Since it first occurred to me on Monday, I spent this week really wanting to make tacos. Burritos, whatever. With flour tortillas filled with rice, beans, a salsa, cheese, lettuce. That sort of thing. Keep it on the simple side, maybe.

Except of course when you cook the sort of thing where there’s so many individual parts, it’s hard to keep it small. So I had two helpers. In terms of the eating, at least. (And they made some guacamole, which was a grand addition.)

The primary thing I made was refried beans, which I’d actually never made before. I used a recipe from a food blog I really like, The Homesick Texan. Now, I usually make this sort of meal with mashed kidney beans, which I guess is technically along the same idea as refried beans, but I figured I’d follow her recipe pretty closely.

I went to the butcher near me and bought something that may or may not have been salted pork. Was it pork? Definitely. Was it salted? Unclear. Anyway, you don’t eat it; you just boil it with the beans. Which I did, after soaking them all day. I also got bacon from my butcher, which was pretty delicious; I need to get thicker slices next time, though. I actually think I bought pancetta, which is more or less raw bacon, for the first thing; I also think the bacon I bought was prepared differently than in the US. But I’d never bought bacon that wasn’t pre-cut; it was strange to have him take a cured hunk of meat and slice it for me.

The best smell of the evening came within the first twenty minutes of cooking the beans, while the pork cooked and the beans began to soften. Delicious. Really, really.

I also softened some red and green pepper slices in a pan, bought cheese and lettuce, made pico de gallo, although without coriander/cilantro (I only found it at the Corte Inglés, for more than it’s worth). And then rice and guacamole. And delicious.

I should add that pico de gallo, which literally means rooster’s beak, is that chunky salsa made with tomatoes, onions, garlic, lime juice, and a jalapeño or two.

Anyway, I think that’s more than enough blathering.

I also went out last night, after dinner, with Mateo; we wandered down to Lavapies and found some interesting bars; we ended up at this place called Bodegas Lo Maximo where some girl saw Mateo’s Tufts shirt and started talking to him, leading to about half an hour of fairly enjoyable conversation with this American girl and her Spanish maybe-boyfriend-maybe-flatmate, and this other Spanish girl they were with. (Elsa, her. Alvaro, him. Marian, the Spanish girl.) I don’t understand how this sort of thing works. I’m quite bad at picking up on things. If I had been Mateo, I either wouldn’t've heard her calling me over, or I would’ve been awkward and said hi and then walked away. Then again, it’s not like it was a thrilling conversation. I guess the point is more that I find the way some people seem to draw these sorts of interactions interesting.