Kookaburra Cafe and Accommodation

Good staff? Not so hard to come by...

Here's Kookaburra's newest employee, Nancy, concentrating on getting a good coffee out to a couple of notorious customers.

Ok, not exactly the truth: Rich and Nancy aren't that notorious...

Rock my world...

Legends are legends in any part of the world, it seems. This graffiti was photographed at Banos, just a short half hour bus ride from Cuenca. This next shot though is normally what tourists would focus on there.

The church. It's very blue and by contrast, the food is very golden.

...and street food is really tasty. This is a dish of roasted pork and fried potato cakes.

I took my parents there for lunch when they were visiting from Australia.

Supermarkets aren't big over here. It's great that food is still prepared from scratch and readily available to all income brackets. One of the most popular Latin American 'fast foods' is the Tamale.

We serve these Tamales in the cafe - they're from Susana's bakery and are a tasty and complete meal. Susana also bakes heavy loaves of baked grain breads which we serve with natural jams and fresh butter.

Kookaburra sources most of its fresh vegetables from organic and/or local growers, from the markets, the street vendors and friends. Thomas is one such friend. A year ago he built greenhouses especially for Kookaburra. He picks these gorgeous lush tomatoes every Wednesday night to deliver fresh to the cafe on Thursday mornings.

 

We don't want to give too much away about our coffee, but it's good, some say the best in the country. Who am I to disagree? The beans are all grown in the Ecuadoran highlands and roasted in Guayaquil, on the coast, by a family with their roots in Italy. It seems like the European roasting expertise really shows off the Ecuadoran bean. That's Chris making espresso on the Italian machine, Sibilla.

Teas are much more popular among the locals than coffee. This tea is called Horchata and, like Tamales, you'll find variations of the recipe throughout the continent. In Ecuador, the tea is made from fresh flowers and grasses and herbs like carnations and geraniums, amaranth, borage, cedron, chamomile and basil - so it's pink! It's drunk mainly for its medicinal properties. The nuns from the Mariana Sanctuary on the edge of the flower market here in the historic centre, sell their home brew from the tiny door in the wall of their convent. There can be quite a number of people lining up to buy a cup of the healing Horchata. No such miraculous qualities attached to our brew though but you know, it's never too late to start a good rumour. 

Not Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice but....

Jim and Susie and Carol and George are the four wonderful people who run California Kitchen. Yahoo!  Waffle and pancake deprived foodies now have a breakfast haunt on Saturdays.   Here’s a recent photo of Waffle and French Toast I devoured!  

Now that you’re all counting, I ordered Biscuits and Gravy too. It’s a Southern staple I've been told and as they don't come more southern than Australians, I thought it sounded like a bit of me. They’re a small bun with a gossamer-like, ‘melt in your mouth’ texture and a crispier crust served alongside a bowl of meaty gravy. I can really see why people develop a hankering for them.

Yesterday, Jason, Donna, Chris and I worked our way through the entire breakfast menu.  Today, Linda and I could only work our way through a third but that didn't stop us mulling over the idea of hanging around long enough for the Lunch menu to arrive. One of the set breakfasts, the big one, the one with the lot, is called ‘The Day Ender’ which, in Spanish, is something suspiciously like ‘The Terminator’.  Jason ordered that. What a guy! (Arnold Schwarzenegger, I mean...)   Belly full, I downed my cuppa and headed back out to the bustling streets to pick up some supplies.

California Kitchen is on the corner of Gaspar Sangurima and Antonio Borrero, in an Historic Mansion located in one of the city’s Indigenous Food and Market Precincts. The Mercado 9 de Octubre is one block down.   Civic funds have revitalized this important Inner-city food bowl and assisted the preservation of the tradition of people living and working in the Inner City. Big public places have opened up between Sangurima and Lamar and greener and more pedestrian friendly walkways are being carved out of what was becoming chaotic and choked with traffic.  The refurbishment of the Market Precincts is a really big deal because it's all about valuing the more integral ways of life where food is made from fresh ingredients and eating is a necessary and rewarding social activity. (Just like at Kookaburra and California Kitchen you say?)

Continuing another block down Sangurima and you arrive at one of my all time favourite places in Cuenca, Plaza Sangurima – better known as the Rotary Market. I love wandering around this exquisite working plaza, eyeing off the handmade baskets, tin ware, wooden utensils, simple furniture, ceramic pots, ironware, horse blankets, hemp rope, piggy banks....buying it all in my mind, imagining how I could find a use for everything I see, thinking about housewarming presents.  (Don't worry Donna, I know the pink 'plastic tape' furniture won't go with your drapery!) Attention visitors to Cuenca: This is one of the best venues for finding quirky, unique gifts that have both beautiful form as well as frighteningly simple function. The coffee dripolators here, for example, don’t need electricity: an important consideration when the power goes off from time to time. 

On yesterday's post breakfast excursion, Chris and I did some actual buying, using real money. We bought a woolen saddle blanket, six hand-turned wooden pear and apple shaped boxes, two huge hand thrown ceramic pots for our Crow’s Nest Ferns, as well as several smaller glazed pots for the plants that keep arriving on our doorstep. (see Jason’s blog!) All very practical and useful items except perhaps for the fruit shaped wooden things which you would all probably regard as 'stuff'. Hey, we've got a lot of catching up to do on the 'stuff' front, having arrived in Cuenca two years ago with only four suitcases.  

So, California Kitchen is indeed in very good company -  as if any of us needed another reason to visit.

Update October 2011: Here are California Kitchen's new hours:

 

Tuesday & Wednesday - 11:30am - 4pm
Thursday & Friday - 11:30am - 4pm & 5pm - 9pm
Saturday - 9am - 5pm

Phone number - 083111740