Belize: Chimole and Belizean Bread Pudding
Belize is a Central American country, located east of Guatemala and south of Mexico. Belize has the second largest barrier reef in the world, next to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, and is also the site of a lot of Mayan ruins.
Well, I’m not gonna lie- this was NOT a favorite. For the main dish, I made chimole, which was one of the dishes that kept popping up for Belize and it sounded really unique. Unfortunately, it wasn’t great. I also made a Belizean bread pudding, which was actually pretty good!
Chimole, or “Black Dinna” is a chicken stew with Mayan origins. The key ingredient is black recado, which is a paste made from roasted ancho chilis, garlic, cloves and several other spices. I could not find the pre-made paste anywhere so I attempted to make it on my own and I think that’s where I went wrong. I roasted the chilis with my creme brûlée kitchen torch (which was pretty fun!) and then blended them with the rest of the spices.
Black recado spice mixture.
This was also a super heavy and meaty dish between the chicken, pork meatballs and boiled eggs (both mixed into the meatballs and WHOLE EGGS inside the meatballs). All of this was stewed with the black recado paste, tomatoes, garlic and onions, and then served over rice. I was disappointed that I didn’t love the flavor and the amount of meat was really overwhelming since I generally don’t eat much meat.
*Edit: I recently went to Belize and got to try this stew and it was actually reallllly delicious, with a totally different flavor than what I made. This most certainly comes from the black recado paste, which I was able to find in a grocery store there and brought back to the US with me! I can’t wait to try again with the paste! I also loved that they added some veggies like carrots, chayote and potato, so will definitely be adding that in as well.
While I didn’t love the main dish, I did think the bread pudding was pretty delicious. I’d never made bread pudding before but this seemed like a pretty typical recipe- with the addition of coconut milk and rum. LOTS of rum lol. I called it boozy bread pudding because the scent and flavor of rum was pretttty strong, but it was still a hit with friends when I served it at our Halloween party! This would actually be a great holiday party dessert- it was super easy to make, really tasty and who doesn’t love a boozy dessert??
Belizean bread pudding.
We recently took a trip to Belize to scuba dive with friends and it was SO much fun! While it is a relatively poor country, the people are lovely and it’s such a beautiful place. We spent most of our time diving around San Pedro and then traveled into the mountains to see the Mayan ruins and do a cave tour! Every part of the trip was so fun and I absolutely recommend coming here, especially if you’re a diver! Check out some pics from out trip below!
Excited to dive!
Longanisa sausage burrito on San Pedro, Belize.
Another gorgeous day on the water!
Fresh seafood platter at Secret Beach in San Pedro, Belize.
Secret Beach, Belize. Perfection.
Mayan ruins with Ryan. :)
Group pic at the ruins!