Food in Guatemala

Overall, we're fans of Guatemalan food.  Our meals have been simple but tasty.  Breakfast isn't usually included with our rooms, so we wander in the morning to find a small cafe.  Our breakfasts have been hearty, (allowing us to skip lunch many days) and are typically a few eggs scrambled or over easy, served with salsa picante, a scoop of refried black beans, and a basket of warm tortillas.  The eggs in the picture above are "huevos divorcados", or "divorced eggs", so named because of the two different sauces (orange and green).

Typical dinners are grilled chicken or beef served with seasoned rice, a garnish of tomatoes, and again- a basket of warm tortillas.  When you pass by open doors to private homes, you can often hear the slapping sound of women patting cornmeal into a ball and then flattening it on a hot griddle.  We took this picture of women making blue corn tortillas in the food stalls at the Chichicastenango market.

Some scruffy American ex-pats recommended a place in San Pedro for its variety of traditional Mayan cuisine.  We ordered chicken and squash in a green herbal sauce to share.  The dish arrived as a stew, the green liquid was still boiling when the bowl was set down.  I tasted lots of cilantro, though we weren't sure what else.  It wasn't our favorite, but it was definitely unique.

One of my favorite meals was a late lunch at a small place in Flores (after a long morning hiking at Tikal).  Mohit liked his banana-pineapple-papaya smoothie so much he drained it in a few long slurps.  My shrimp enchiladas were served with amazingly fresh guacamole (rivaled only by the guac Mohit was served with grilled chicken from a late-night street vendor in San Pedro).  Since it was a rainy afternoon, we lingered for awhile reading the cafe's books about Mayan history and ordered a dessert of crepes with banana, papaya, and chocolate.  The crepes were spongy and thick, different from the paper-thin crepes we're used to.

My only difficulty with the food is that vegetables are hard to come by.  The only veggies we can find (other than black beans and tomato garnishes) are usually on tourist menus and not at traditional Guatemalan places.  Still, the freshness of the produce, which is all grown locally and doesn't travel far to make it on your plate, makes everything yummy.  One night we had the most delicious appetizer of grilled eggplant served with a soft salty cheese similar to feta. Mmmmm.  I also ordered a "veggie burger" for dinner one night and was pleasantly surprised when a huge sandwich with layer upon layer of grilled spiced squash, potato, carrot, eggplant, and pepper was brought to the table.

Our next stop is Tokyo, it's hard to believe we'll be there 2 days from now!  We're both looking forward to sushi and noodles...

Vulcan Pacaya and Chichicastenango, Guatemala

I've been looking forward to getting up close and personal with flowing lava as one of the highlights of our four-month adventure, and Vulcan Pacaya did not disappoint!  After a cramped hour-and-a-half van ride from Antigua, we arrived at the base of the volcano.  Hopping out of the van, we were swarmed by little boys with armloads of walking sticks, "Stick for you?  Stick for you?".

I'd read that the hike up Pacaya is challenging, but we were both still surprised when our guide led us up steep inclines for the first half hour at a sprinting pace, and we were immediately winded and already wondering...how much longer?  The guides are clearly in cahoots with the guys following hikers with horses, trying to get us to pay to take a rest and ride a horse up.  We were determined to get our workout without the horses.  The landscape changed from green fields under a grey sky, to green shrubs in the middle of clouds, and then suddenly to a vast horizon of loose, coarse dark grey pebbles.  Off in the distance, we could see another volcano that was erupting steam into the sky.

Trekking through a cold drizzle, the pebbles underfoot gradually changed to sharp pointy rocks, and then we started passing what looked like cooled lava flows- the rock had liquid shapes but was sharp to the touch and sounded hollow when we stomped on it.   Suddenly, the air around us grew warm.  We were several hundred  yards from the top and yet the rocks around us were definitely giving off heat, which was much appreciated since it was really windy and cold!  Coming over the last rise, the sight of bright orange glowing lava was breathtaking, a surprising sight even though it was what we'd been working toward for the past hour and a half.  So cool!  We were able to get within feet of the lava flow, careful not to let the wind blow us into it, and worried about the soles of our sneakers melting to the hot rocks.  There's no way you'd ever be able to get this close to a live eruption in the U.S.- thank you Central America and your lack of safety rules!

By the time we started down, it was past 6pm and rapidly getting darker.  It was pitch black before we made it to the bottom of the ash flow and back onto green earth, with still an hour of hiking ahead of us.  We'd brought a headlamp and a flashlight but most hikers were headed down through the darkness.  At this point we were thankful for the literally hundreds of other hikers coming down the mountain with us, since it didn't seem like the smartest idea to be trekking through parts unknown in the dark and vulnerable.

We spent the next day at the Sunday market in Chichicastenango, a small mountain village northwest of Antigua.  Mohit loved that he was at least a full head taller than all the locals, and he was also in heaven selecting from the street food options for lunch.  We bought a few small things that we'll ship home when we pass through Dallas on our way to Hong Kong next week.  We made friends with two Swiss girls, a French couple, and an Argentine couple riding our bus on the way back, and got some great recommendations for our next stops.  Tonight we're chilling at a rooftop cafe, enjoying grilled vegetable sandwiches and a yummy brownie with cinnamon-sprinkled ice cream and plotting the rest of the week.  We just watched a volcano erupt off in the distance, a spurt of red up into the air and then a gradually dimming stream of orange down the side of the volcano.  This wasn't even Pacaya, someone just told us there are something like 30+ active volcanoes in Guatemala.  Pretty cool scenery to top off a fun few days!

Antigua, Guatemala

After an early wakeup in Mississauga and a mad dash through the Miami airport to make our tight connection, we arrived in Guatemala City early afternoon on New Year’s Eve!  Unfortunately, our bags did not (even 30 hours later, as I type this post), but we’re taking it in stride since we figure we’re likely to be tested far more than this over the next 4 months. 

We arrived in Antigua after a 45-min drive out of the city and up and down mountains.  Mohit is thrilled that there’s a Pollo Campero about every two blocks (literally!), since he’s enjoyed their fried chicken at the one in East Boston.  At a stop light, the car trunk in front of us was stuffed with several silly pinatas, a hint at the New Year’s Eve party to come….

After checking into our hotel we immediately headed out to explore the town in the fading afternoon sun.  Antigua is quaint and beautiful, all cobblestone streets,  faded pastel stucco houses with clay tile roofs, and a Volcano looming green and grey in the background.  We ventured warily at first, cautiously sticking to well-populated streets, thinking about all the warnings we’d read about risk of theft in Guatemala.  But it didn’t take long for us to feel comfortable wandering more freely, since we’re finding the Guatemalan people to be warm, friendly, and leaving us entirely alone.  We’re so used to being stared at and subjected to aggressive sales techniques in places like Istanbul and Hanoi that we are surprised to be able to browse in shops and not be hassled.  We also feel relatively safe since families have been out together the past two nights to celebrate the New Year, and small children are underfoot everywhere. 

After an early dinner of chiles rellenos and chicken in a cinnamon sauce (yum!), we joined the thousands of locals in the streets to ring in 2010 al fresco.  We enjoyed live guitar music, a guy juggling flaming sticks, a strange dance performance by people dressed up as political characters, including a statue of liberty with an Obama mask, and picked out some churros con chocolat from a sidewalk stall in front of a beautiful church.

At about 8 p.m., the fireworks gradually began.  Lit mostly by kids, the fireworks exploded in the middle of crowded streets, sending the tourists like us running for cover, and the locals running closer to see.  Boys ran through the streets with frames shaped like a bull or a bird strapped to their back and loaded with exploding sparklers.  Everyone wore either glowing devil horns or what looked like Mickey Mouse ears.   Public drinking in the streets is not allowed, and police with machine guns lurked at the edges of the crowd to ensure compliance.  For the last hour of 2009, the fireworks grew even bigger, louder, and more frequent, until car alarms were ringing everywhere from the vibrations and the whole city smelled like gunpowder.  If you closed your eyes you could imagine what it's like to be in the middle of a full-on firefight in the middle of a warzone.  Welcome 2010!!

We woke up late to streets littered with confetti and fireworks remains.  We spent today exploring the city, grateful for the moderate weather (sunny and breezy, about 70 F), since we’re stuck wearing the same jeans, sneakers, and long sleeves that kept us warm when we  left Toronto yesterday.   Everyone assumes Mohit is Central American, and after we had to tell a cute little old lady at a church that sorry, “no habla espanol” she looked really surprised and asked Mohit in perfect English “what are you, Italian?”  When he told her he is Indian, she said with a huge grin “Ah!  Beautiful country!  I want to go to India someday and ride an elephant!”  Me too.  But for now I’m enjoying Guatemala…