Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

In southern South America, including Chile, avocado is called palta. In Chile they also call "palta" the mixture they make that looks somewhat similar to guacamole, but the two mixtures are different. Avocado, in Chile, is mixed simply with lemon juice, salt, and salad oil. Guacamole is avocado mixed with garlic, tomato, a little jalapeno pepper, salt, and lime juice (though that can vary, a little). Palta and guacamole are not interchangeable in my opinion!

Chilean palta, all by itself on bread, is also delicioius, and is a common treat for the afternoon/evening onces.

I stumbled upon this blog earlier today. The descriptions of the Chilean sandwiches are making me even more eager for my return trip to Chile in July!

Careful, Zach; I don't call them "crackareros" for nothing.

I am all about the works! There is a great little place in Boston's Downtown Crossing called Chacarero, and go figure, they sell chacareros. There is a line down the street at lunch time and they are only open during the week. So good!

Guacamole with sour cream or cheese??? :-O Where would that be? I'm ready to accept that there's variation in guacamole recipes throughout Latin American (i.e., it's not just Mexican); adding dairy sounds extreme to me, but I'm happy to be corrected.

@Baine - I totally know what you mean about the palta v guacamole thing, and translation of foreign words is sometimes going to be iffy, but I was under the impression that palta is just the word for avocado. Order an Ensalada de Palta in Chile, and you get a plate with whole slices of avocado. It's understood that when you say palto in reference to a completo or churrasco, they're going to know you mean mashed up avocado stuff- but I felt like using the term guacamole was a fair translation. I feel like once you mash up avocado, and add condiments to it (whatever they may be), it becomes guac.

Thoughts? (Semantics discussions are fun!)