Another Week Another Food Fight Friday!

Hola Triple F Freaks!

So we landed in La Fortuna earlier this week. It’s a small town smack dab in the center of Costa Rica right at the base of a massive inactive volcano. I don’t know if you’ve ever laid your eyes on a volcano but they are stunning. I unfortunately booked our reservation a couple days late and the container (yep, I said container) that we are staying in is the one facing the garden rather than the volcano, like I wanted. Those shootuupid, severely nice, always smiling and waving Canadian neighbors got it first and we are left looking at a river with colorful stupid birds, chameleons blending in everywhere and wonderfully annoying perfectly orchestrated butterfly dances choreographed to the heavenly sound of bird chirps- it sucks!

Now we are in a “garden view” container for a week with NO volcano view… 👎. Whatevs… did I mention we are staying in a shipping container? Yep, the same shipping container your shoes very likely came in on, or your clothes, or your electronics, your tools, cars, maybe even your neighbors… it’s pretty rad though. The entire thing is done very nice with this strange but cool “rock looking” like cement finish and a full kitchen. It’s all brand new too. I like that :) The air conditioner works like a freezer and although it’s been raining since we got here the air conditioner is still quite necessary.

Our first night in we were starved from our 4.5 hour drive so we popped into a little cafe to grab dinner before we headed to a store for grocery items. I have a real problem with hitting grocery stores hungry and walking out with a bunch of crap that tastes good going down but is laced with broken dreams and guilty tears as you try and button your pants the next day.

I asked the server about the fajitas (all in Spanish so you can imagine the things that get lost in translation. My Spanish is still quite subpar) and if they could make a vegetarian version of them without cheese and sour cream. He was happy to oblige like they’ve done it before and offered me a cold beer with it. I don’t drink alcohol so I kindly attempted to stay with my more than adequate ice water but he insisted I get something saying “Es incluye”. All right then I’ll party, “quiero un coca cero, por favor”.

While waiting for our food Dandays and I just tripped out on all of the people eating with us that were tourists. I mean, everyone in this town is a tourist. I dig it though, the more tourists the nicer the locals are and I much prefer nice locals over the total turds we just experienced in Golfito!

Check this king sized fajita plate out… 4 corn tortillas, 3 large patacones, sautéed vegetables, refried black beans, fresh guacamole, some salsa and fried yuca… dude, my plate was massive and made Dandays plate look like a sissy in comparison.

I don’t know why they gave me so much food but after the initial introduction to my meal I got busy on those fajitas. Would you believe me if I told you I ate all 4 fajitas? To be fair I only ate half a patacone, tried to pawn off another one on Dandays but he stole my yuca instead and only ate half the black beans. Still, I think I put it down like a champ. When the bill came I was shocked to discover I actually ordered for two (it was probably meant to be a shared dish) and although I’m only eating for one it seems I’ve been practicing the skill of eating for two for most the weekend, or at least that’s what the buttons on my pants are telling me 🤦🏼‍♀️.

I probably should have taken some to go in hind sight but apparently I walk around eating shareable, twenty dollar, drink included plates like it’s nothing now.

Anyway, day two we woke up and I went for a morning jog. My friend @plantstoplanks is always bragging about her training sessions, hitting the pavement, and one of her last posts finally lit a fire under my booty. In Jaco I was jogging on the beach but here I mainly stick to around the center of town. I was able to locate all of the restaurants I wanted to eat at, the bakeries I’d get my baguettes from and the coffee joints I’d hit up later that day. Jogging in La Fortuna equals “success”!!

Dandays, of course, locates the gym every time we enter a new town. We tried working out together one time but it wasn’t that much fun. We both much prefer our own personal workout regimens being just that, personal!

Once we were all showered we jumped on our bikes and headed to wherever the day was going to bring us.

What??? Don Juan Coffee and Chocolate Tour you say? Bring it!!

We stumbled upon this chocolate and coffee plantation giving tours and decided to join in the fun. Seriously, how does anyone pass up mid morning coffee and chocolate?

Rather than seeing coffee rain and chocolate rivers first thing, we are immediately confronted with banana piñatas (not really a piñata but you catch me drift). First thought was “I didn’t have breakfast this morning, maybe I should devour two of these before I get all strung out on coffee” … I’m glad I resisted because as the tour began their purpose was immediately revealed and they aren’t just there because they knew I’d be showing today.

Apparently the bananas, among other fruit trees, attract mosquitoes and the mosquitoes are the actual preferred method of pollination when it comes to cocoa…

I, myself, didn’t think mosquitoes had ANY redeeming qualities but I guess there’s the reason Noah put two of those suckers on the boat instead of smacking them 🤷🏼‍♀️.

These are the cocoa pods that grow on the trees. Some are purple and others are green. Both are considered to produce the drink of the Gods though… (hot chocolate).

Apparently those pollinating mosquitoes don’t bite people… Look at how convinced I am…

Our guide cut open one of those pods and had us suck on the garlic clove looking center. It was sweet, not bad at all.

He went through and in detail explained the very tedious process of growing and then preparing cocoa beans so we can all make and devour our delicious chocolate desserts 😋.

Super informative and very cool but I was primarily interested in the part where we got to taste the chocolate…

With freshly ground cocoa and other ingredients laid before us he surprised me and said “now you get to make your own chocolate”.

Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! I think I died and went to orgasmic chocolate heaven…

I immediately added a little cinnamon, some sea salt, a pinch of cayenne because “why not”, sugar, Dandays made me add powdered milk, and our guide came over with the vanilla to finish it off.

After working it with my hands I determined we needed to add a little bit more of everything… now I have a very fresh homemade piece of cayenne spicy chocolate sitting in our fridge 🤷🏼‍♀️…

I know, I know, it looks more like a turd in a bag than chocolate but it wasn’t bad, I swear. Did y’all catch that mini person size shot of hot chocolate Goddess nectar though?

So good 😋.

We finally got to the tasting part and look at everyone sitting patiently to politely try the chocolate for themselves…

… not me, I quickly jumped to the opposing side of the table and waited for the guide to say “GO”. Haha… just kidding but I definitely wasn’t bashful. Chocolate is my spirit animal 🤡.

Once done teasing my taste buds with a little sugar we headed over to check out the coffee deal… I’ll let Dandays cover that.

When all was said and done it was time to eat some real food. I saw a chipotle in town on my jog so we headed there. Again, I ordered the vegetarian tacos without cheese and sour cream. This is what they brought me…

Apparently they celebrate St. Patrick’s day in May around here… the tortillas could’ve been rainbow colored but they were still delicious.

@dandays and I were still rip roaring and ready to go do some more adventurous stuff after lunch. We jumped in our car and headed to what is known as “the hanging bridge”.

My grandma even face timed me right before walking across this thing. She had missed 4 of my FaceTime calls the night prior so I had to quickly answer her. She got to see the crazy view for herself.

Walking through the jungle is so peaceful. I didn’t even mind those large rain drops that would fall right in my eyelashes. Everything seems brighter out there, the birds sing louder, the air is crisper, it’s a magical place this planet in which we inhabit.

The entire day made us hungry for some real traditional Costa Rican comfort food. After getting back into town we settled on a cute Soda called Soda Visquez. This would actually be our first real Soda eating experience. To my surprise they had quite a few vegetarian things on the menu and I couldn’t resist the sound of a good Sammie so there it is…

A traditional Costa Rican vegetarian Casado vegetarian sandwich. Yum, yum, yum. It had avocado so no sharing with Dandays but we did pretty good on sharing the fries :)

Thanks for hanging out with me today you @foodfightfriday booger flickers. Hope to see y’all in the ring with me.

Special shoutout to @weirdheadaches… “where’s your Food Fight Foo? You can’t go missing two weeks in a row now” :).

Catch y’all later, Pura Vida ✌️