Breakfast Rotary Raises Funds for Guatemalan Library Prototype

On December 9, forty-one club members, friends, and members of Engineers Without Borders enjoyed a carry out dinner of Guatemalan Pepian chicken, or a vegetarian option, with rice, squash, tamales and rum spice cake from the Migrants restaurant in Madison.
 
Chef Oscar made the Pepian chicken from a recipe of Chef Javier in Guatemala City. The dinners costing $20 each were preordered, asking for a donation to the library. After picking up their dinners, the participants went back home to eat and watch Chef Javier in Guatemala City prepare the “Pepian Guatemalteco chicken”.
 
 
 
He first blackened tomatoes, onions and a slice of chili in a pan on the stove without oil. The tomato mix was mashed up with the water in which the chicken had been cooking on the stove. A blackened slice of bread, and a variety of blackened seeds were added and the sauce was poured over the chicken. It is typically served with a can of beer topped with chopped celery, onion and slice of lemon. Chef Javier has been cooking for 25 years and has a TV show.
 
The club Rotario Los Altos of Quetzaltenango in western Guatemala also participated and Alvaro from that club introduced the chef and described the library prototype his club would like to pursue. The library would have a capacity of 300 to 400 books, a computer, and an interactive games section. It doesn’t take up much space and would be ease to install, maybe in a hallway. On the doors would be whiteboards for use for instruction. The first prototype would cost $1500. If that is successful, they would like to install them in other schools. Many thanks to Chef Oscar of Migrants, Chef Javier in Guatemala City and to Alvaro of the Los Altos club.
 
The club raised $1,256 for the project. Betsy Nordstrom, our fundraiser extraordinaire, chaired the planning committee with members Helen Baldwin, Eng Braun, Ellen Cook, Joyce Crim, Mary June Fries, Kevin Frost, Erin Hastey and Gary Muldoon.