We see these black water birds all the time, everywhere we go in the Caribbean, and up until now, I never knew what the were. But now I do. They are Great-tailed Grackles. This one bird was just having so much fun splashing around in the wading pool. He was just begging for me to take a series of pictures of him. So I did. 🙂
And at the end, he was very proud of himself and was strutting his stuff.
Life is short. Have fun and play. Sometimes, you just have to make some splashes too.
As I mentioned before, We’re Home Again, while in Cozumel, we ate at a lot of the same restaurants as we have in the past. However there was one new one that we thoroughly enjoyed with our new friends whom we met at our resort. Our new friends, Maureen and Milosch(sp) are from Canada, and were literally staying 3 doors down from us at our resort. We became fast friends and ended up hanging out together for a good portion of the week. Someone Maureen met had recommended Guido’s, located in the downtown district of San Miguel, Cozumel. We were invited to go as well.
OMG!!!!!! Guido’s was FABULOSA! It is my new favorite restaurant on the island. It doesn’t look like much on the outside, but once you walk in, it is a completely different experience, especially when you sit outside in their beautiful patio.
Guido’s is a traditional Swiss-Italian restaurant that has been in Cozumel since 1978. We definitely felt like we were dining somewhere in Italy. Guido’s offers “daily specials of fresh fish, seafood platters and meats. Traditional Swiss-Italian cuisine, great tasting pizzas & lasagnas cooked in a well seasoned wood-fired oven and the homemade pastas” .
“There are no secrets to the success of Guido’s, just time tested restaurant qualities:
Consistently good food, pleasant atmosphere and great service.
Our consistency comes from an amazing kitchen staff which has been around for a long time. Yvonne’s dad Guido was a classically trained chef with an amazing curriculum by the time he opened the restaurant. Two of our current chefs learned their French culinary skills from Guido 40 years ago.”
In the evening, all the lights in the trees were brightly shining stars that just made for a perfect romantic ambiance. We were literally dining beneath the stars.
And the food!!!!!! OMG! Everything was fantastico! All four of us thoroughly enjoyed our dining experience at Guido’s. We started off with drinks, including one of their famous pitchers of Sangria.
Cesar was our waiter extraodinaire! He was so funny and friendly, with just enough of sarcasm and spunk thrown in to make the evening super fun.
Once the drinks came, we all shared some of Guido’s homemade garlic bread, baked in their wood fired oven, and some calamari marinara.
Larry ordered the house specialty, lasagna.
Milosch ordered the osso bucco.
And Maureen and I both ordered the chicken stuffed with spinach.
Everything was cooked to perfection. We all raved about the food and the restaurant in general.
We were celebrating Maureen’s birthday and Cesar came out with a beautiful, sparkling mango cake for the birthday girl, that he then lit on fire.
We all had such a fun evening. We will most definitely be going back to Guido’s the next time we are back in Cozumel, and again, and again after. Thank you for a fabulous evening and so much delicious food. Happy Birthday Maureen, and thank you for letting us come to your party. 🙂
Guido’s is located at Ave. Rafael E. Melgar #23 Between 6th & 8th Street | On the Waterfront. You can call ahead at+52 (987) 8692589 or make reservations online at info@guidoscozumel.com or just walk in. We were walk-ins and were treated like royalty.
Yesterday, March 13, “A Jeanne in the Kitchen” had a birthday. We are now 5 years old. There has been a lot of growth, expansion and evolving over the years, with lots more in store. Thank you for sharing the ride with me. I am looking forward to the next 5 and hopefully many more to come. None of this would be possible without all of you. So let’s celebrate together!!!!! 🙂
Cozumel and the rest of the Mexican Riviera have very deep Mayan roots. The Mayan culture is found all throughout the area in many different ways, from their art, to their architecture, and especially in their foods. Mayan foods are not the traditional Mexican foods we see everyday. They are steeped with tradition and history and are full of flavor.
We discovered a wonderful restaurant/cooking class/Mayan history lesson all wrapped up in one in Ix-Kool, located in the Royal Village Shopping Center, right across the street from the main cruise terminal. Ix-Kool blends together the Mayan traditions and heritage with memories and feelings of long ago. Ix-Kool represents life through ancient times. The name Ix-Kool itself, is Mayan and is loosely translated to mean fresh from the garden to the table.
The Ix-Kool experience was a one-of-a-kind, hands on experience. We learned how to make many of the traditional Mayan foods in the traditional ways that have been passed down through generations. We were indeed Mayan for the day.
We scheduled our class for 2:30 in the afternoon. The whole experience, from start to finish is about 2 hours. When we walked in, our table was already set up for us. Our very knowledgeable guide and instructor Juan, lead us through all the steps, complete with the Mayan history of the foods we were about to make.
Step one was to watch a short video of the history and traditions of the foods we were going to make. Before we started with the foods, Juan made us a special drink fit for the gods and the Mayan priests. The drink was made from ground cornmeal and cinnamon, honey and water. Before we could drink it we had to offer it up to the gods in prayer. It was very tasty and refreshing.
Then we made the traditional guacamole (which by the way is the exact way I have always made it too) and some Sikil P’aak, which is a sauce made with roasted tomatoes, habaneros, garlic and ground pepita seeds. Both dishes were made in a molcajeta, which is like a stone mortar and pestal.
The Sikil P’aak was served on freshly made tortillas, which was the next thing we learned how to make.
There are three types of traditional corn tortillas, all made from the same recipe, that are used in all the Mayan dishes. There are the tortillas, the panucho and the salbute.
The tortillas are made from corn that has been cooked for seven hours, then ground down and and mixed with water and a bit of ground limestone.
Then the dough or masa is made and is formed into small balls. The balls are pressed with a tortilla press and are carefully placed on a very hot grill to cook for just a few minutes. The process and the handling are key to making them turn out just right. You have to carefully place the tortillas on the grill. If you just flop them down, they will puff up with air and will be no good. Then you let them brown slightly, and flip them twice.
This is the recipe for the tortillas. To turn them into panuchos, while the tortillas are still on the grill, after the second flip, gently press with a spatula to make them rise up and puff with air, then immediately remove them from the grill and cut a small pocket at the edge, and fill with refried black beans, then gently press together.
To make the salbutes, take the tortilla and fry it in hot oil. Salbutes are very similar to the fried tostadas we all know and love. You can top them with anything you like.
There are three main spice flavorings that are used in all Mayan dishes, and they are all very similar, with only slight modifications for each. They are white or blanco reservado, red or roja reservado, and black or negro reservado. The white is made with green onions and was pre-Spanish. The red is made with red onions and ground achiote peppers, and the black is made from combining the two.
We also made some fresh ceviche with shrimp and octopus,
As the ceviche was “cooking”, we were shown how to make the lima soup. Ceviche is made from raw fish that is “cooked” in the lime juice. You can use any kind of fish you like, but the traditional Mayan way is to make it with shrimp and octopus. Mix everything together, and let “cook” or marinate for about 2-5 minutes, before serving.
Limas are fruit that are similar to limes, but are a bit larger and have more of a sour taste to them. They are green on the outside, with a hint of orange on the inside. They are grown exclusively in the Mayan Riviera. All Mayan recipes, as well as a lot of Mexican dishes, are made with a combination of limas, limons or sour oranges, again only grown in the Mexican Riviera.
Pork is also very prevalent in Mayan cooking. Many dishes have pork in them. Our next course was pork with beans.
This was followed by a plate of both salbutes and panuchos,
followed by some Mexican cornbread with shaved Gouda cheese, honey and coconut ice cream, because we just weren’t full enough. We shared this one. 🙂
The tradition of adding the shaved cheese was by accident, though the ancient Mayans thought of it as a gift from the gods. The cheese came from a Dutch shipwreck, and has been part of the Mayan tradition since the mid 1600’s.
We thoroughly enjoyed our Mayan cooking class, and highly recommend it to anyone interested in learning about the ancient traditions and history of the Mayan foods. Most definitely bring your appetite though! You will be eating and sampling a lot of different and very delicious foods. And by all means – PACE YOURSELF! It’s A LOT OF FOOD! As you can see, everything is always very fresh and healthy, but also very filling.
Ix-Kool is located at Royal Village Shopping Center, Av. Rafael E. Melgar Local 53, 77600 Q.R., Mexico. Their hours are from 12-10 PM, everyday except Sunday, though the hours are subject to change. Make reservations ahead of time. They will do a class for two, as they did with us, or for a large group. You can contact them either by phone +52 987 105 9793 or online at ix-kool.com. This is truly a unique, one-of-a-kind Mayan culinary experience, that you will love.
We arrived home late Saturday night. We had a good time, and did a lot of fun things, but the trip did not go as planned. I will do a short series of the fun things we did and saw.
I got sick with a very bad cold and was only able to dive for 3 days. Anyone who is a diver knows that diving with a bad cold, or even a slight cold, can be very damaging and causes a lot of problems. I did once, years ago in Fiji, and almost burst an eardrum. I was deaf in that ear for over a week. So, as much as I wanted to dive, I just couldn’t do it. It is much better to live to dive another day than to die diving for just one day.
This is Julio. We have been diving with Julio for about 14 years, and counting. He’s great. We highly recommend him to anyone, and have, on numerous occasions, regardless of their skill level. Julio will take very good care of everyone. DiveWithJulio.com
We stayed at the same resort we stayed at last time we were in Cozumel, 18 months ago, El Cid, and we dined at a lot of the same restaurants too. Cozumel is, after all, a small island, and when we go back repeatedly, there are only so many new things to find, though we did find some and enjoyed them all.
This is a beautiful map of some of the dive sites of Cozumel. We have dived all of the Western sites many, many times. The Eastern sites are in the open waters, that are not protected and very few dive operators will venture there. Larry and I dive enough that we would be fine, but I would definitely NOT recommend these rougher waters for beginners. In Fact, Cozumel in general, with it’s drift dives, can be very challenging for non-experienced divers too.
Even though I wasn’t able to dive as much as I had hoped, it is the tail end of eagle ray season, and we saw quite a few. They are gorgeous creatures. This is a mural. Our photos from underwater didn’t turn out that well.
Because I was not out diving, we did some of the activities at the resort, El Cid. We played BINGO a couple of times, though we didn’t win anything.
We also went to the Latin Festival, which featured a group of very talented young dancers, dancing to a variety of traditional Latin music or musica. Oh, to be young and fit again. I am a wee bit jealous. 🙂 All of these dancers were fantastico!
I will leave it here for now, but have no fear, I still have lots of very good things coming your way in the very near future.
I am catching up with all the necessary things we have to do once we return from our travels, plus I am still in the recovery phase of whatever nasty crud I caught on the island. I am also planning on the first of my two upcoming eye surgeries, one as early as this coming Friday, if they will still allow me to after being sick. So I may be sparsely posting for a bit. But don’t worry, everything will get back to normal again soon. 🙂 Until then, stay well and stay safe. ‘Til next time.
I remember back in the 70’s through the 90’s when baked potato skins were all the rage, and every restaurant had them. Then, they all but disappeared, and you couldn’t find them anywhere. They still are difficult to find in most restaurants. The only way to enjoy them is to cook them myself, and I LOVE baked potato skins.
We leave for Cozumel early, early tomorrow morning, so I am still using up whatever I have and am not going to the store for any reason until we return home. This means I use up whatever I have, get very creative with whatever I have, and make do however I can. Usually, it all works out just fine too. One of the things I had to “make do with” was some delicious loaded baked potato skins. Or darn! 🙂
Baked potato skins are easy to make, just time consuming, but well worth every minute, and every calorie. I made them as a side dish to go along with some steak we had down. as well as using up the last little bits of my cut up vegetables that I roasted.
I like my potato skins loaded with bacon, tomatoes, green onions, and yes, even melted cheese, and then topped with ranch dressing. Some people like sour cream with their potato skins, some like ranch like I do, some like bleu cheese (French spelling, the way it is spelled for bleu cheese) dressing, and some people like all of the above. Larry would be one who would load them up with all three. I am happy with just the ranch dressing, thank you.
Preheat the oven to 425* F or about 220*C.
Rinse and scrub the whole potatoes, then poke holes in them with a fork. Bake for about 40-45 minutes. Then remove from the oven, and turn the heat up to 450* F or 235* C. Allow the potatoes to cool slightly, then cut in half, and carefully scoop out the insides, leaving about 1/4 inch around the edges. Save the insides for a later use. I am going to freeze mine, then make some gnocchi and/or potato bread once I return home.
While the potatoes are cooking, cook your bacon and crumble it and cut up your tomatoes and green onions.
After the insides of the potatoes are scooped out, coat them, inside and out with olive oil. Then start layering them up with the cheese, bacon, tomatoes and green onions. I added more cheese on top too, to kind of hold everything in place. I sprinkled a dash of hot sauce on top of the potatoes, then placed them back in the hotter oven to continue to cook for an additional 10-15 minutes, or until the cheese was all melted and gooey.
Top them with your favorite topping and eat them up yum. (Old Dr. Demento reference, sorry. I couldn’t resist). 🙂
And with this, my fridge is cleaned out, and I am off. I will be off the grid, scuba diving all week. I will see you all again soon. In the meantime, stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.
The refrigerator is getting more and more empty with each passing day. This is a good thing. I think I will have it cleaned out pretty well before we leave at o dark thirty on Friday morning.
We finished off the Puerto Rican casserole Puerto Rican Casserole and I made a spinach salad with a lemon vinaigrette to go alongside it, so I also used up all my spinach too. WHOOOO HOOOOO!!!!! This salad was good as a side salad, but it would also be really good as a main salad with chicken, ahi tuna or shrimp added to it as well.
My salad had huge, delicious blackberries and pepita seeds. Larry is not a fan of either of those, so his salad had tomatoes and shredded Parmigiano cheese instead. Both salads were tossed with cooked green beans, diced red and yellow bell peppers, and both green and red onions and a refreshing lemon vinaigrette.
Lemon Vinaigrette
1/3 cup olive oil
2-3 TBSP lemon live oil, optional
3 TBSP lemon balsamic vinegar or white balsamic vinegar
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper or to taste
1 tsp fresh ground black pepper or to taste
Whisk everything together until well combined and serve. This dressing is good as both a salad dressing or as a marinade for either chicken or shrimp, or seafood. It’s light and refreshing and will be perfect for Spring and warmer weather.
It’s a good thing we had this salad last night rather than today. It snowed again, and snow is not exactly the best salad weather. I love salads, but when the weather is warm, NOT cold and frigid. 🙂
You will still hear from me again tomorrow, then I will be off, diving the beautiful turquoise waters of Cozumel for the next 8 days. Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.
We have two kinds of Mergansers that frequent our lakes. We have the Common Mergansers, who are less frequent visitors, and we have the Hooded Mergansers. Lately, I have been seeing quite a few Hooded Mergansers on a daily basis, just swimming around peacefully with all the Canadian Geese and Mallards. I have also been seeing more Common Mergansers than I have in years past too, but today, I am going to share some of my Hooded Mergansers with you.
Let’s all swim together and have a great day. 🙂
I am still in the process of going through the fridge, using up anything and everything I can before we leave for Cozumel. Last night, I have to say, the Queen and I were really in a conundrum. I/we kept pulling things out, and then putting them back in, then pulling something else out and putting it back in. This went on for about 10 minutes before I finally decided on what to make. Nothing was really speaking out to me. This is odd because usually I know exactly what I am going to make. Not this time.
I had some crab that I wanted to use, but I just wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with it. I finally decided on making some crab and cheese stuffed chicken pesto.
I wanted to use up as much as I could, but we just had shrimp pesto the other night when Elizabeth and Mike came over for dinner, so I was reluctant to have pesto again so soon after. But I had pasta that needed to be used, as well as little bits and pieces of vegetables. Using up these items would use up the most of what I had leftover, more so than some of the other ideas I was tossing around, so the pesto pasta won out.
First I flattened out out my chicken breast with the meat tenderizer, then added some jalapeno jack cheese and crab.
Then I carefully rolled it all together and dipped it in an egg wash and coated it with flour.
Next I seared it to give it a good crust, then finished cooking it in the oven.
While the chicken was cooking, I sauteed my vegetables, starting with my heartier vegetables first, then adding the softer ones later.
I served it all over pasta topped with pesto sauce.
Pesto is one of my favorite sauces. I could eat something with pesto all the time. Everything all worked out, and you would think I had this all planned out beforehand, but once again, I was just using up my leftovers.
We leave on Friday, and I still have a couple of things left in my fridge that we need to eat before we go. Can I do it? I think so. I love a good challenge. 🙂
Have a great day and make everyday great. Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.
We are gearing up to go diving again, which means we are literally cleaning out the fridge and throwing together whatever we have. As you all know, I am really creative when it comes to repurposing leftovers anyway, after all, my alter ego is The Queen of Leftovers, but I get even more creative when we are about to leave for a trip. When it’s time to leave, we want our refrigerator as empty as we can get it before leaving. We never know what we will be eating when this happens. It’s usually a hodge-podge of everything thrown together.
This quote sums this line of thought up perfectly, though we did pretty well last night. I turned some left over steak and olives into gyros with a mixture of Mediterranean salads to make a couscous salad. If you didn’t know better, you might think I planned out this meal ahead of time. 🙂
This is very true, especially when I am throwing things together. A lot of little bits of this and little bits of that add up quickly, and you definitely need a large pot to hold it all.
Refer back to the top. 🙂
These both refer back to what I said yesterday. Bananas Foster This is a motto I grew up with.
This is very true. We have this conversation on a daily basis.
Hope these help brighten your day and the start of your week. Have a great one.
Stay safe and stay well. ‘Til next time.
A Jeanne in the Kitchen 