A Tale of Five Cities: Merida, the food (part 2)

1/10/2013

On Sunday around lunchtime, we were walking around downtown Merida where a variety of outdoor food vendors cluster to serve the shoppers and walkers. I wasn't very hungry but was hoping to find some Sopa de Lima (Lime Soup), a classic Yucatecan soup I'd heard so much about. Although the booth we stopped at said they had it to lure us in, they didn't actually, though they had some other kind of chicken soup. Realizing it was probably too hot for soup anyway, I settled for a cooling Horchata (a traditional rice beverage) to drink, and Barry got a panucho.

Food stands

Where we had our snack

Panucho

Street food in Mexico is incredibly cheap and makes a good choice for lunch or a quick snack.

Horchata -- delish!

Since we had such a light lunch, we decided to eat dinner early and tried one of our Tripadvisor picks, Amaro. Since we were eating so early, we had the place to ourselves. I started with a michelada, another specialty drink in Mexico, and Barry had one of their special cilantro/habanero margaritas. We also ordered some guacamole, chips, and salsa to whet our appetite as we perused the menu.

Cilantro margarita

One of our favorite things to eat in Mexico!

I still had Sopa de Lima on the brain, and we'd planned to go for sorbet after dinner, so I decided to have a light soup dinner. Barry had a chicken dish.

Sopa de Lima

Barry's chicken with sides

After our relatively light meal, we strolled back up to the Paseo de Montejo for some sorbet. We'd eyed this place the night before but had chosen fancy desserts at Hennessey's.

Some of the flavors were obvious, some we had on our cheat sheet, and a few we had to ask about.

Heck if I can remember what flavors we got, but they were very refreshing!

We neglected to get a photo of the breakfast Larry prepared for us on Sunday morning, but it was very good -- fresh fruit, granola, yogurt and toast. On Monday, the day we were hitting the road again for our next destination, we asked for a hearty breakfast (but sans meat) since we'd be eating only snacks for lunch.

A nice setting for breakfast at La Casa Lorenzo

Veggie eggs and toast - excellent!

Before heading to the bus station to be on our way, Barry was determined to stop at the French pastry shop, Cafe Creme, very close to where we were staying. A Frenchman owns and operates it, so it is authentic and lovely. We figured we'd pick up a couple treats for the bus ride, since we wouldn't be having lunch.

After meeting the owner and getting a few free sample tastes, we picked our poisons. It was all so delicious we could hardly go wrong with any choices.