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Belizean Cooking

Harold's been into "all things Belize" since coming home and went out and bought some Coconut Rum, pineapple juice & mango juice so we can have our rum punch.

And then he made a typical Belizean meal from a cookbook we bought in Belize:

Mmm... A taste of Belizean cooking

Stewed Beef
by Fido's Courtyard & Pier, San Pedro, Ambergris Caye

Ingredients
1&1/2 lbs beef
1/2 gallon water
2 ounces recado (this is an annato paste)
1 bell pepper, sliced
1 medium onion, sliced
2 tomatoes, chopped
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

Preparation
* heat oil in a large saute pan and fry the meat
* drain oil and set beef aside
* in another large pot bring the water to a boil
* add recado, mix well
* add onion, bell pepper and tomato
* bring the mixture down to a simmer and add the beef
* season with salt and pepper
* let simmer for about 20 minutes (H simmered 2.5 hours to reduce liquid)
* serve with rice and beans and fried plantain (and he served with plaintain!)

Serves 6


Rice and Beans with Coconut Milk
by Elvi's Kitchen, San Pedro, Ambergris Caye

Ingredients
1 cup red kidney beans
5 cups water
2 tablespoons onion, chopped
1 garlic clove
salt and pepper
pinch of thyme
2 cups rice
1 cup coconut milk

Preparation
* cook beans in pressure cooker until tender (don't add salt until beans are cooked) (Harold just used canned beans)
* saute chopped onion and add to the beans with salt, pepper and a pinch of thyme
* add the washed rice and coconut milk to the beans
* cook over low fire, stirring gently from time to time, until rice is cooked
* serve with your favourtie meat, fish or poultry dish

Serves 4


try it!

Crooked Tree & Altun Ha pictures

We have uploaded pictures from our first couple of days. Eeeks - that doesn't sound like much, but it was a lot of bird pictures to go through. Actually, Harold still has to label most of the birds - I'll sick him on that tonight:

Bird's Eye View Lodge, Crooked Tree with wildlife and lots of birds:

Crooked Tree

The Mayan Ruins of Altun Ha:

AltunHa

Apocolyptico

After having toured some Mayan ruins in Belize and Guatemala, we decided to watch Apocalyptico (a Mel Gibson movie) that is set during the time of the decline of the Maya civilization.

It was interesting, but pretty violent!

Pictures

We have started working on the pictures.
Hopefully post some soon :)

What we came home to

Much like what we left behind... here's what we came home to:









































(can you see harold???)

HOME!

Missed our original flight that was supposed to leave Houston at 4:05pm, and had to catch the next one scheduled for 6:45pm... ugh. And of course that one was delayed until 8:05! So only 4 hours late - it probably departed around 8:30.

But we're home now :D

Kitties are getting used to us again. Only took Tazo a couple seconds. Dutchie a few minutes. Sid and Penny we'll have to keep working on.

HOME HOME HOME !

Lots of snow!

We'll try to get to the pictures soon ;)

delays

Our flight from Belize City to Houston was slightly delayed, and then a huge line up in customs in US, so we missed our connecting flight. boooooo. We are now stuck here at the airport for about 3 hours (at least) as ourrescheduled flight is already delayed *sigh*

Oh well, I'd rather be delayed coming home than getting there, so I guess I'll try not to complain ;)

Hopefully will get into Toronto aroundmidnight now.

singing sands

The last couple of days have been the most leisurely of the whole vacation. Sara and I have done little except for swim in the pool, snorkel, read, lay in hammocks, watch little crabs on the beach,, take pictures of cats and eat. Tonight we will probably walk down the road to have dinner at the Green Parrot Inn. The food is good here and it's different every night but we would like a bit of a change. We went to Monkey River a couple of days ago and got some great pictures of howler monkeys, crocodiles and even manatees. The excursion was nice but not our favourite. There s some repetitiveness on some of the tours. We are hoping to go to the Cockscomb Jaguar reserve tomorrow which will be our last trip into the jungle. I still would liketo get some better pics of the Keel Billed Toucan and perhaps some others. Sunday is our last day and we are hoping to perhaps canoe out to False Caye which is a mangrove island about a km offshore. It's a bit hard to post pics from here as te upload speed is a bit slow. This post is done from the palm sitting by the pool. Not looking forward to the snow after nearly a month of 30 degree days.

Maya Beach - final destination

We are now at the Singing Sands at Maya Beach, further up the Placencia Peninsula. There has been a complete 180 in the weather and it is HOT and sunny again. Hot hot hot. Good for our last week, which will be our most relaxing. We have 2 more tours included which we will go to Monkey River & Cockscomb, and perhaps do one more snorkle tour as well, since we haven't seriously snorkled since Caye Caulker.

The place here is absolutely beautiful. The garden is spectacular, and lush and covers most of the grounds except for the pathways through it, and the beach. There is a 40 foot pool, that is beautiful as well. The best part - two dogs and FOUR CATS! Smudge (b+w), Bob (orange +white), Sandy (all orange), and Ginger - a small one we haven't met yet, but is also orange. The dogs are Lucky and Deli. Smudge is already close friends with us due to the cat treats we brought from Caye Caulker (there is no cat treats anywhere in Placencia it seems!).

We went in the pool almost immediately after arriving because our ride here (1/2 hour from Placencia town) was hot, and Harold had this huge smile!

Today we did nothing but lounge around, swim, read, take pictures and pet the cats. Ahhhhhh....

Will try to upload pics later in the week if we're allowed to here. Mainly I've been accessing the net on my palm through the wireless here though.

Rain in Placencia

Typing this in my palm in a restaurant, so excuse any typos.

Placencia has been rather windy nd rainy fir us so far. Feel a bit homesick due to missing my kitties something fierce.

The sun is out now, and will hopefully stick around longer this time. Gotta get Harold in that ocean! Plus we are hoping to go to Red Bank to see the Scarlet Macaws tomorrow.

Off to Singing Sands Monday morn.