Help me plan my Costa Rican trip

[chef koo]

I have a friend who recently moved down to Costa Rica. She's working at a restaurant as a waitress to pay the bills. Although I'm sure it's a fine establishment, it's pretty mainstream. Crab cakes, ahi tuna, stir frys or what they call "woks", that kind of thing. I want to get into the heart of things. But I have no clue about Costa Rican food. What some quint essential things that a Costa Rican diet consists of. And where would you go to get the best of each of these?

This is the place my friend is working

seasidediner.net

[justDeb]

Costa Rican food is very plain. Typical Costa Rican food is not spicy and doesn't really have a lot of flavor. The most typical dish is casado which is a plate consisting of rice, beans, salad, usually a fried plantain and your choice of meat (a piece of chicken, pork, beef, etc.), served with tortillas. The best place to get good typical food is at a "soda" which is a small Mom & Pop (often open air) place, somewhere in between a stand a building. The Costa Rican diet is full of a lot of fresh fruits and veggies which can be purchased at stands and farmer's markets all over the place. Tuna (yellowfin) is rather common as it is caught locally; same for Mahi Mahi. Beef, however, is generally not great.

This is not to say that you can't get some good, international dishes in Costa Rica. Due to the number of Americans, Canadians and Europeans living there, most of the larger towns offer a number of restaurants ranging from Italian to German to Mediterranean, prepared by chefs imported from all over. I recently returned from a vacation there and one of the best meals I had was at a wonderful Italian restaurant in Santa Ana (a suburb of San Jose in the Central Valley) called Bacchus; some people say it is the best place in the country. It is a beautiful country and the people who live there are some of the nicest, friendliest people around; enjoy your trip!