The recipe here, although delicious, is not the real story; the baking process is what’s intriguing. We spent a few days in a Garifuna village (read about the Garifuna people) called Hopkins, full of people beaming with ready smiles and pride in the richness of their culture, if not their material wealth.

Sarita, the "Sweet Bun Lady" as she is known to everyone in town, is no different. She has kept alive a baking tradition begun by her great-grandmother and when we showed up with cameras and lots of curiosity, she was only too happy to let us watch and learn.

She makes a yeast dough with the standard flour, butter, sugar and eggs and flavors it with local allspice and a little cinnamon, but the true magic happens when she bakes it. The oven is a large steel barrel cut in half, and covered with a piece of corrugated roofing. The heat comes from a fire made of coconut husks and driftwood burned down to coals. She places the risen buns in the barrel, rests the barrel on pieces of cinder block around the fire pit and puts the lid on top. The majority of coals are taken out of the pit and put above the lid to top heat the oven and avoid burning the rolls’ bottoms. Fifteen minutes later, sweet, fragrant and perfectly golden brown rolls are taken out and placed on a table to cool. They don’t last long, as people seem to come out of the woodwork to plunk down 50 cents and "get dem while dey hot, man!"

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The phrase "fish balls" doesn’t impart much glamour to this wonderful dish, so I used a little artistic license. Not that "dumplings" is much better, but when writing about food, it’s all semantics and esthetics. Something tasty for your palate must be equally delectable to your ears. Although the preparation is essentially like meatballs, the experience of dining on them is sublime.

This recipe actually comes from Tobacco Caye in Belize, but variations can be found all over the Caribbean. I would classify it as Creole or Garifuna cuisine rather than Latin.

The dumplings are egg-sized and come in a generous portion of broth served with tortillas or bread. They are slightly spicy and sweet from the coconut and achiote paste seasoning, and the firm-fleshed white fish and bread combine to make a texture that is the perfect balance of meat-like density and cake-like consistency.

Ingredients:

• 6 slices of dry bread
• 1 ½ lbs (3/4 kilo) white fish filets (cheaper, flakier meat is actually better)
• 2 eggs
• 1-2 cloves minced garlic
• 1/2 tsp minced ginger
• ¼ tsp each of coriander, cumin, chile powder
• ½ tsp oregano

Soup:

• 4 cups chicken bullion
• 1-2 cups coconut milk
• Achiote paste (start with 1 tbsp, add to taste)
• 2 tbsp cooking oil
• Salt, pepper

Preparation:

Sopa De Caracol

This recipe is a testimonial to an old adage, in this case referring to roadside eateries in Central America, “Never judge a book by its cover; you may be pleasantly surprised.” I will tell you from the outset, however, that the daily fare in Honduras is nothing to write home about. With the exception of the wonderful fruit, it’s an uninspiring mix of refried beans, rice, eggs, tortillas, plantain fries, leathery meat, and a few veggies. A standard plate of food will contain four or five of those items with maybe two choices of meat. It’s cheap, salty and fills you up when you’re very hungry.

We were sitting in a tacky beachside stand with Pepsi logos plastered on everything in the coastal town of Omoa, just over the border from Guatemala. On a Monday, with all the weekend Honduran tourists back in San Pedro de Sula, the industrial city of 500,000 a 40-minute drive away, the beach town was empty. Even during the high season, on weekdays this town is quiet. There was only one other table of diners.

You will find that these places only stock a couple of menu items during the week, making it pointless to look at the menu. Just ask them what they have. Fried chicken and Sopa de Caracol were the only options. JP, unfamiliar with caracol, chose the chicken but I decided to give it a try, anyway. It was an excellent choice. Large meaty chunks of conch, al dente in texture and sweet in flavor, came in a soup of chicken broth, coconut milk, garlic, chiles, cilantro and a pinch of fresh ginger and cumin. Diced tomatoes, onions and carrots added extra flavors and textures. With a beer, warm corn tortillas and merengue music on the stereo, it was a fabulous meal despite the legendary Honduran sand flies feeding on me.

Ingredients:

• ¾-1 lb conch cut into large chunks
  (substitute large clams, scallops, or any sweet shellfish)
• 6-8 cups chicken bullion
• 3 cups coconut milk
• 3 cloves minced garlic
• 2 minced chiles (use your own judgment here)
• 2 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro
• 1/2 tsp minced ginger
• ½ tsp cumin
• 1 diced carrot
• 1 diced medium sized onion
• 1 diced medium sized tomato
• Salt to taste

Preparation:

Put bouillon in stockpot on high heat and turn down to simmer once it boils. Add diced veggies, cover and let simmer for 10 minutes. In a pan, sauté the garlic, chiles and ginger in a little oil on medium heat until garlic turns translucent (30 sec.). Add conch meat and sauté for 2 minutes, then turn off heat. Add meat to stockpot along with the coconut milk and cumin. When liquid begins to simmer, turn off heat, add the cilantro and serve.

Bay Island Mango-Glazed Chicken

Utila Bay Island, Honduras is the setting for this one. If you step back 300 years you would be rubbing elbows with the original Captain Morgan and his merry band of cutthroat pirates who holed up in Utila Bay. This island was the staging grounds for raids on Spanish forts and galleons up and down the coast of Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua. Abundant rumors of buried or sunken treasure are surely apocryphal but there is a different variety of leftover Spanish loot that you should be able to get your hands on with ease: the golden flesh of mangos. People tell me that the mango is not indigenous to Central America, that it was brought by the Spaniards and then proliferated wildly. On the island of Utila alone you will find 15 different varieties, one of the broadest selections in the world. All are fabulous.

This recipe comes from an ex-pat Idahoan and legendary fusion chef from the Bay Area named Dave Ayarra, who stumbled onto the island some five years ago on a treasure hunt of his own. All chefs worth their salt know a winner when they see one and this recipe spoke to him: a puree of overripe mangos laced with thyme, ginger, sherry, garlic, a twist of lime and a touch of chile de arbol ladled over a whole chicken and baked to the color of the late afternoon sun. The chicken juices infuse the mango sauce pooled in the baking pan and are spooned over each serving. I imagine that Captain Morgan, with a ship’s hold full of salt-cod and moldy potatoes, would have traded a chest full of doubloons for a plateful.

Ingredients:

• 1 whole chicken
• 4 medium sized mangoes
• 1-2 tsp dried thyme
• 3-4 tbsp sherry
• 2 cloves minced or crushed garlic
• Salt and pepper to season chicken

Preparation:

Season the chicken with salt and pepper; place in roasting pan. Peel mangoes, slice off flesh and puree in blender with thyme, garlic and sherry. Ladle over chicken and bake at medium heat.

In all art, classic forms and pure design are the foundations upon which all subsequent works are built and then judged. However, creative local visionaries, influenced by their unique regional heritages, are the ones who push the artistic envelope and become the defining pop icons. Cuisine is no different. Classic French, Italian, Asian and Indian cuisine will always be revered, but fusion cuisine will inherit the earth.

David Ayarra is the best chef on the island of Utila. Among the standard grill houses, Latin comedores, and eclectic Euro cafes, Dave’s Stingray Grill stands alone. Its diverse and multi-lingual flavors turn rustic and hearty fresh fish steaks, local produce, beef and poultry into vibrant and savory dining experiences. Take a look at his background and you’ll understand. His grandfather ran the Hiawatha Hotel in Hailey, Idaho, where local big game and southwestern ingredients met European savoir-faire and were served to Hemingway, Clark Gable and other Hollywood high rollers. Dave himself cut his teeth cooking in Idaho, moved to San Francisco, apprenticed with an Austrian Grand Chef and a Chinese wok master, then embarked on a stint as a legendary caterer of his own designs. His long-time dream to set up shop on a tropical island came true five years ago.

I walked into the kitchen one afternoon to smell his pureeing a concoction that perfumed the air with an incredible multi-layered aroma - spicy, sweet, pungent, and smoky. The recipe had come to him all at once in a vision, he told me. Praise celestial intervention! Praise prawns, julienne veggies, coconut milk and the thick spice paste elixir that bonds them all together!

All the spices and ingredients in this recipe are locally grown, if not on the island of Utila itself, on mainland Honduras. Thai, Sri Lankan and Indian curries move over; a sassy new sister has arrived. Charred jalapenos, cherry chile peppers and capsicum (bell) peppers pureed with mango form the bulk of this paste. The seasonings blend smoky, spicy, earthy and sweet: pan toasted cumin seeds, black peppercorns and coriander seeds mixed with pan roasted garlic, pounded cilantro root, oregano, ginger, lime peel and a dash of soya sauce. The resulting paste is viscous, the color of fecund jungle earth and when diffused in coconut milk, the layers of flavor that pass over your tongue develop in stages like a Polaroid. Serve with tropical weather and very cold beer.

Curry Ingredients (for 6):

• 2 jalapeno chiles (red and green)
• 4 "seasoning" peppers (cherry, serrano, anything small/medium size with mid-grade heat)
• 2 medium-sized green capsicum (bell) peppers
• 2 cloves pan roasted garlic
• 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
• 8-10 black peppercorns
• 6-8 coriander seeds
• 1 tbsp whole leaf oregano
• 3 root sections of cilantro plant (only the bulb, minus tendrils and stalk)
• 1 knuckle of ginger
• Pulp of one large ripe mango
• 1/4 cup oil
• 1 ½ tbsp soya sauce
• Peel of ½ lime
• Salt to taste

Curry Preparation:

Char the three types of peppers over open flame until the skin blisters. Cut out the seed pods. Roast garlic cloves with skin in cast iron pan. Toast the cumin seeds, peppercorns and coriander when garlic is nearly done. When the seeds begin to pop, add the oregano and take off the heat. Pound the cilantro root with a flat knife. Peel the garlic and add with all above ingredients to processor along with the mango, ginger, oil, soya, lime and salt. Puree.

Sauté the mixture over low flame until the oil begins to separate from the paste and it gives off a rich aroma. Begin the next stage of the recipe:

Prawns and Veggie Saute Ingredients and Preparation:

• 1 ½ lbs of veined "16-20" (medium) shrimp
• 1 cup cubed pineapple
• 3-4 cups julienne carrots, jalapenos, Napa cabbage, etc.
• 2 cups rich coconut milk

Yucca Pie

Pescado Frito con Tajadas: 
Honduran Fish and Chips

Stewed Chicken in Coconut Milk