Breakfast in Guatemala

I was daydreaming about early morning chapin nosh as I walked along the river towards the pier today.

Desayuno (breakfast) really is the best meal of the day over there. It typically includes huevos revueltos (scrambled eggs, often with chopped onions and tomato), pan frances ('French bread', actually tasty little pastie-shaped white rolls), plátano frito (fried plantain) and frijoles volteados (a thick, dry, dough-like serving of black bean paste).

Guatemalans eat a lot of fruit at breakfast times (as well as most other times). In the market in Antigua the papayas on sale are the size of giant marrows. The fewer the pips, and the smaller the diameter of the core they reside in, the better the papaya. This fruit (along with mango) contains enzymes which are especially good for the digestion and can also aid weight reduction, though the altitude over there speeds up your metabolism anyway.

Where we live in Antigua you generally have to get up around 6am if you want to get hold of fresh franceses before they sell out.

Many heat up their huevos with chiltepes, little green turbo-chillies that are split open and sprinkled over the plate. Other common accompaniments are requesón (rather like ricotta) and thick sour crema (cream).

Aguacates (avocado) like frijoles, are likely to be eaten at any time of the day in Antigua. The locals are known by the rest of their compatriots as panza verde (green stomachs) as a result.

The best plate of frijoles volteados I ever experienced (there was more to it than just taste you see) was served to me by a grey-haired waiter wearing a starched white linen jerkin in the dining room of the wonderfully wooden Hotel del Norte in Puerto Barrios, the main port on Guatemala's concise Caribbean coast.

Visitors to Antigua that have to pay for their own breakfasts are best advised to try out either Doña Luisa Xicotencatl or Café Condesa on the main square. Both are situated in charming old colonial mansions.

Doña Luisa's is one of the most well-known and well-frequented hanging-out spots in Antigua. Café Condesa has never been one of V's favourites though- she objects to the headphones that the waiters wear and the the over-elaborate nature of the "delectables". But just beside the main entrance on the parque you'll find Condesa Express which serves gourmet coffee grown locally by Goya; possibly the best cup of espresso coffee you will drink anywhere in the world, and a suitable antidote to the kind of caffeinated beverage you are likely to drink in Guatemala if you are not one of those people that pays for their breakfasts!