April 7:
First step accomplished, we arrived to Willoughby, Ohio with no problem. We already have diner and are in the hotel in a good shape by now. Most of the way was known area because we went to Niagara Fall a while ago, but everything was new when we went through Pennsylvania and Ohio. New York landscape is beautiful and so are the mountains of Massachusetts. We saw immense vineyards. We ate at an Italian restaurant, pasta with sauce but it was so much sauce that I couldn’t eat it all and the plate had the salt that should be eaten in the entire month. The hotel is very comfortable so I hope we can have enough rest tonight.

April 8:

To the far west – Camino al lejano oeste

Second day. We arrived to Davenport, Iowa, 3:30 central time. We drove 80 miles per hour the most of the time. We had intense raining in our way. The landscape changed a lot, mainly flat in Indiana and Illinois, many industrial farms, trees are short, some farms with small trees with twisted branches that for sure are fruit trees but I don’t know what kind of fruit. Many wind power towers in Ohio. This city is picturesque, there are not three deckers, but many fast food chains thriving.

We have a sign in our car dashboard that says that the car needs maintenance. We checked fluids and seem to be okay. Called AAA, they said it does not need urgent care, something related to gas exhaust, they recommended not to drive over 70 miles per hour and use better gas.

 

Farewell

The time to say good by has arrived. After 10 years of living in Worcester we have to move from this wonderful community. I want to publicly say an special THANK YOU to Laura Suroviak, Mary Keefe and Matt Feinstein for welcoming me when I just arrived to US and introduce me to the best of this vibrant community. I will have you in my heart for the rest of my life.
Next weekend, March  23 and 24, after 3 pm my home will be doors open to friends and neighbors that would like to say good by and warm my soul with a hug.

Empanadas Revolucionarias

Empanadas revolucionarias was born 10 years ago out of my activism in Worcester, MA. The first time that I made empanadas in USA was for the birthday party of the collective Go Go, in Worcester. I made 80 vegetarian empanadas that disappeared in a few moments. Compañeros started asking me to make empanadas to share in our meetings. I started catering for events, parties and so on and the name “Empanadas Revolucionarias” came out of the creative mind of my dear friend Matt who meant by that food for social change.
Worcester is a vibrant city full of diversity where more than 90 languages are spoken. Out of that diversity came the Worcester World Cup event that once a year gather teams representing many countries in a soccer championship. Food from many countries is sold to thousand of families soccer fans. That was a good test for us to realize that our empanadas were a success. Next step was a huge, entire day, art event that is held twice a year and gather artist from towns and cities from Massachusetts. It was a major success. We had a long line of customers along the day and we would sold twice if we had it done.
Worcester is our American ‘home town’ and where our business was born, but we have our family in the west coast. Portland the green captivated us when we visited our children last year. It was a hard decision to take but finally we rented our home, sold or gave away our belongings and drove all the way from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean to start a new life close to our children and grandchildren and share our Uruguayan food with our new Portlander friends