Beer Belly? Think again.

My cousin J**** says that the key to the Lithuanian diet is beer...let me explain.

The food here is incredibly rich and - in J****'s words, "realllly fatty". It is delicious but I can't seem to ever finish even half of my food - because my tastebuds are simply exhausted! Imagine, for example, this meal:

Lithuanian beer (skanu! tasty!), with pork ear strips, chickpea salad (texturally like macaroni salad), and fried beer bread, 100% saturated with oil, and dressed in cheese sauce (don't worry, the cheese sauce is mixed with mayonnaise so that it is creamier)

Tricked you! That is just the first course for while you drink. :)

For appetizer - baked potato, dressed with a sour cream, mushroom (grybai), onion, and pickled herring.

For dinner - two stuffed cabbage servings. The meat interior is half pork, half beef, minced together. It tasted an awful lot like a Peking Ravioli from home. To top it all off - literally - a cheesey, runny sour cream dressing with dill. Don't forget the potato on the side.

Of course, more and more beer.

So J**** explained that when she went to the USA for six months (here, JAV), she gained an enormous amount of weight eating the American way. She now is back to her normal, very slender self - and eats like this on a regular basis. Nothing is ever "diet" food for her, and every meal is rich. The Lithuanian women I've seen around town are all very healthy-looking and slender - and when they eat, they clean their plates. After the dinner, I've seen women split ANOTHER plate of beer snacks - with beers 3 times the size I'm used to drinking.

How do they do it? J**** explained the secret: the beer! "The beer has natural yeasts in it that break down the fats and keep us healthy. Every bite you have, drink a sip of beer, so that it mixes". Her fiance, mom, and dad nodded along in agreement. Halfway through the meal J**** reminded me to drink my beer. And her dad, Romas, encouraged me to order another once I was done. Of course this, I'm now remembering, was at the point we were eating our appetizers. Romas told me to not worry about finishing my potato - since "more warm ones are coming!" Ha, they had ordered for me in Lithuanian, I had assumed I was eating my big meal at that point...

And to think that in the United States, the first thing a doctor suggests is to cut back on the empty calories of alcohol! Clearly we've got it wrong - eat as much fat as possible, and drink up! :)

I should take a moment to quickly mention how hospitable everyone is here. Really, people are kind and friendly, they never prod into your business, but you are treated really well by friends here and are shown around and cared for.

The part I thought was most ironic was that J****'s mom scolded her for ordering sparkling water (instead of still). Sparkling water, I learned, is bad for your health.

Here are lots of pictures from exploring Gediminas Castle and the rest of Vilnius - more stories and posts to come! I'll have to explain our excursions so far, including to the Ethnography museum, in some future post.