Our Mex Voyage: Las comidas...THE FOOD!!!!

Brace yourselves for a culinary whirlwind that is the food of central america!

Mí y mí coco...Me and my coconut. Petrina enjoys one of natures refrescos (soft drinks) in Puerto Escondido. The kids at Misión México loved to spend time at the beach hunting and breaking into los cocos. Some of them got into big trouble one week for stealing rope and tools from the shed to assist with the retrieval and opeining of the coconuts - they were coconut mad!

Some of the yellow preservative-coated chickens in the open air all day in the outdoor markets. Mmmmm. When they first arrived in the country, and before they knew about the presrvative, one of the house parents at Misión México asked one of the locals what made the chickens here yellow...they were met with blank stares and the response ´because that's what colour chickens are'. Hmmm. No, no thery're not. Not last time we checked.

Nuestros comida favorita en Tapachula (our favourite food in Tapachula) - the huge quesdaillas with queso oaxaqueño (a super stringy unpasturised cheese from Oaxaca state), flor de cabeza (squash flowers), y champiñones (mushrooms) from Quesadillas Rubita ('Ruby's Quesadillas'). This little gem-of-a-street-cafe should be in the Mexico Lonely Planet for Tapachula for sure.

Churros in the cold, cold San Cristóbal

A traditional guatemalan postre (dessert) called Torrejas. Essentially it was a sweet bun with a toffee sauce.

Mexico's answer to the Magnum. We ate a lot of these packaged ice creams after we got parasites for the first time (hey, its hot there, and freezing stuff doesn't kill the bugs so no ice cream from the street vendors for us!)


Ok, ok, so we took a few chances on the parasites....

Mezcal (a special kind of Tequila that you sip) in Oaxaca city

Se vende chile (chilli for sale). In the indoor market in Oaxaca city.

No, these aren't more chilli's..they're mounds of dried, fried grasshoppers on offer at a market in Oaxaca city. Hmmm, no gracias, son vegetarianos (no thanks, we're vegetarian!).

Flan is super popular in Mexico. Tastes like Creme Brulee, which is lovely, but not so good if you're expecting cheesecake!

Mmmm, liquado (smoothie). Fresh juices (jugos frescos) were also served everywhere for next to nothing.

Ensalada y nachos con frijoles negros (salad and nachos with black beans) in San Cristóbal

Totopos (fried tortia pieces) and salsa verde (green salsa). That salsa is HOT. Nearly everywhere we ate throughout Mexico we got a little 'bread basket' like this at the start of our meal. We are addicted to the Totopos now.

And again at another comedor

Another fried corn tortilla product that we are now addicted to...we would top with various mexican specialities (see below). These replaced rice cakes in Petrina's diet! We couldn't count how many packets of these we went through.

Tostada con tomate, cebolla, lettuga y aguacate (fried corn tortilla with tomato, onion, lettuce and avo) - the Logan no-cook Mexican special!

An ambulante peeling oranges he would sell for a couple of pesos

The next few dishes are all meals we ate in Guatemala at our homestay family's place. We stayed with a Guatemalan family while we did a one-week Spanish course - we needed to head to either Guatamala or Belize to reset our Visa so we could spend more time in Mexico / North America. The visa run paid off as some of the best food we ate our whole trip we ate here. The family was a very well-off Guatemalan family and they spoiled us! Not to mention the great fun we had around the meal table trying to understand each other. Good times.

Pasta, ensalada y papas (pasta, salad and potatoes)

Pasta con mantequill y perahil y frijoles refritos (refried beans and pasta served with parsley and butter sauce). Beans were served with nearly everything, much to Petrina's delight!

Pancakes (pronounced paan-cark-us)! Told you they spoiled us! Having said that, breakfast on most other mornings was a corn-based gruel called 'mush' (no joke, its actual name!).

Arroz, tostadita, ensaladas de col, chayote y tomate (rice, mini fried tortilla - top right, coleslaw and salads of steamed choko, tomato and onion)

Sopa de pasta y tamalito (Noodle soup with mini tomale, a steamed corn parcel thats been fried to re-heat)

Frijoles negros, arroz y tostaditos. Can't count the number of times we ate this throughout mexico too.

Tamale with spinach, cheese and chilli salsa

Spinach cooked to a traditional Guatemalan recipe, garden salad and potato salad. Pictured with Valentina Salsa Picante, basically a chilli / hot sauce that we are now addicted to!

Mini tamales

Rice, chili salsa and ejote verde (green bean) salad

Petrina's salad in a fancy restauarant in Palenque

Quesadillas fancy style! In the same restaurant.

More quesadillas (left) and enchiladas

Fancy way of serving Guacamole and Totopos with a little salad. This was probably one of the best guacamoles we had in Mexico

Sopa flor de calabeza - squash flower soup - a popular, delicious, traditional vegetarian dish in Oaxaca state

Pre-prepared veges, mexican style - you could buy them like this in every market for a few pesos. So convenient for cooking up later at the hostel!

Nopales or cactus leaves - traditionally used in a cactus leaf salad. We forgot to take a photo when we ate it though!

Sopa, pan y enchiladas de mole (Soup, bread and Mole enchiladas); Mole is a savoury sauce containing chocolate and lots of different spices. There are heaps of regional variations served around the country.

Petrina with her yoghurt - this is the most popular way of serving yoghurt in Mexico - actually a mixture of milk and yoghurt, so you have to drink it. They even add their own tropical touch by using fruit juices like coconut and pinapple to flavour (plus a whole lot of sugar!). You couldn't really buy what we in Australia would call traditionl flavoured milks there (choloclate, strawberry etc.), and we think its cos these drinks have flooded the market!