Mmmm mmmm spicy!

So in general Panamanian food is just not spicy. There is a spicy hot sauce made here from a chili called Aji Chombo which is alright. I don't use it all that much honestly but it's cool that it's at least available in restaurants and stuff. Thing is people here seem to claim that spicy is bad and will cause stomach problems which I just don't buy....I dunno my mommy always said spicy was good especially for clearing sinuses/speeding up the metabolism. Through the years I have become a spicy super fan, adding chili to just about everything I eat. Well, so I found some interesting health facts about chili and there was way more benefits than I even thought! Check out Sweet N Spice for lots and lots of chili sauces. My personal spicy chili sauce favorites are Tabasco Smoked Chipotle Sauce, Tapatio Hot Sauce, Sriracha chili sauce & Lee Kum Kee Chili Garlic Sauce.

Mmmm anyway last night I needed to make dinner. I desperately need to go to the super market...but last night I had to make due with what I had available. I had soaked some garbanzo beans, and had some sad looking basil, squash and celery in the fridge. So are you thinking what I'm thinking? I bet you are! SOUP! So I made one of my concoctions and it came out well. Almost reminded me of Idili Sambar from India (minus the idili)! This is one of my all time favorite soups/foods and actually it's been years since I've even had it so maybe my soup isn't even close but to me it tasted similar enough and yummy! So here's the recipe in a nut shell:

Yummy Sambarish Soup!

1 cup cooked garbanzo beans
1 cup zapallo (sorta like butternut squash)
1 cup celery
1 cup carrot
1 cup onion
3 big cloves of garlic
1 table spoon of fresh basil
1 tbsp of olive oil
3-4 cups water
Spices:
salt to taste
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp yellow curry powder
1/2 tsp termeric
1/2 tsp coriander
splash of smoked chipotle tabasco sauce
splash of tapatio hot sauce

SOAK garbanzo beans over night
BOIL beans until tender w/ salt
CHOP vegetables roughly & add to hot water
COOK veggies until tender & add spices
BLEND soup until smooth (or not so smooth depending on how you feel) at this point add basil & olive oil
EAT it up! Yummy would be good with some rice or some kind of bread. I had neither & ate a mushroom omelet with it :p

Here is a real recipe for Idili Sambar which sounds yummy but much more difficult. I saw an Indian Restaurant here the other day and have been wanting to go. Maybe I'll be lucky and they'll have it!

Mmmm mmmm spicy!