Cooking with Wood

Lydia Walshin, author of the blog The Perfect Pantry, recently posted a series of pictures of the wood burning oven/stoves she found in every kitchen on a recent trip to the Minas Gerais region of Brazil. The stoves look almost like tables, with a flat metal surface above the fire to heat pots. They heat the kitchen, and food placed on top of them can be kept warm until ready to serve. When you see these pictures, you'll want to have one of those stoves in your own kitchen:
Brazil Food: Kitchens and Cooktops

Cooking with wood is common in South America, where natural gas or electricity can be prohibitively expensive. In Peru there is a certain roast chicken dish that is cooked over charcoal from the huarango tree, ancient trees that grow in the desert near the site of the famous Nazca Lines. These trees can live in the desert because they capture moisture from the sea mist in the air, and through extensive root systems. Unfortunately these amazing trees, which can live for hundreds of years, are fast disappearing - people are chopping them down and selling the wood for firewood and charcoal. You can read more about this problem and the ecosystem of coastal Peruvian desert in this New York Times article, Ecosystem in Peru is Losing a Key Ally, by Simon Romero.