Soda la Hormiga — Restaurant in La Fortuna

La Casa de La Hormiga La Fortuna Costa Rica August 2023

Cosada de Chuleta (pork chop) for 3000 colones ++ (about 5.5 USD)

Casado is a loving name for a dish traditionally made by the homemaker for their working partner. It is also often referred to as a tipico/tipica aka typical/local dish. Casados usually consists of rice and beans with plantains, vegetables, and your choice of meats (usually chicken, fish, beef, pork, or vegetarian). Naturally there can be quite a variety based on region or depending what the purveyor will prepare for you.

What i find interesting (and definitely delectable) is that the vegetables may come in the form of salads or chopped veggies, but often times it will also include some form of stewed chayote or mirliton squash. This really tastes like home for me because Indonesia also has various stewed squash dishes albeit the most notable would include coconut milk and is usually much spicier.

Anyways... after trying various renditions, i find that this particular one really hits the spot for its lower than average price (most others would charge 4000 colones or more) as well as for coming with that really flavourful pork chop. Now the amount of meat is quite meager, but this may well be one of the most flavourful pork chop I've ever had. The pork chop had enough charring (although i would always go for a bit more), it was really juicy and bursting with savouriness, as well as having that slightly sweet pork aftertaste which is just chef's kiss.

Sadly the rice was a bit dry, but mix it with the juices and add some salsa and I'm a happy camper. I have also found other purveyors which prepared the beans and veg somewhat better, but this was not bad by a long shot. I was also happy that their fried sweet plantains were the best to balance taste and consistency compared to most others.

Furthermore their 800 colones linseed drink and the similarly priced chan (similar to chia seed) drink are still the best drinks I've had in this trip. They were almost jelly like but still drinkable - they were filling, tasty, and definitely refreshing. I would go back just for the drinks and the pork chop!

#great #food...

We stopped by here for lunch at our AirBnB host's recommendation. This is not like the other Sodas we've visited so far and felt way more touristy and sport barish. Not the Mom and Pop shop type place I think of when I think Soda. As for the food, Not sure if it's just a cultural thing and they're called different things here in Costa Rica but all 3 of our orders were not what we expected. I got a "Taco" which was much more like a Taquito and had a LOT of tough and crunchy breading and not a ton of meat. One of my brothers got a "Quesadilla" which looked way more like a flat burrito and the other brother got a "Fajita" which was way more like a quesadilla. I didn't enjoy my "Taco" much but both of my brothers liked their meals and I enjoyed the salad and fries that came with my food. One other note, and I don't know for sure that it was caused by here but my brother who got the Fajita and a water was struck with a case of Montezuma's Revenge later that evening and into the next day. Service was good though, our waiter spoke decent English and was patient with our...

Maybe we were spoiled coming from the nicoya peninsula and having an amazing experience food and service wise but the food here was good (not amazing) and the service was not good. They forgot some of our order, they switched servers 2-3 times and the whole staff was sort of grouped together at the counter not really doing much but giving everyone dirty looks. My kids were also playing quietly with the sauce packets while we waited for our food (as they often do, respectfully) and one server came over without saying a word looking very irritated, collected all the sauces off the table, took the little wooden box out of my daughters hand and walked away to put it on the bar (not for someone else to use, it just sat there). We even had to ask for it back later for ketchup for the fries.

I would probably recommend going here for the food to avoid all of the bad touristy restaurants selling burgers and pizza but I wouldn’t expect much in terms of service, or just...