Around the World in the Hetzel Kitchen

So here we are. My kids have convinced me to start cooking around the world again. We've decided to start with Iran, because I don't remember what I did last time. I do have the pictures though and they tell quite the story. The rice was supposed to be crunchy on the bottom, Kevin melted his skewers, and I set a towel on fire. Oh, and Katie came to visit!    But that was then. This time, we're in Colorado! And we've decided to be ambitious. Three full Iranian recipes, because we have the manpower. Iran is a country in the Middle East between Iraq and Pakistan. It is over 1.6 million square kilometers, making it the 18th largest country in the world. It is still slightly smaller than Alaska. Almost 82 million people live there, making it the 17th most populous country. The capital is Tehran. ( I had actually written this paragraph back 6 or so years ago. Finally get to use it...woo! ) I may also look at moving to WordPress where I...

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Dennis Jarvis via Creative Commons Hungary is a Central European country about the same size as Indiana. It is landlocked and the capital is Budapest. For more information, see the CIA World Factbook . I knew what I wanted to do for Hungary before I ever got there. Goulash . I remember loving it when my grade school served that for hot lunch (although, in retrospect, it was probably "American Goulash.") My in-laws mentioned it when they visited Hungary. The World Factbook even calls their liberalizing their economy "Goulash Communism." There really was no choice here. Best yet, my in-laws brought some paprika back from Hungary for me, so when the recipe called for Hungarian paprika I could definitively check it off the list. And in Hungarian! Somehow when I put this recipe into my meal planner (Plan To Eat...if you're interested, let me know!) it doubled the recipe, so I double-bought a lot of things. Like parsnips....

Honduras is in Central America bordering both the Caribbean Sea and the North Pacific Ocean. It is slightly larger than Tennessee and has almost 9 million people. The official language is Spanish and the capital is Tegucigalpa. It is one of the poorest countries in Latin America with the world's highest murder rate. Read more at the CIA World Factbook . Sometimes it is really hard to decide what recipe to do for a country. There are too many options, or nothing out there are all. Then there are the countries where you do a search and Carne Asada comes up and you don't need to look anymore. There were, of course, multiple versions of the recipe, so I did have to do some deciding. I ended up with this recipe from a blog doing the same thing that I am. Hello fellow world cooker! Kevin's parents came to visit us in early September, so it seemed like a good time to plan this one. The weather was great and we had company, so why not make something delicious? Flank steak ...

Ugh, losing everything you wrote is awesome.  Let's try this again... Guatemala is a Central American nation slightly smaller than the size of Pennsylvania.  There are over 14.5 million people living there, and the capital city is Guatemala City.  Learn more on the CIA World Factbook . I didn't have anything in mind when looking for a recipe to make for Guatemala.  When I saw Guatemalan Tacos (second on the page), however, I figured it was a match made in heaven.  We do Taco Tuesdays almost every week, but these were definitely different than the heavily seasoned meat + flour tortillas we were used to.  Plus there were ingredients I wasn't used to using.  Perfect! This was also the first around the world cooking after the twins were born.  In fact, they were four months old by this time.  Wasn't going to get anything done before that. Amelia left, Emily right Around the time of this dinner So anyway, back to cooking.  Boi...

Flag courtesy of Wikipedia Location : Central Europe, between the Netherlands and Poland Area : Over 350,000 sq km; 63rd biggest in the world          Slightly smaller than Montana Population : Almost 81,000,000; 18th largest in the world           Second largest in Europe after Russia Capital : Berlin Economy : Based on GDP per capita the 5th biggest in the world and the biggest in Europe Source: CIA World Factbook Next up in fast-forwarding through Danielle's life is...Germany!  And not only Germany, but Germany in Colorado at Christmas. Why such time travel?  Sickness, tiredness, general lack of time.  What does that sound like?  Yep, that's right, time to have another baby!  And this time, although we didn't know it when I cooked this food, there were twins.  Turns out that makes things a lot more interesting.  There were a lot of foods I had aversions to, and just making a shoppin...