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Thanks to the young Euskal Txokoa Basque club, the Basque community in San Martin de los Andes was able to enjoy activities held thanks to the support and participation of members of the Euskal Etxea Basque club in San Nicolas and the Union Vasca in Bahia Blanca.  Cooks from San Nicolas taught a cooking workshop, and the dantzaris from Bahia Blanca entertained at the Basque Taberna with their dances and inviting the audience to join in. 

San Martin de los Andes, Argentina.   The Basque community in San Martin de los Andes in the province of Neuquen has been active for just over a year and during this time it has been able to go to institutions with longer lives in order to get their help on this first step.  Not long ago they received representatives from the Mendiko Euzko Etxea from Bariloche with them and they were also visited by Carlos Gabilondo who is in charge of the traveling Basque Film Series.

Always with the goal of diffusing the Basque culture, in September the Basques in Patagonia were visited by Basque clubs that collaborated with them during the second Basque Taberna.  On the one hand the cooks from the Basque Clubin San Nicolas, Damian Cebey, Damian Landaburu and Ana Maria Erausquin, traveled to San Martin expressly for the event and taught a workshop on cooking that was attended by 15 students.

As the club president explained to EuskalKultura.com, “a great atmosphere of work and camaraderie that we really enjoy was created.  Besides, the idea is to capitalize on this cooking experience and pass it on to our cooks who we especially thank and value their contributions and selflessness having traveled so many kilometers to help us grow.”

For the workshop the chefs prepared garlic mousse, txorizo in cider, pintxos (squash ones) and blod sausage, txiperones in butter, pork, caramelized fruits, baked apples and pears in red wine.

Second Basque Taberna at Euskal Txokoa

The Basque Taberna was held on September 26th and drew a large crowd in the hall at the Gendarmeríe in the city of San Martin.  For this event the cooks were also challenged but succeeded as always.  The new Basque club welcomed guests with the classic paella from San Nicolas.  But the cooks weren’t the only stars of the evening since the dantzaris from Bahia Blanca didn’t just entertain with their dances but also encouraged the public to dance which created a great atmosphere of fun and camaraderie.

This month the Euskal Txokoa will welcome the traveling exhibit “Changing Perspectives,” sponsored by the Delegation of the Basque Government in Argentina.  The exhibit gathers some of the awareness campaigns sponsored by Emakunde (Basque Women’s Institute) to promote equality among women and men.  It will be a part of the Regional Book Fair in San Martin de los Andes.  It can be visited between October 7-12, at the Municipal Exhibit Hall. In November, around the time of Semana Nacional, the club is organizing a teleconference between their children and students at an ikastola in the Basque Country

Positive result for San Nicolas too

Basques in San Nicolas also came away very satisfied with its participation.  As Damian Cebey explained to EusalKultura.com, “In the first place, it was very motivating to know that someone had recommended our members to help out with the Basque Taberna, it also encouraged us to know that we could go and teach some Basque cooking recipes to a lot of people, and that they could learn them well enough to replicate them in the future. Obviously, our degree of craziness is noted to not do usual things, like travel more than 3,000 kilometers to do a workshop…. It was also very interesting to see how the experience of cooking somewhere that is new to you, with other equipment, and other limitations, and with participants that have had different cooking experiences.  Everything was a challenge but was a real success!” Etxe Nasaia project's main chef said.