Abroad Chronicles: “What did you eat?”

One of the questions my people have been asking me about my abroad experience, which always surprises me, is “What did you eat?”. I sometimes found it surprising that people are so intrigued by food, but then I remember, my people love some good, seasoned eats. Not only that, food, for many cultures, is the center of community and life. So, I am learning it is a more natural question than I would have imagined. It is just funny when my family and friends ask in a concerned way as if I was overseas eating grass & beans (I don’t even like beans btw).

I’ll first answer that question by telling you what I did not eat. It wasn’t any burgers, hotdogs, excessive snacks, or anything else that I now realize is way too heavy to be processed on the regular. I ate 3 meals a day, breakfast by 8 a.m., lunch by 1 p.m., and dinner by 8 p.m. Most of those meals were home-cooked by my host mama or locally sourced at local restaurants. I drank more coffee in 33 days than I had in my entire lifetime. I did not go a day without a bottle of water. I basically ate how my “holistic, fantasy, future” self eats LOL!

The difference between eating in Costa Rica, in my experience, was the freshness of the things I ate. For the first time, I felt steadily nourished by the food I consumed. One of the consistent dishes I ate for breakfast was eggs and “Gallo Pinto”, which is Costa Rican rice and beans. Now as I mentioned earlier, I am not a beans girl, and I assure you I still am not. It’s just something about the “mush” that gives me the “push” if you know what I mean. But, me being the open-minded individual I am, I tried it anyway, and it was actually pretty darn good. “Gallo Pinto” is an everyday Tica dish that is prepared with this special salsa named “Lizano”. It has a vinegary twang to it that just reminds me of the South, so you know I had to bring a personal bottle back to the States right?

“Gallo Pinto” lasted me a good week until it caught up with me, and well let’s just say, do some research on the effects of foreign food on your stomach LOLLL. After that painful episode, I ate more eggs, toast, and fruit in the mornings. You cannot tell me the pineapples I got to experience in C.R. were not of GOD! Tea or water was always the liquid that washed it down.

On weekdays, I was responsible for my own lunch. On weekends, my lunch was made by my Host mom. During the weekdays, I was a regular at “Aroma y Sabor”, a restaurant that offered everything from sandwiches, pasta, coffee, desserts, pizzas, and more. It was not a time that I went there and left unsatisfied with my meal. I often got the “Wrap de pollo sin tocineta”, which is the chicken wrap, no bacon. I had the guilty pleasure of a tres leches cake more times than I’d like to admit. I always followed up with water, coffee, or “jugo naturales de pina” (pineapple juice/smoothie).

Dinner was always various. I enjoyed the fish and rice dinners the most, and I actually got to overcome the fear of eating from a fish with the head still intact. I must say, it was delightful. I honestly don’t recall my host mom frying any food either. I just noticed that most of my food was grilled or baked.

As someone who does not eat pork or beef, nor do I indulge in the beans, CHILEE, I thought I was gone be in C.R. starving. However, as told in the previous “How was it? blog, I was blessed with a gracious host mom who accommodated my needs to the best of her ability. There was even a moment during the weekend when she took me on a date with her and her mother to their favorite sushi spot, can you say HEARTWARMING? She made sure I was ALWAYS FULL. I sometimes hear her in the back of my head saying “Quieres mas?” (You want more?"), and it makes me smile.

The things I ate in Costa Rica undoubtedly put me on track for a lifestyle change, that I now know is very tangible from experience. As breakfast was always waiting on me in the mornings, I still wake up early in the mornings\attempting to put something light, yet fulfilling on my stomach. I am much more conscious of not overeating during meals.

Eating in Costa Rica was very fulfilling. I came back home and found that I had lost TEN POUNDS, a freshman 15 weight I’d been trying to lose for the past year. I had 3 healthy meals per day and was very active, which I’ll speak to in my next blog post by answering the big, “What did you study?”.