Costa Rica is house to one of many world’s Blue Zones, the place folks stay longer and more healthy lives than common. I am from a small city within the area of Cartago, known as Llano Grande, which is understood for its wealthy agriculture.
As a cookbook creator and cooking instructor who was born and raised right here, I’ve all the time felt that our food plan and “pura vida” way of life is our secret to longevity.
To Costa Ricans, what we eat is simply as necessary because the expertise within the kitchen and across the desk. We deeply worth the group that comes with cooking. Rising up, I all the time helped my household put together our meals, and even harvested a few of the elements.
Lunches and dinners all the time lasted for not less than an hour, and it was our time to speak about our day. This sort of aware, collective method to meals is one thing I like to share with the scholars who take my cooking courses. It’s not nearly the meals we eat, however the connections that occur round it.
What Costa Ricans eat to stay longer and happier lives
One of the best ways to explain Costa Rican delicacies is straightforward and recent. Our food plan depends extremely on staples like recent greens, fruits, grains, and beans.
Listed here are a few of the meals that I cook dinner and eat day by day to really feel more healthy and happier in the long term.
1. Beans
Beans are an amazing supply of protein, fiber, complicated carbohydrates, prebiotics, nutritional vitamins and minerals. They’ve been linked to lowered danger of power ailments like coronary heart illness and diabetes.
Black and pink beans are the most well-liked, often served as a part of a casado (our conventional dish of rice, beans, veggies and protein) or as a soup consisting of beans and greens.
Chickpeas and lentils are well-liked right here and can be utilized as an alternative to the standard black beans.
2. Contemporary fruit and greens
Fruit and greens in Costa Rica are typically eaten recent, not out of a can or a freezer. We sometimes get our fruits and veggies from native markets known as verdulerias.
Among the commonest ones in our food plan are papaya, mango, banana, watermelon, pineapple and fervour fruit, and they’re both eaten on their very own or made into drinks and juices.
We use a wide range of greens in Costa Rican cooking, together with potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, avocado, onion, beets, yucca and zucchini. Veggies are both eaten uncooked, in easy salads dressed with lime, or ready as picadillo, chopped and boiled, sometimes with some animal protein blended in for taste.
Picadillo de chayote might be my favourite. Chayote is a kind of squash that’s native to Central and South America, and never quite common in the USA. It’s inexperienced and crisp, and it tastes much like a jicama.
3. Rice and corn
Grains like rice and corn are current in our food plan, however primarily as a complement to the beans and greens that we eat.
For example, the tortillas are used to eat the picadillo in what we name “gallos.” Arroz con pollo is a standard Costa Rican dish consisting of rice, quite a lot of chopped greens and completely different items of hen.
This meal is a very talked-about at celebrations like birthdays, however it is usually very generally loved daily.
4. Espresso
Costa Rican espresso is understood for being excessive in antioxidants, which might assist scale back irritation. Sugary drinks are typically not an enormous a part of the coffee-drinking tradition.
Espresso right here is loved black or with a little bit of milk. And as a lot as another meal, a cup is greatest loved slowly — we do take our time to drink.
My favourite Costa Rican longevity recipe
We eat rice and beans, both black or pink, two to 3 occasions a day. For lunch this meal is named casado. For breakfast, it’s known as gallo pinto and consists of rice and beans blended with onions, peppers, and cilantro, accompanied with corn tortillas and low.
Because of its mixture of entire grains, protein, amino acids and antioxidants, longevity researcher and Blue Zones founder Dan Buettner considers gallo pinto to be the healthiest breakfast on the planet. It’s superb how such a easy dish will be filled with so many well being advantages.
Right here is my recipe for Gallo Pinto, so you may make it at house.
Right here is an instance of my favourite Costa Rican breakfast, Gallo Pinto.
Picture: Melissa Guzman
Elements:
- 2/3 cup of cooked black beans
- 1 1/4 cup of cooked rice
- 2 tablespoons chopped onion
- 2 tablespoons chopped pepper
- 2 tablespoons minced cilantro
- 1/2 teaspoon salsa lizano (non-compulsory)
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin
- 1/4 teaspoon pepper
Steps:
- Warmth up a pan over medium-high warmth, add olive oil, and let it get scorching
- Add onions, peppers, cilantro, garlic, cumin, salt, and pepper
- Cook dinner for 3 to 5 minutes till the onion is translucent
- Combine within the beans, stir, and scale back warmth to medium
- Add the lizano sauce, stir, and cook dinner for 5 extra minutes
- Add the rice, stir, and cook dinner for a number of extra minutes, to include all of the flavors within the rice
To my thoughts, the recipe for why we stay longer, more healthy, and happier lives in Costa Rica is an easy one: Contemporary elements which are ready with care and meals which are deliberately loved and shared with family members.
Melissa Guzman is a Costa Rican cookbook creator and cooking instructor from Llano Grande, Costa Rica. She is the creator of “Residing Longer, More healthy, and Happier: Recipes from Costa Rica.” Observe Melissa on Instagram @recipesfromcostarica.
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