Nicole Hamilton was one of the girls that visited Santiago as part of the Latin American Studies class that visited our country from Indiana University. Nicole and her group did various activities while being in Chile, like for example, visiting the CNN Chile facilities and doing canopy with her friend Brennan Smith, “a zipline adventure” as she called it, in Camino a Farellones. Here we can see some pictures:
Nicole and I met when she visited the Journalism and Communications Faculty of the Universidad Católica de Chile, school where I attend to. During our talk, we ate a lot since there was plenty of food sort of “waiting for us”. So the food was one of the main topics of our conversation.
But one of the things Nicole and the Indiana University Group enjoyed the most was the Chilean Cuisine. They enjoyed specially the variety of food that Chile had, and the different plates of food Chileans could do with the same piece of meat, for example. Nicole tasted “anticuchos”, “empanadas” and even “chorrillanas”, and was surprised with the fact that all of these meals had meat in them! She was also amazed by the number of restaurants available in Santiago, specially in Barrio Bellavista. Nicole also recognized many of the food brands that were also present in the Unired States, like McDonald’s, KFC, Pizza-Hut, Taco Bell and others, but strongly mentioned that while Domino’s Pizza in the States was “so-so, and that’s saying a lot!”, the Chilean Domino´s Pizza was far better.
She couldn’t let the opportunity to taste one of the most popular drinks of Chile past her. In one of her visits to a restaurant she ordered the (in)famous Pisco Sour, of which Nicole had to say: “It was my Chilean weakness. I loved it!”
We want to show places to eat, and food people coming to Chile should try. We show a short story on American Food, so Chileans that visit our page because they could also want to look at which places to go, or what to eat, know a little about traditions in U.S.A. Also, there’s a piece on American fast food, and how it has made an impact on Chile. We hope you enjoy the information we provide and indulge yourselves with our recipes…
Most of American fast-food companies arrived approximately 20 years ago in our country, concentrating 180 US$ millions per year. Among these very highly competitive markets, the most outstanding and famous both in Chile and in the rest of the world is McDonald’s.
McDonald’s was the first one to arrive in 1990, establishing their first restaurant in Santiago, in the Kennedy Avenue, the one that still exists until today. Three years later, McDonalds opened six more restaurants in Santiago. Then in 1995, with the success in the community, they decided to also open new restaurants among all the country, starting in Viña del Mar and Rancagua, which also were a great accomplishment. This powerful and multinational chain in Chile is concentrating almost 45% of this market, and making more than three thousands new jobs, where young people can start working but also develop a carrier inside, where almost all of the managers start working in this very place. McDonalds also help the community, having the Ronald McDonald’s foundation, and giving scholarships to their outstanding employees witch participates in different types of events such as arts or sports competition.
The direct competitions for these hamburgers are the also famous Burger King’s hamburgers. This company arrived in 1994, with a strong investment of 25 US$ millions. As McDonalds, Burger King also starts in Santiago, but today they have restaurants all along the country, with a total of 24 restaurants.
But the fast foods are not only hamburgers; we can also find other kind of foods, such as chicken, tacos, or pizzas. The most important company in this last item is Pizza Hut (that is also united with Taco Bell). Maybe the fame and the privilege that this fast-food has was the reason why we all enjoy it when we met!
The history of Pizza hut began in 1958, and now is the world's largest pizza franchise. It arrived to Chile also in last decade, with a single “hut”, but today they are less than a hundred in all the country. Today the Pizza hut company is part of the Pepsi Empire.
