We haven't had a thread like this in a while and I'm curious what people's experiences in this regard have been. I'm sure we have people here with experience from the smallest food shack to the most refined Michelin-starred 'raunt.
I worked as a waiter in a mid-end steakhouse on and off for a bit in college and then in another restaurant briefly after college and mostly had pretty pleasant customers but I know some here will have some zany stories from that perspective as well. Unfortunately the first restaurant I worked for went out of business a few years back; they had excellent steaks, sandwiches, pizza, salad, lots of things.
One of my all-time favorite meals was in Puerto Viejo de Talamanca on a trip to Costa Rica my wife and I took in 2012. It's a really gorgeous area and offers a lot of ecotourism and local flavor.
There are several local restaurants of not only Caribbean cuisine but also many other ethnicities as well. Crepes, sushi, all kinds of stuff. One in particular was exemplary above all others, though:
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaur...rto_Viejo_de_Talamanca_Province_of_Limon.html
This is a picture from Lazlo's Catch of the Day. It's not a picture I took, and it probably isn't much to look at. You get a piece of fish, grilled and seasoned beautifully, with some perfectly cooked French fries and grilled veggies. I believe it was red bell pepper that day. What makes the cuisine exemplary beyond the pitch perfect cookery is that the Lazlo and his family go out and catch the fish that same day, then cook it up and serve it till it runs out. So this is just about the freshest fish you can find, and ridiculously delicious. The café is al fresco-style dining, nestled next to a (at least when we were there) pizza joint, across the street from another also very good seafood restaurant. Just a stunning meal all around and maybe yet to be topped for us.
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Now for a tale on the other end of things, not bad per se, but just strange. There's a couple of sushi restaurants, at least there were when we went, down in Puerto Viejo. Well, we chose to go to one of them on our last night in the village. The food was great, and we found it charming that a local cat (unsure if it was the owner's) liked to hop up on recently absent tables and gobble up leftover fish. The owner was a whip-smart expat from an Asian country that's escaping me at the moment. I went to the restroom at one point and glanced down mid-stream. There was a paperweight of a snake (turtle? now I'm forgetting) in middle of the bowl. It seemed an odd place for one but I kept relieving myself. Well, all of a sudden it moves. The snake leaps out of the toilet and scurries off. The owner assured me this is a relatively common occurrence but it was really startling.
I worked as a waiter in a mid-end steakhouse on and off for a bit in college and then in another restaurant briefly after college and mostly had pretty pleasant customers but I know some here will have some zany stories from that perspective as well. Unfortunately the first restaurant I worked for went out of business a few years back; they had excellent steaks, sandwiches, pizza, salad, lots of things.
One of my all-time favorite meals was in Puerto Viejo de Talamanca on a trip to Costa Rica my wife and I took in 2012. It's a really gorgeous area and offers a lot of ecotourism and local flavor.
There are several local restaurants of not only Caribbean cuisine but also many other ethnicities as well. Crepes, sushi, all kinds of stuff. One in particular was exemplary above all others, though:
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaur...rto_Viejo_de_Talamanca_Province_of_Limon.html
This is a picture from Lazlo's Catch of the Day. It's not a picture I took, and it probably isn't much to look at. You get a piece of fish, grilled and seasoned beautifully, with some perfectly cooked French fries and grilled veggies. I believe it was red bell pepper that day. What makes the cuisine exemplary beyond the pitch perfect cookery is that the Lazlo and his family go out and catch the fish that same day, then cook it up and serve it till it runs out. So this is just about the freshest fish you can find, and ridiculously delicious. The café is al fresco-style dining, nestled next to a (at least when we were there) pizza joint, across the street from another also very good seafood restaurant. Just a stunning meal all around and maybe yet to be topped for us.
--
Now for a tale on the other end of things, not bad per se, but just strange. There's a couple of sushi restaurants, at least there were when we went, down in Puerto Viejo. Well, we chose to go to one of them on our last night in the village. The food was great, and we found it charming that a local cat (unsure if it was the owner's) liked to hop up on recently absent tables and gobble up leftover fish. The owner was a whip-smart expat from an Asian country that's escaping me at the moment. I went to the restroom at one point and glanced down mid-stream. There was a paperweight of a snake (turtle? now I'm forgetting) in middle of the bowl. It seemed an odd place for one but I kept relieving myself. Well, all of a sudden it moves. The snake leaps out of the toilet and scurries off. The owner assured me this is a relatively common occurrence but it was really startling.
