A few weeks ago I told you I always touch ground with a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ chef, remember that? Well, her star rating hasn’t changed or anything but she’s not always the cook—chef’s need served too.

This weeks contender is a few of the meals we’ve enjoyed recently at various restaurants in and around Atenas, Alajuela Province de Costa Rica. Atenas means Athens, named after the capitol of Greece, the slogan for this city is: “The best climate in the world.” I bet you didn’t know the houses here, in a tropical country, just nine degrees from the equator, don’t even have air conditioning in them—neither did I! The average temperature here is 26 degrees Celsius year round. I know... I know... the entire world understands that unit of measurement except for those of us from the United States so I’ll dumb down this next sentence and wait until everyone’s on the same page: seventy. eight. point. eight. degrees. Fahrenheit—cool?

The cover image this week was taken at Numu, a sushi joint on the Pacific Coast where Erik said “today’s catch are lobster and red snapper. A lobster is taking me about five minutes to get and the snappers are taking about 15.” Well, there’s minimal seafood I won’t eat—lobster is one of them!

Red snapper caught 15 minutes ago, baked potato topped with onion, herbs and garlic, a side salad with lemon and a balsamic reduction for even more flavor—welcome to #foodfightfriday, my favorite Friday of the week! 👍🏿

Regardless of where we are or the restaurant we’re at and, regardless of language barriers or eating habits, two things remain consistent:

1. I’m sitting across the table from a 10.
2. She’ll have the salmon.

Medium cooked salmon topped with cilantro and a garlic lime sauce served with herbed steamed rice, fresh green beans and a side tomato and cucumber salad.

This next meal is from Loveat Restaurant in the hills of San Ramon de Alajuela Province, a Mediterranean joint, approximately 1,000 meters above sea level aka thirty. five. hundred. feet. for all of my fellow Numbericans on the #blockchain this evening. 👊

Everywhere there’s a bridge, there’s a river or a stream en route to Fortuna, along Calle 35 and, regardless if there’s a bridge or not, it’s going to be green and it’s going to be thick.

You’ll be driving along Calle 35 with nothing but rain forest on either side of the road and, every once in awhile, you’ll be overwhelmed with the scent of pineapple. You know you’re close when you smell it. It’ll only be a few more metros and you’ll have pineapple on one side of the road and corn on the other for as far as you can see. Another metro, you’re back in the rain forest, destination: Arenal Volcano, an active volcano in San Carlos, Provincial de Alajuela, about noventa kilometers outside San Jose, Costa Rica.

I took this next picture of the volcano with the pole-top disconnects (left side) in it intentionally for @jlsplatts. I showed him on discord and he corrected me. Those aren’t pole-top disconnects at all, they’re regulators, I should’ve asked a lineman first. Arenol:

As I was saying, Loveat Cafe, a Mediterranean restaurant about 1,000 meters above sea level in the middle of the rain forest. When you see a dummy zip-lining across the road on your left, the destination’s on the right.

Remember last week, when I told you I’m a falafel connoisseur? Well, you’ll never guess what they had on the menu. 😉

Falafel and hummus with a side of pita bread and a cucumber salad. Also, are four mini salads: carrot, eggplant, beat and tomato. Pura Vida can’t have falafel right now because of her restrictive diet, when she asked me how the falafel was, I said “ehh, not bad I guess, you probably would’ve hated it.” It was either that or “oh my goodness gracious! The only place with better falafel is HipPea and just barely, this falafel is delicious!”

Alright, this next picture is taken about two weeks after we landed in Costa Rica. We just got our new (new to us) vehicle and it was spotless, shiny clean. The restaurant was down a dirt, gravel road, perfect! We got the truck filthy dirty in the first hour of owning it. They even armor-all shined the tires for us, that didn’t last long at all.

At this point, I hadn’t been eating very well and not very often, either, I was running out of gas. I decided to give eggs another shot because I thought I needed something other than a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and water—that didn’t last either! About a week later I tried eggs again, I couldn’t do it, I’d rather think I’m out of gas!

Quiche made with eggs, spinach, onions, several different kinds of peppers, several different kinds of onions, too, I don’t remember all of them now. 🤔 I think it had cauliflower, broccoli and I’m probably leaving out some ingredients. It came with a strawberry and banana salad, two pieces of toast and peanut butter.

The fifth and final restaurant on the menu this evening is Organico Fortuna, an all natural #vegan and #vegetarian accommodating restaurant in La Fortuna.

Ok :confession: I didn’t take any pictures of the meals we enjoyed at Organico Fortuna but I think you’ll understand after I explain myself. First, our meals were delicious! Second, they had a professional photographer there the same time we were, he was taking pictures of perfectly plated meals. So, I took pictures of him taking pictures and forgot to take pictures of our own meals—I hope you don’t mind!

I’m pretty sure @puravidaville is also using those last two images for her contender this week, she’s tough to keep up with! Did you see the article she released on Wednesday?! I’m the luckiest guy I know. But, even she didn’t get a picture of the bright red, custom Toyota Land Cruiser with a shortened truck bed turned into a tow truck. Notice it’s nose to nose with the truck parked in front of it? That’s just how roads/parking/driving works here in Costa Rica—Pura Vida!

Same place next week deeeee... Waaaiit—cut! Wait a minute, time out—are you ready for the twist? Not twist like a Cinnabon or donut or any type of dessert at all, twist like Martin Scorsese and The Departed or Andrew Jarecki and All Good Things.

Alright :confession: I just really like both of those movies and my twist is nothing like theirs but, either way, it is a twist! Are you ready? Meal #2, the salmon and meal #4, the quiche, neither meal was prepared or eaten at a restaurant. That dirt road I was talking about is the route to our current location and the quiche was from a different place we were staying at a few weeks ago is Santa Ana, pronounced “Santana,” Alajuela Provincia de Costa Rica. “I always touch ground with a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ chef.”

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