Sibinal and Its Food

During our time in San Marcos, we stayed in Sibinal, a small town where I don't think they see many gringos. Our girls were rockstars walking around. There are two restaurants in town that had been previously "approved" by the tourism industry for health standards and such, so that's where it was recommended we eat during our stay.

A typical Guatemalan breakfast often consists of eggs, refried black beans, fried plantains, tortillas, and sometimes crema to go with it all. You can find that breakfast everywhere throughout the country. Lunch and dinner are similar, but maybe use chicken or beef in place of the eggs.

Most small restaurants or small eateries don't have menus. Usually they will have a "menu of the day" posted on the wall. That's the extent of what's available and it's usually a short list.

In four days in Sibinal we went to the same restaurant six times, usually for breakfast and dinner.

And this is what we got. Every. Single. Time.

Usually this was served with coffee in the morning (very sweet watered down weak coffee) or in the evenings hot chocolate. I have to admit I got used to this food. I never understood why plantains and refried beans went together, (like in the rellenitos I wrote about here). And I often skip the tortillas. But after several days of this plate, I got to really liking the eggs and beans and plaintains all mixed up and scooped into a tortilla. Maybe I'm becoming a chapine (Guatemalan or Guatemateca).

Michael wasn't feeling well on this trip (we think it was beef we ate here in the city), so he usually just ate bread for breakfast, or in this picture, chicken soup.

Oh, side note: I should say regarding our vegetarianism that we've eaten more meat in the last couple months than in the last five years combined. Besides eating a lot of beans and tortillas, being vegetarian here is difficult when eating out. I still don't buy meat or cook with it in my home, but we eat it fairly often when we are out, especially because many people prepare us food and it's usually meat-centered.

The one day we ventured to the other "approved" restaurant I decided to venture out and order the fish. I was excited for something other than eggs! And this is what I got:

I have to admit I was momentarily thrown off by the fish head and fins, but I decided to dig right in. (I had to remember how to tear fish meat off bones). It was amazingly tasty and the only fault was it only had about five bites of meat on the bones.

One of the main purposes of this trip was to take one of our new one-year young adult staff to his host family's home in Sibinal. Here's the back yard of their house:

This family has cats, dogs, pigs, ducks, geese, chickens and roosters walking all over the place. They also have a fish pond in their back yard connected to the river where they raise fish to sell.

Peering at the fish.

The host parents. All the children were gone as well as our staff member, but we posed for a picture anyway.

Throughout our drive to Sibinal, and here in Sibinal, we could hear marching bands playing everywhere, practicing and marching. It's impressive that many of these schools have simple, basic supplies yet have a priority for music and instruments. Here the band is marching in the rain downtown.

The hotel we stayed at had super hot showers with great water pressure, lots of warm blankets, and even a television, all for about $8/person. Not a bad deal!

Sibinal was an interesting town. It was great to see some of the work MCC is doing here in the department of San Marcos. We look forward to our next visit.