Villa

This past weekend I went to Tsetska’s villa for a day of eating, chatting, and playing with Mitko and Ellie. It was great. I introduced them to the awesomeness of piggy back rides and spinning (where you take their hands and spin so they are lifted off the ground) and they kept me busy most of the afternoon

Salads and Rakia

During the day, the men grilled a ton of different types of meat-not just the kebabches and kyufteti. There were also several types of salad dishes and sides. I brought a wheatberry-chickpea salad. I was pretty pleased with myself about it.  I’d been looking for chickpeas for a while, but had been unsuccessful in any of the grocery stores. I found them by chance for 4 lev/kilo at the bazaar near the bus stop in Montana. FYI: 1 kilo of dried chickpeas=A LOT of chickpeas.

Visitors during lunch

After soaking and cooking, I had plenty for a huge salad as well as about 4 cups of hummus. I discovered that if I put them through a juicer, they won’t turn to juice, but be ground up super fine. Twice makes store quality hummus. It was the first time Tsetska and her friends had eaten chickpeas (except for the one who worked in Spain for several years, he immediately recognized garbanzo beans).