One of my favorite parts of traveling is the food! Costa Rica has certainly given me plenty of new things to try, some of which are great…and some of which are not so great. Here’s a collection of some typical Costa Rican food I have enjoyed.
Let’s start with the morning. This is a pretty typical Costa Rican breakfast, including “gallo pinto” (gah-yo-peen-toe) – rice, beans, and vegetables mixed together. Eating rice and beans in the morning seems strange at first, but gallo pinto is really good! Other common items are eggs, bread, fruit, and of course coffee. The white block in the picture is cheese—it has sort of a spongy texture, but it tastes pretty good, and they put it on everything!
Although I don’t eat gallo pinto every day, I certainly don’t go hungry in the morning! 8/10
For lunch, the typical plate is called a “casado.” It includes rice, beans, salad, fried plantains, and sometimes beef or chicken. It’s a cheap, filling, and tasty lunch! Fun fact: In Costa Rica, lunch is considered the biggest and most important meal of the day. Quite a contrast to the U.S. where we are constantly eating lunch on the go or while working!
Lunch at the university cafeteria. Super cheap and quite different from Founder’s! 9/10
One of the most typical dishes of Costa Rica is “arroz con pollo” (rice with chicken). They eat it so much that sometimes they substitute the word for chicken with the word for always (siempre). Hence, “arroz con siempre” (roughly translated “rice with always”). It’s one of my favorite dishes!
This dinner also included fried plantains and cucumber salad. 10/10
This is a pretty typical dinner at my house. A pork chop, white rice, beans, salad, and fried plantains. Fresh, homemade fruit drinks are also very typical—the one in the background here is pineapple—my personal favorite!
Pretty hard to go a day here without rice and beans. 8/10
A picture of a fruit drink at a restaurant in San José—“mora” (blackberry).
An upgrade from soda, I have to say. 10/10
I thought I knew what I was getting into when my friends’ host mom served us “perros calientes” (hot dogs), but it was very different than I expected! This is a hot dog with cabbage, potato chips, and a mayonnaise and ketchup sauce. Not the best hot dog I’ve ever eaten, but it was an interesting (and messy) experience.
Not bad, but I prefer Chicago style. 7/10
Costa Rica has a lot of different fruits that we don’t have in the U.S. A few I’ve tried are granadilla, cas, and tamarin. This particular fruit is a guanabana—it has a weird texture but good flavor! (Also, the fruits that are the same are WAY better here—pineapple, bananas, melon, to name a few).
The juice is better than the fruit. 6/10
Another new fruit I’ve tried is called pejivalle. (pay-hee-vah-yay). It has the texture of a potato but a different flavor. It is typically eaten with mayonnaise. Another thing I wouldn’t eat again but am glad I tried!
We had this at breakfast a few days ago. 5/10
I love yogurt. In the States, I barely go a day without it. I was a little disappointed to find out that the only yogurt people seem to like here is in liquid form, but once I tried it, I was hooked!
It comes in a variety of flavors, but my personal favorite is “frutas tropicales”(tropical fruit). 10/10
Finally, a blog of Costa Rican food would not be complete without POPS. This ice cream/smoothie shop never fails to satisfy a craving for a cold treat on a hot day. You can find one on nearly every corner!
Strawberry smoothie = perfection. 11/10
