Fish Stew on the Rio Dulce

Rio Dulce
Originally uploaded by thegreatplotnik.

In a few weeks, The Great Plotnik and The Great Ducknik should be riding on a little launch like this one, staring out at the view of the Rio Dulce, which is a short, tropical river which flows to the Caribbean, in Eastern Guatemala. The town of Livingston will be their destination, where the black, Spanish-speaking Garifunas live. Livingston is accessible only by boat. Plotnik and Ducknik's goal will be the famous fresh fish stew called 'Tapado.'

Well, that and hiking up the side of a volcano (can they turn volcanoes OFF when tourists climb up them?), trekking through rain forest, seeing Maya ruins, indigenous markets and colonial churches, you know, that kind of stuff, but let's not forget the Tapado, which is supposedly made from some super-yummy kind of extra-special --- well, fish.

Otherwise, it sounds like tortillas, rice and beans, which ain't too bad. Plotnik has yet to determine how much chile the Guatemalan Maya employ in their cooking. If Guatemalan Maya food is anything like Yucatecan Maya food, look OUT for the itsy-bitsy teensy weensy half-a-fingernail-size red chile that can boil the oil from your carburetor.