I have this palm variety in my backyard, a shorter plant, that at this time of the year produces fruit in the form of berries. Each morning I wake up and see them lit up in the morning light just outside my window. I think the photo below (the one that is bright orange) captures the beauty of these little guys quite nicely; if anyone knows what the plant is, let me know!
El Chaka – A Yucatecan Tree with Papery Bark
The Chaka (chah-KAH) tree is found everywhere in the Yucatan and can be identified by its papery, red colored bark which seems to be suffering from some sort of skin disease as it is constantly shedding. Many locals consider it an ‘acceptable’ tree to leave on ones property when clearing in preparation for building a new home. While the other endemic varieties such as chukun, catzin and even the honey-producing dzidilche are considered ‘undesirable’ because they either have thorns (like you are going to be climbing these trees every afternoon) or produce garbage (in the form of leaves, the horror), the chaka is left because it has neither thorns nor a huge amount of leaves and many think it is attractive (which it is). So, when coming upon a cleared lot you will often find that the chakas have been left standing as solitary reminders that some native trees are more desirable than others and testament to the owners – or in many cases the architects – somewhat tepid desire to preserve at least some of the local vegetation.
Unfortunately, the chaka is a soft wood whose root structure seems to be largely superficial and in my time here in the Yucatan, which has included observing the passage of more than one major hurricane, I have noticed that the chakas, when left surrounded by their more hardy, deep-root, neighboring trees, survive strong winds much more handily than when left alone to fend for themselves. Standing alone, they easily succumb to a strong gust of wind which snaps their branches and if the gale strong enough, uproots them entirely.
You can read up on the chaka here (en español) but in a nutshell it says that the tree is indigenous to the area, and its leaves are used for medicinal purposes (curative baths for fevers, according to this site), its wood for carving (although most wood carvers will use other, harder wood varieties) and as an ornamental tree in parks and gardens.
I have several in the backyard and here are some photos of their trunks and bark, which I find quite interesting.
Rafaellos Pizza
One word: Go!
Well, that (above) was the original post. Pizza, the Casual Restaurant Critic has found, is like wine or your favorite sexual position; everyone has an opinion and they are convinced that their choice is the best. If you like your pizzas with an ultra thin crust, baked to perfection in a wood fired oven to the point where they have little pockets of black charring in some places on the crust, covered with ingredients of the finest quality including delicious meats like Italian sausage, salamis and prosciutto and fine cheeses from Gorgonzola to Parmigiano, then Rafaellos Pizzeria will be your pizzeria of choice from now on.
The Critic has often said that Bostons Pizza makes what is probably Meridas best pizza, and theirs is still a very satisfying option; so much better than the drab, flavorless ultra-hyped pizze mass-produced by Dominos and Pizza Hut, but now this Rafaellos is firmly tied for top spot in the Merida’s Best Pizza category.
The restaurant is tiny and open in the evenings only; there is a small air conditioner that struggles to keep the place cool and the tables are wooden and it just feels like an Italian neighborhood pizza joint, complete with the Italian pizza chef in the kitchen.
The photo below is of the 4 cheese pizza with anchovies. Yum!
Calle 60 at 49.
That New Meat Place with Giant Skewers next to Walmart
How’s that for a title?
Either the Critic was too distracted or never did find out the name of this “Brazilian” rodizio-style meat restaurant located in the City Center mall (Merida not Vegas) , just off the periferico and at the entrance to Walmart. UPDATE: Thanks to the Critics good friend, the intrepid Juanita, the name of this restaurant is ASADO BRASIL.
In any case, he accompanied the always better-looking and better-humored Better Half and another couple there for lunch. As usual, the restaurant was packed with hungry and motivated Yucatecan meat lovers, out to get their money’s worth of the all you can eat menu.
The overall impression is that the place is decent enough, although it is extremely noisy due to an excess of hard surfaces and two televisions (one with sappy telenovelas, the other with a raucous futbol game) and is somewhat charm-challenged. This doesn’t seem to be deterring anyone from having a grand old time however.
The salad bar, a term optimistic at best in this case, is a sparse arrangement of very basic items like lettuce, tomatoes and peppers arranged along one wall with a minimum of grace and fanfare. Just a 12 inch protruding shelf with the smallest of home-made glass acting – not very successfully – as a sneeze guard. The Critic stood in front of this rather sad display for some time before deciding that nothing appealed to him at all, except maybe for a few slices of tomato to offset the meat to come.
The meat, brought out on skewers and carved with a sharp knife in front of your face, is excellent. Everything from chicken and arrachera to pork to sirloin to a truly succulent slice of picaña; and you can eat and repeat as much and as many times as you want. Apparently, the price hovers in the $180 per person range, which is not unreasonable given the amount and quality of meat.
The service was a little lackadaisical at first, but the meat carving specialist, from Argentina apparently, was a joker as was his assistant and made the meal quite entertaining.
For desserts, there is ice cream and some bananas on the salad bar display thing with thick, sweetened Nestle milk to pour over them if you need a real sugar fix after your protein overload.
Would the Critic go back? Sure. Just don’t expect fine dining.
Hanging out with the Expats at the Living in Merida Book Launch
The other week, I felt strangely compelled to join other palefaces living in the formerly white city to an event organized by the Merida Verde people to officially launch the second edition of the Living In Merida book, now new and improved and chock full of information for new, English speaking arrivals, with the occasional tidbit that might be useful for those of us who have lived here longer than most and have our own personal favorite suppliers of everything from accurate law advice to honest real estate brokerage services to where to get a transmission repaired without losing an arm and a leg in the process.
To project an air of respectability I put on a clean shirt, picked up always charming Better Half and headed out to that hotel with the Pinedo Covalin boutique located on the corner of 47 and Montejo, right where Montejo ends and what some locals call El Remate which of course is a misnomer as it is not a remate as such, but a principio or beginning of that famous avenue modeled after Paris’ Champs D’Elysees.
Again, I digress.
There were all manner of expats milling about, some of which sported faces completely new to me, as I am somewhat out of touch with this crowd, who for the most part inhabit that part of Merida they charmingly call ‘Centro’ and are not frequent visitors to the other end of Montejo, where the Fridays, Sams Club and McDonalds along with the mall and its adjacent Starbucks make for a very different, and oft-criticized by visitors, impression of Merida.
“I prefer the REAL Merida!” they will say, wrinkling their nose, as if everyone should be wearing white outfits and balancing trays of glasses and bottles on their heads while dancing a typical jarana, panucho in hand. God forbid the locals should aspire to eating a hamburger or having a double grande latte with non-fat soy milk.
As I made the rounds, I overheard – and occasionally engaged in – earnest, well-meaning conversations on organic gardening, saving yet another local dog, the latest restoration of yet another fabulous little colonial down on 66 and all the Art that everyone seems to be making. These subjects are somewhat foreign to me, having been here now for so long with my regular boring job, normal family obligations and other mundane, boring activities that leave me precious little time for this navel-gazing that seem to be so popular among those who have moved here from el norte, to relish the freedom that a bank account in dollars can provide in a land of pesos.
Inside, the wine flowed freely (hey it was free, aprovecha!) and as some of the dialogue began to get a little slurred, I tried to identify, without much success, some of the people who I might have engaged with only online, before moving outside for some fresh air and a smoke. This nasty activity is of course now banned anywhere indoors in Merida, to the delight of many and the disgust of many more who can’t understand why Merida needs to adopt these new regulations when there are so many other things to be improved upon.
Once the book was presented and the thank-you’s made to all the collaborators in a drawn out affair which proved that not only Yucatecans will continue their conversations while someone is making a speech, the little soiree was over. A little more socializing with a few good friends I found there and I called it a night.
And the book? I’m sure it will prove to be a valuable addition to the information already out there, particularly on websites such as yucatanliving and yucatantoday and of course lawsonsyucatan, but one must take it all with a grain of salt. For example, the section on buying a used car mentions that one place to buy a previously owned vehicle is the ex-Penitentiary, which, as any local will tell you, is rife with stolen automobiles, cars with ‘papers’ issues and the occasional con artist.
It was a strangely different sort of evening, a take on a Yucatecan night out minus the Yucatecans, featuring a fantastic selection of characters out of some travel novel from the last century; something by Somerset Maugham. And although at the time I was a little less than enthusiastic about going, I am glad I went.
Bella Roma – New Authentic Italian Find in Merida
Everyone is talking about it.
A new Italian eatery; a really authentic Italian restaurant, located in the most unlikely and hard to find places; the new, gigantic urban development known as Las Americas. Not the mall, but the Sadasi construction companys huge housing project near Dzitya, just off the Merida-Progreso highway.
The Casual Restaurant Critic, Better Half and several friends visited this hidden gem a few nights ago and the group was magically transported from Merida to a Roman neighborhood trattoria, where a large (20 members by one account) Italian family hosts Yucatecans and the occasional Canadian and offers up real food from the land shaped like a boot.
The pizza is of the ultra thin crust variety and while the ‘everything’ pizza was fine, it was the quattro formaggio with anchovies that wowed the group. Pastas were perfect; rare indeed is the restaurant that can put together a delicious pasta cooked perfectly. Elio al Mare is one, Bella Roma is another. Accompanied by a reasonably priced bottle of Moltepuciano red wine, the meal was perfect up to and including the tiramisu and limoncello (and mandarincello) for dessert. Exquisite!
Service was adequate, but the crushing onslaught of Yucatecans never stopped and the female waitresses, evidently sisters and daughters of the older folks in the kitchen as well as several young men including the Eros Ramazotti singing member of the family who provided live entertainment for part of the evening, were hard-pressed to spend much time at any table. Every few minutes, yet another Italian face would appear with a load of plates and the Critic counted at least 11 different members of the staff, all related apparently.
Dinner for 8 came to about $1400 pesos before tips which the Critic felt was quite fair.
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- Woodfired oven baked pizzas
Sunset in Chicxulub, Yucatan
For all of you who winter here and miss the glorious sunsets at the beach in Chicxulub, Uaymitun and Progreso, here’s a short video of the sun sinking into a golden sea, from Chicxulub beach.
Gasoline Prices Up Today
In case you are not on top of these things, are driving a Nissan Leaf or only use bicycles to get around Merida, I thought I would mention that gas prices went up today, Saturday April 9th, 2011, yet again.
The price of Magna is now $9.08 pesos per liter, Premium is $10.26 and Diesel $9.44.
From my somewhat limited mathematical conversion ability, this works out to about $2.85 USD a gallon for the Magna stuff. Some people say, “Oh, that’s about what we pay back home!” Yes, Virginia, but back home you are earning in dollars and here we are earning in pesos, dear. “Oh”.
Oh, indeed.
Los Almendros – Ticul, Yucatan (it ain’t pretty)
Yesterday the Casual Restaurant Critic, along with the always lovely Better Half and two other guests of Yucatecan extraction were in sunny Ticul, the clay pot and shoe capital of the area. Ticul is also home to Los Almendros, the Yucatecan restaurant to go to back in the day.
No longer.
The Critic was aghast at the decline of this once-great culinary destination. The restaurant itself looks pretty much the same, with plenty of religious paintings hanging on the walls, above aesthetically-challenged lamps with energy saving bulbs protruding from their petal-like openings and non-functioning mini-split air conditioner units. One must assume that the air conditioning is for a) really hot weather (hard to imagine it getting any hotter than April) or b) for when the restaurant is full, which might be never.
The courtyard in the back has been converted to a hotel and the lobby entrance is at one side of the restaurant. Evidence that the breakfast for the hotel is served here includes the buffet table, still strewn with coffee machines, cups, a few boxes of Zucaritas mini cereal boxes and some thermoses; this is at 4 in the afternoon. The Critic suspects this makes setting up the next mornings breakfast service so much easier; a quick rearranging of these items will greet guests when they wake up for their all-inclusive 60 peso breakfast.
Orange juice was refreshing and tasted fresh, the pitchers are filled from bags of orange juice stored in the fridge behind the bar. Guacamole, ordered by the afore-mentioned Yucatecans, was fresh enough and came with crunchy tostadas. Everyone ordered Poc Chuc and the pork was tasty, tender and there was lots of it on the plate. The big dissappointment was the Critics favorite, Queso Relleno which was nothing like a queso relleno eaten – and enjoyed – elsewhere. A bit of cheese covered meat, which looked like a pate, swimming in a large bowl-like plate filled with corn-starch kol which was strewn with bits of cheese, tomato sauce and turkey. What the hell the turkey was doing in there baffled the Critic who was unable to finish the unappealing dish as it just seemed like the kitchen had combined a bit of Queso Relleno with some Pavo en Relleno Blanco that was lying around.
Tortillas were fresh and decent enough and of the hand-made variety, although they weren’t nearly of the consistency, flavor or freshness of those served at the Principe Tutul Xiu in Mani. Usually Poc Chuc is served with a small bowl of Frijol Colado, which is cooked black beans, strained (not ground up in a blender) served like a soup on the side. The beans only came along after being asked for and to the Critic, tasted a little off, but everyone else seemed to think they were beyond excellent, so the Critic must have been negatively influenced by the horrendous queso relleno, which surely clouded his judgement.
Service was poor to average at best, what with the television blaring over the cash register area and providing entertainment for the staff from which it was necessary to tear them away to get any kind of service. Dirty dishes remained on the table for ever, and don’t even get the Critic started on the coffee.
The coffee! This was very possibly the worst “coffee” ever encountered by the Critic or his guests, anywhere in the Yucatan, ever. With a bouquet that was distinctly reminiscent of burnt tortillas, the hot, dark water in the cup tasted like the proverbial agua de calcetin (dirty sock water) and was literally undrinkable.
Lunch as described, for 4 persons with two pitchers of orange juice came to about 500 pesos and really, they should be paying the guests to eat here, not the other way around.
What a shame that this once-proud and fine Yucatecan bastion of good eating has degenerated to such absolute misery.
Avoid, avoid, avoid.
Fruteria La Jarochita
There’re probably a million fruterias in Merida now; this is one of them, called La Jarochita which means “little woman from Veracruz” but rather than little, the ita (or ito) at the end of the word Jarocho a term of endearment.
I stopped by for some fresh squeezed carrot & orange juice and the afternoon light was again, like the “doors and facades” moment before, fantastic. Each fruit displayed looked like fat colorful jewelry. Alas, I did not have my camera with me, only the ubiquitous iPhone.
Here are some of those shots:
