Here we are preparing a special New Year's Day lunch. I sat chopping vegetables in Graciela's sisters' kitchen while watching the Rose Parade broadcast live from America. We ate roast chicken, salad and corn tortillas -- very yummy.
Earlier in the morning I joined the family in eating the traditional New Year's breakfast: hot chocolate and a large white sweet bun. Hot chocolate is definitely not an everyday drink here. It's a special treat reserved just for holidays.
I was hoping to buy some handmade chocolate in the market, and learned that outside of holidays it wasn't commonly found. Luckily Graciela knew the lady who sold it, and a few days after new year's we found her at the market and she said she still had a few packages left at home. This chocolate is unsweetened and sold in round patties about 8 cm across and 0.5 cm thick, separated from eachother within the bag by leaves that hold in moisture and add a bit to the taste. I enjoyed it off and on thru the rest of my trip, whenever I had a kitchen to use to make it up. This genuine Guatemalan hot chocolate sure took a lot of sweetening to make it tasty for me, who is used to much more processed and sweetened chocolate.
