Street Food - San Ignacio, Belize

Don't let fine dining fool you, the best food comes from the streets. In San Ignacio, some of the best food comes from an avenue; Burns Avenue, to be exact. Here on Burns, carts and tables and stalls burn throughout the day and into the night, furnishing affordable food for the frugal and enough grease to feed every guilty pleasure.

I've spent a lot of time wondering what makes street food superior to half the things legitimate establishments sell, and after trying almost everything Burns Avenue has to offer, I think I'm onto something. 

For starters, street food is usually fresh. Most things are made to order, and they haven't spent their day under a heat lamp. Few things are fresher than unrefrigerated, naturally-ripened fruit. On a converging corner of Burns, you'll find all sorts of dealers with dime-bags of sliced Papaya, Pineapple, and Plums. The papaya and pineapple are just dripping with sweet, juicy nectar, and the regular plums are sour, sinewy spears. Just steer clear of the sliced plums with salt unless you have shot of tequila waiting. They're laced with an entire shaker of the powdery white stuff.

Another great thing about street food is that it's always cheap. In case you accidentally ate the plums, a 50-cent cup of Horchata, a sweet, rice-based beverage, will wash the salt away.

Street food is always the quickest meal you can get. I love me some dime-bag fruit, but I need the hard stuff when it's time to eat a real meal. I can always hit up my man Nelson's cart for a quick fix after 6.

After downing consecutive Panty Rippers until the sun goes down, you can't help but relish an instant Hot Dog with the works. Frankly, it's just a frank from a bag, but the sauteed peppers and onion with an Austrian flag of condiments are a game-changer.

The best thing about street food is the grease. And what's better than grease? More grease! The Beef Tacos taste just like the Pork Tacos, because they're all cooked in the same fatty pan. The corn tortillas are heated and fried right in the meat grease too. All that flavor will stop your heart...and all that grease will stop your arteries.

No local grease is complete without a few drops of Marie Sharp's Habanero Hot Sauce. Bottled as one of few national products of Belize, the habanero is a sharp burn and a slow death, but probably one of the better ways to go.

Marie Sharp's isn't the only happiness in a bottle. Belikin is the local beer here, Central America's Bud Light, borrowed from the nice neighbors in Guatemala. This beer-for-a-couple-bucks is sold in every corner store and pairs perfectly with tacos.

There you have it, all the reasons to go to town on all the tidbits they sell on the streets. Your food is swiftly made-to-order, with enough grease to keep you full for days. It goes well before, after, or with any beer, and it's a sweet way to start, middle, or end your day.

Speaking of sweet, a single US dollar will buy you a small scoop of a sweet ending if you're willing to pay. And there is no ending sweeter than Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream... Except the Sweet Corn.

Martha's Kitchen - San Ignacio, Belize

I'm not an alcoholic, and The Nile isn't just a river in Egypt. But I didn't go to Egypt, I went to Martha's Kitchen, where danger exists in liquid form. 

You can't have just one of these tropics-in-a-glass with fresh-squeezed pineapple juice and coconut rum, appropriately named the Panty Ripper.

Rum Punch sounded like a safer bet, but all those sweet juices mask the alcohol content in this gigantic fishbowl of a glass. For those who want to keep their panties on, allow me to recommend the fresh-squeeezed Lime Juice.

When you're done with panty-ripping, you can move on to the meat. But you don't need alcohol to appreciate the size of those Beef Kabobs with grilled pineapple.

Just try not to make any decisions you'll regret. The Garnaches aren't the most exciting of options, but no one ever regretted waking up next to fried tortillas with refried beans, onion, cabbage, and cheese.

If you want something to get excited about, go for the Tacos Pibil. Braised pork drips juice into a thick, out-of-this-world, homemade corn tortilla. I've always been by-the-rules when sober, but I just might try to smuggle some tortillas home.

As if a drink called the Panty Ripper wasn't scandalous enough, the Chaya Tamales made me go off the deep end, eliciting a reaction not suitable for...anyone. The Jon-Snow-bastard-child of spinach and kale set in the softest cornmeal, you know nothing...until you've tried the chaya.

In case you haven't had enough chaya, the Chaya Dinner is a simple sautee with onion, pepper, and mozzarella cheese. Don't bother if you already tried the tamales.

Only four days in San Ignacio, and three of them were spent eating dinner at Martha's. I don't know what kind of crack they put in that Panty Ripper, but there's no denying I'm hooked.

Ko-Ox Han-nah - San Ignacio, Belize

I came to Belize looking for an adventure beyond my wildest dreams, and Actun Tunichil Muknal (ATM) was the cave for the job. Packed with sacrificial pottery and a human skeleton that required wading through rushing waters to reach made this particular cave a little more precarious. 

The spelunking starts with a swim into the mouth of the cave, and let's just say the S in my B.S. didn't stand for swimming. Then you squeeze your head into a decapitating gap between two rock formations, which I wouldn't have gotten through without a giant Iced Coffee. This brewed blend of coffee with honey and vanilla ice cream was the Daenerys Targaryen of Starbucks Frappuccino - the beans remained unburnt.

I loved the concept of the cave tour, just like I loved the concept of Ko-Ox-Han-Nah. Described by locals as one of the best experiences in San Ignacio, both places came highly recommended. Unfortunately, reality didn't live up to expectation. 

I had expected ATM to be a warm cavern of wonders, steamy as the Breakfast Burrito. Unfortunately, the burrito was about as interesting as the cave was warm - the runny refried beans with scrambled eggs and shredded cheese were a great combination but not exactly inspiring wonder.

ATM was indeed a cave of wonders, but we could have done without our loquacious guide . As much as we love a tour with a personal touch, there were more words pouring from his mouth than there was sauce dripping from the BBQ Lamb Ribs. The farm-fresh lamb was as authentic as the carafes that once held offerings to the gods, but the lamb was smothered by too much sauce, and our quiet time in the cave was smothered by a guide who repeated everything he said at least three times while we waited to die of hypothermia and old age.

I thought it wouldn't get any worse, but when we finally got to the Crystal Maiden, highlight of the cave, we were treated to a 20-minute soliloquy about his entire career, a speech as dry as the Rice and Beans with Stew Chicken. But we can always throw away rice and beans...

Lauded by locals and Lonely Planet alike, it was impossible not to be blown away by ATM. Given all the praise I heard about Ko-Ox-Han-Nah, it was impossible not to be disappointed. Ko-Ox-Han-Nah is Mayan for "let's go eat", and I for one will be ko-ox-han-nah-ing elsewhere.

Pop's - San Ignacio, Belize

It's hard to get out of bed knowing your day will be in ruins. Which is why we slept until noon and got the latest start we possibly could. Fortunately, we had breakfast at Pop's to prepare us.

It takes a lot of energy to hike up the nearly-vertical hill to Cahal Pech, and a big plate of Hash Browns was what the doctor ordered. Not worth writing a postcard home about, but they did give us our carb fix for all that climbing.

The carbs lasted for all of Cahal Pech, but we needed the Chaya Pockets as a pre-Xunantunich power-up. Tortillas tucked with sauteed kale-meets-spinach, scrambled eggs and cheese, these protein pockets have even more character than El Castillo. 

By the time you actually get to El Castillo after a one-mile trek, you'll inevitably look up and think that you just can't bring yourself to mount another set of high, uneven stairs. That's when the Fried Jacks give you some juice. Impossibly fluffy pockets of puffy fried pastry-dough with an almost mochi-esque texture, these are easily the least ruinous things in Belize. 

We packed a full day of ruins into an abbreviated afternoon despite a sluggish start - the brilliance of the Mayans was just too good to miss. And although nothing could have taken away our sense of awe as we sat on the stone throne at Cahal Pech and gazed up at the friezes of El Castillo, it was our breakfast at Pop's that prevented us from passing out before we got there.

Fuego - San Ignacio, Belize

After the lunch we had at Eva's we were as desperate for a quiet dinner as a girl in the bathroom line after three beers at the bar. Fortunately, the owner of our hotel understood our need to go a little gringa for the night and pointed us toward Fuego, a tasteful, modern place overlooking the well-lit center of town.

If nothing else, the cocktails relaxed us enough to at least laugh at some of the creepy catcalls we heard on the way there. I tried my first Michelado, which is basically a beer in sea water with a hint of spice. It was definitely well-made, but all it did was make me more thirsty. The Kiwi Lime Mint Mojito made for a pretty good thirst quencher, though. The sweet took away the salty and the sour washed the seawater down.

We knew our experience at Fuego would be different the minute we tasted the ripe Roasted Plantains. The plantains were soft and sweet, covered in a crazy creme fraiche-y sour cream.

The same sauce did well as a dip for the crunchy Cassava Fries, and we marveled at the fact that we had yet to get a single catcall and could actually hear ourselves speak.

The Pibil Tacos were a taste of simple street food minus the side of street trash we encountered that morning. Dripping with savory shredded-pork juice, topped with a sprinkle of red onions and cheese, these three tasty tacos were messy yet marvelous. 

Belizean meals are undoubtedly delicious, but all those carbs were making us covet the cows. And not just because no one catcalls a cow. Fresh greens are hard to come by, and we were begging for some bunny food. I didn't expect much from the Lamb and Apple Salad, but it ended up being one of the better salads I've eaten. The crusted-sugar glaze on the lamb cruised well with crisp fall apples and sweet red watermelon.

After all that, we were still hungry for an extra taste of Belize so we got the Fettuccini with Chicken and Tomato Cream Sauce to go. Even the microwave couldn't zap the flavor out of the tender dark meat and creamy sauce with a touch of tomato. The noodles were so al dente they even reheated that way. Not exactly a homage to authenticity, but we'd already had enough culture for the day.

To be fair, Fuego had it easy. It was impossible not to exceed our expectations after Eva's, but despite clearly catering to tourists, the food was still fairly fun, and I can't say anything less than fabulous about Fuego. 

Eva's - San Ignacio, Belize

We finally arrived in San Ignacio after a couple neck-cricking red-eye flights, and we were starving. We picked a promising place called Eva's, but the peaceful lunch we envisioned went south pretty quickly thanks to some local men who walked over after we sat down. I was really hoping we wouldn't start this trip on the wrong foot so I guess I was hoping those men didn't have feet. 

All that flying made us pretty thirsty so we started with some Fruit Juice. The pineapple was a sweet sip of the tropics, and the papaya was the nectar of the Mayan gods.

We had barely taken a sip of our juice before the men at the next table started trying to talk to us. "You're so pretty." "Are you sisters?" We ignored them and figured it was just part of the local flavor.  

Then we decided to try some local flavor we could actually enjoy. The Escabeche, a chicken stew loaded with onions, was a salt n' vinegar potato chip in liquid form, not a far cry from Chinese hot and sour soup, minus the hot. I loved the flavor of the soup, but the large amount of practically-raw onion wasn't all that edible.

Every meal in Central America should include Rice and Beans with Stew Chicken. The rice had beans mixed in and had a nice touch of flavor. The chicken had a decent stew on the outside, but the inside was about as tasteless as the leering men who kept up their commentary throughout our entire meal. "I want a Chinese girl. I like Chinese girls" was about as gross as the mayonnaise-soup potato salad. I usually love plantains, but the little slice on this plate was about as ripe as those men were mature.

So I finally made it to San Ignacio, and after Day #1, I can only hope a chant from my childhood gym class rings true for the rest of my stay; "First is the worst, second is the best..." Now that we've seen Belize's trash, I wouldn't mind seeing some of its treasure.