FRIED SPAM AND SURIMI SALAD SANDWICHES

Surf and turf at its finest. Serves 4.

Ingredients

❑ 1 kaiser or brioche roll, halved

❑ 150g sliced ham (or turkey)

❑ 1 slab cream cheese (about 1/3 cup)

❑ 2 Tbsp strawberry preserve

Instructions

• 1 can of SPAM, cut into 8 slices

• 1 package surimi, coarsely torn

• 2 Tbsp mayonnaise

• 1 tsp rice vinegar

• Toasted sesame seeds

• 4 kaiser rolls, split

• Crispy onions (optional)

• 1/2 cup baby spinach (optional)

A Bit About Surimi

…

Yes, you guessed it, it’s a fish paste. It’s low fat and low cholesterol.

Surimi is packaged pre-cooked and ready to eat. It’s closer to us than you might think (often made from wild Alaska pollock). n

WIN!

Ican see my breath in the chilly pre-dawn light as my lungs work a little harder than usual to get enough oxygen from the thin mountain air. While my hands and feet are cold, my body feels warm from walking all night. Repetitive and lively melodies played on quenas (traditional Andean flutes) and drums accompany the movements of the people dancing around me. Everyone is cold and tired, but like birds singing on a tree branch, we’re waiting for the sun to rise. A long line of people forms along the ridge we’re standing on, as everyone instinctively ichu. The music and voices fall silent as the first rays of the sun appear over the horizon. Some close their eyes while others raise their hands to welcome the warmth in what must be one of the mostancient and basic human rituals.

This ceremony of gratitude and respect to Tayta Inti (Father Sun) takes place on the final day of Qoyllur Rit’i, a pilgrimage with pre-Columbian origins that happens around this time each year, about three hours outside of Cusco. In late May or early June (depending on the date of the Feast of Corpus Christi, which

The sanctuary of the Lord of

buses from the city. Many begin their journeys in the middle of the night and arrive in the dark and freezing hours of the early morning, to begin the eight-kilometre trek from the small town of Mahuayani to the sanctuary of el Señor de Qoyllur Rit’i at the base of a large glacier and several snow-capped mountains. Women, children, old men and troupes of dancers and musicians begin the slow and cold upwards hike, eventually reaching their destination at almost 5,000 metres.

festival, meaning that it grew out of a combination of different religions, cultures and ideas. Lots of the external imagery is clearly related to the Catholic Church. Wooden crosses and holy icons are plentiful, and the focal point in the high glacial valley is a temple built over a rock where it’s said that the image of Christ appeared in the late 18th century.

how local Indigenous communities managed to keep alive their traditional dances, music, costumes and identity during hundreds of years of colonization. They hid them in plain sight. Elements of Andean cosmovision were mixed and intertwined with Catholic ideology and managed to survive in this manner, to this day.

faces the growing glow in the east. The snow-covered peaks of Ausangate (the highest mountain in the region of Cusco) are already dazzlingly illuminated off to our right. As the light gets brighter, we kneel down in the frost-covered happens a week later), thousands of people gather from communities all around southern Peru, piling into trucks typically used for farm animals, bundling their whole families together on small motorcycles, or taking collective

Most of these devotees speak Quechua, the Indigenous language of this part of Peru, as well as Spanish. During the time of the Incas (and before), Quechua was never a written language and that is why you will find so many different spellings of Qoyllur Rit’i, as well as of the names of other local places and mountains. The pilgrimage to Qoyllur Rit’i is often referred to as a syncretic religious

It’s clear, however, that this place was sacred long before the arrival of the Spanish colonizers, 500 years ago, and subsequent attempts of the church to inject Catholicism into pre-existing Andean rituals and traditions.

Qoyllur Rit’i revolves around the importance of ritual, but not only the ones performed inside a church. Instead, it also celebrates and honours the natural world, the mountains and the traditions that existed in the Andes long before the Spanish arrived. It’s a living and breathing example of

Qoyllur Rit’i is celebrated a few weeks before the winter solstice, and its dates coincide with the reappearance of the Pleiades constellation in the southern hemisphere. Delegations from eight naciónes (nations), comprised of dancers and musicians from eight different regions of Cusco, make the journey each year. Their costumes are largely made by hand and each element has a story and a significance. The choreography of their dances is imbued with historical and cultural meaning, and cont’d on page 15