By Umer Nangiana

Truly representing the biodiversity and multiculturalism of this South American country, the Ecuador Food Festival in Doha is a typical celebration of gastronomy and cultural diversity. Being held for the second time, the festival at the Diplomatic Club offers succulent assortment of Ecuadorian dishes, especially the ones from the Amazon of Ecuador.
Two master chefs have been flown in from Ecuador to prepare the traditional culinary delights with authentic spices. “People around the world have many ways to express their culture and showcasing the cuisine is one of the best ways to do it,” said Kabalan Abisaab, Ambassador of Ecuador to Qatar, at the opening ceremony.  
“Biodiversity, fertile land, endemic species, a singular geographical configuration, a multicultural society and ancestral customs are just some of the factors that come together to make Ecuador a land with unique culinary wealth,” the ambassador told the audience comprising members of Ecuadorian community and that of the diplomatic corps.
The ambassador said that throughout the history, cookery has been a way for them to find and reaffirm their social and cultural diversity. “Our culture as a whole is marked by its diversity of language, dress, music and of course gastronomy,” added the ambassador.
He invited the guests to get closer to Ecuador and to know the richness of its culture, to visit the beautiful country of four worlds and the most compact mega diversity in the world.
Chefs Andre Obiol and Juan Anicento are themselves supervising the preparation and celebration of the traditional Ecuadorian dishes. “In Ecuador we have a lot of sea food. We have the cold current and the hot current. So we have different types of fish and sea food. Then we are in the tropical region so we have the mountainous produce — a lot of quinoa, potato and other stuff,” Chef Obiol told Community.
“The food is fresh and diverse belonging to different regions, especially the Indian food from the mountains,” he added.
Explaining some of the dishes, the chef said there is a lot of corn of different types. For example, they have Mote corn which is cooked by boiling it for 10 hours so that it is hard boiled to make it very soft from inside while it retains hardness from outside and they have cooked it with lamb fat.  
The presentation of sea food called ceviche is a mix of different flavours like coconut sauce, orange sauce, lemon sauce, passion fruit sauce and pineapple sauce. “We have presented lobster, octopus and fish just cooked with lemon and salt. We also have this fried banana and fried corn. It is something that we eat a lot in the mountainous regions,” said Obiol.
“The lamb made in the central parts of the country is prepared with cane sugar and usually we cook it for more than 10 hours so that the meat gets really soft while retaining all the juices inside. We eat it a lot with potato cake with cheese inside and a lot of rice,” said the chef, referring to one of the dishes on the dinner table.  
To another dish on the starters’ table, the chef said it was three types of quinoa mixed with passion fruit ingredients and fresh mushrooms and passion fruit sauce sprinkled over it.  The beef tenderloins on the menu, he said, are usually prepared in thick cuts but here they have made very thin cuts as they were told that people here like them thin.
“We prepare it with a lot of chocolate. We use raw chocolate which is salty,” said the chef.
From Amazonia, they have prepared something called Maito which is fish cooked with chocolate inside and black pepper. It is a speciality from the Amazon, the chef added.
The festival is underway at the Diplomatic Club till March 28.