Costa Rica Post #10 of 14
Since it's about a half hour past lunch (when I'm writing this), and all I have in my stomach is a few cheez-its and some coffee, food is on my mind.
And if there is one thing we do well in Costa Rica, it's EAT.
Sweets. Meats. Veggies. Fruits. It's. All. Delicious. :)
So here are some of our favorites...
This is cajeta de leche. It's sweet with the consistency of fudge, but it's made of milk, condensed milk, evaporated milk, who-knows-what-other-kind-of-milk, and SUGAR. Lots of sugar. Oh, and there's macadamia nuts in there, too.
And if there is one thing we do well in Costa Rica, it's EAT.
Sweets. Meats. Veggies. Fruits. It's. All. Delicious. :)
So here are some of our favorites...
This is cajeta de leche. It's sweet with the consistency of fudge, but it's made of milk, condensed milk, evaporated milk, who-knows-what-other-kind-of-milk, and SUGAR. Lots of sugar. Oh, and there's macadamia nuts in there, too.
Oh. Yumm.
Alejandro didn't share his.
(So it's a good thing we each had our own.)
We bought this scrumptious little treat from a shack on the side of the road on our way home from the beach. We also picked up these sweets: On the left are chocolate-covered and white-chocolate-covered marshmallows with an m&m on top. On the right is more cajeta de leche laced with candied grapefruit.
This is my. favorite. breakfast. EVER.
It's gallo pinto with (what we call) squeaky cheese and corn tortillas on the side. Essentially it's rice and beans with a bunch of spices and if you don't believe it can taste good, well, ya' gotta come over to my house some time. ;)
I'll make it for you, but I won't promise that it tastes as good as it does at the Molino Central, which might very well be my most favorite place to eat on the entire earth. If I took you there, you might be skeptical, upon walking into the hole-in-the-wall little operation. But as soon as you had a bite of their gallo pinto with Central American sour cream on top and a cheese tortilla...
...well, then you'd change your mind. I realize this looks like nothin' but a greasy pancake.
But it's not.
That day, Alejandro chose to order a casado, which is a typical plate in Costa Rica. It's like saying, "I'd like the value meal." Except for about $4 this is what you get:
That's steak, a salad, refried beans, rice, sweet fried plantain, tortillas, picadillo de papa and a fresh fruit smoothie.
Is anyone else getting hungry?
This next picture has a hysterically funny story behind it, but I'll warn you - it might only be funny to me and you may have just had to be there. It was New Year's Day and there were all kinds of left-overs in the house, so everyone got creative. The guys barbequed shishkabobs, while the aunts conjured up the most amazing apple-pie-esque dessert ever.
The result? Well, Tío (uncle) Chito kind of charred the plantains. The apple dessert, however was a smashing hit. So we all sat around drinking coffee, eating dessert for lunch, and munching on charcoal barbequed plantains.
Something else we ate a lot of were Christmas tamales.
There's a fun little Christmas tamale tradition. When all the tamales have been made (around 40 or 50 in a typical house) there are always odd amounts of leftover ingredients. So one more BIG tamale is made, in which all the left-over ingredients are thrown in. That one is called El Tonto (The Dummy). And it's a big deal if you are given the privilege of eating it.
I think this is the biggest Tonto I've ever seen.
There's a normal-size one next to the big one, so you can get the perspective. I think my brother-in-law ate it this year, and if I remember right, his stomach hurt by the time he was done!
Also in this picture is more picadillo de papa (chopped meat, potatoes and spices) over corn tortillas. This is another favorite of mine - but as you can see, I have lots of favorites!
Ok, I think I better go get some dinner now.