove to low heat. Cook for 20 minutes.
7. As the rice cooks, prepare the fried plantains separately. Slice plantains into 1/4-inch thick slabs. In a pan, fry the plantains in hot vegetable oil until tender and medium browned. Remove from the pan and allow to cool.
8. Serve the rice and chicken in a large plate. Garnish with fried plantains on top.

*Note: according to Leo Rosten´s The Joys of Yiddish, the male equivalent of baleboosteh would be baleboss, meaning “the head of the household; the man of the house.” Yet in practice, the latter of the two fails to encapsulate the ability to cook phenomenally, so I choose baleboosteh at the risk of violating the Yiddish gender dichotomy
** Two delicacies that every ashkenazic Jewish grandmother should know how to prepare (Yiddish)
‡ Complain (Yiddish)
† Shame (Yiddish)