| Breakfast is usually a light meal, with bread
and jam and a cup of coffee or mate. Lunch may be a large meal at
home, but in factories and schools most people just have a sandwich. The
most substantial meal of the day is dinner, which Uruguayans eat late in
the evening. Soup, salad, steak, bread, wine, cheese and fruit, followed
by coffee or tea, make up a typical Uruguayan meal.
The Italian influence on Uruguayan cooking and
food preparation has been very important. Uruguayans love pasta and pizza.
The Italian influence can also be seen in the crusty bread Uruguayans eat
at every meal, as well as in the popularity of coffee and pastry bars.
Uruguayans drink strong espresso coffee from very small cups at these bars
and enjoy an assortment of sweets. Coffeehouses are meeting places for
friends, quiet spots for reading a newspaper or book, and a favourite location
for negotiating business deals. |
|
Did you know? |
| The
drinking of yerba mate is a respected tradition in Uruguay. Sharing
a gourd of yerba mate is also a good way to socialize and exchange
information. During the military regime of the 1970s, when public gatherings
of citizens were discouraged, drinking mate was one way that people
could still get together and talk freely. |
|
|
| Wine, including the local Uruguayan wine, is served
in almost all restaurants. Clericó is a mixture of sparkling
wine and white wine that is very popular at parties.
In the countryside, the gauchos often camp
under the branches of the ombú tree, and light a fire for
a barbeque. They boil water to make yerba mate, a bitter tea, which
they drink from a hollowed gourd through a silver tube tipped with a strainer.
This silver tube is called a bombilla and is often finely engraved.
The gourd of yerba mate is passed from person to person. Gauchos
play their guitars and vie with each other in improvising songs called
payadas de contrapunto. |
 |
