In the north where the Atacama Desert is located, it is dry and arid. A Mediterranean climate dominates the central region. Easter Island is a tropical rainforest, while the Andes face alpine conditions. Still, other areas like Patagonia have different climates. And, thanks to the Humboldt Current, the seawater temperature is also much colder than that of the rest of South America. As a result of that uniqueness, Chile is one of the countries with the most endemic ingredients in the world. “You get to see a huge amount of ingredients that grow in certain areas or regions in Chile that you won’t see anywhere else in the world,” Chef Guzmán says. “[Some ingredients] are exceptionally seasonal, lasting only two to three weeks.” In terms of food culture, Chile has suffered from an identity crisis, until recently. “Since Spanish came four hundred years ago to Chile, we were
pretending to be Europeans. Until the nineties, we were pretending to be Americans,” Chef Guzmán says. “Now [Chileans] are very conscious of the good things in our terrain.” “At least eighty percent of us have Mapuche blood, who have been in our land for twelve thousand years… Our culture is very deep, especially related to food,” he says. Chef Guzmán had a difficult time getting Boragó off the ground after returning to Santiago from the famed Spanish restaurant Mugaritz. “When we first opened the restaurant, we were trying to cook with only native ingredients so we were in big trouble,” Chef Guzmán says. “We did not know anything about the ingredients but we wanted to learn. We always felt deeply attracted to not knowing anything about a subject.” “We started from zero. We had no partners,” he says. “After five years, the restaurant was still doing very bad. I was trying to sell the restaurant
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