central-america
Explore 51 foods connected to Belize, from everyday staples to rare local specialties.
Start with Anguillian Coconut Tart →
The local shortlist
12 editor-selected foods for understanding the place through what people eat.
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The full directory
51 foods in this view. Filter by category, type, rarity, or search every recorded name.
Saint Martin
Coconut Tart
A pastry filled with grated coconut, sugar, and spices; a local bakery specialty in Anguilla, often served with vanilla ice cream; a classic island dessert. Across the islands this coconut-filled tart is baked as a bakery sweet, with local notes ranging from Anguillian spice to Sint Maarten and Cayman fillings.
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Conkies
Cornmeal, grated pumpkin, coconut and sweet potato spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg, wrapped in banana leaf and steamed into a soft parcel.
Jamaica
Flat cassava cake pressed and dried by a Taino method that predates the Spanish, soaked in coconut milk and then fried or steamed.
Belize
The national beer, brewed at Ladyville outside Belize City with the Altun Ha temple on the label; effectively the only domestic brand.
Belize
Bile up
Cassava, yam, sweet potato, plantain and flour dumplings boiled with fish, pig tail or eggs, drained and served with a tomato and onion sauce poured over.
Northern Belize, Belize
Escabeche
Chicken poached in a broth heavy with vinegar, whole onions, oregano and charred habanero, served with corn tortillas to soak it up.
Belize
Belizean turnovers of flaky pastry filled with seasoned minced beef, onions, and often raisins, baked or fried until golden.
Belize
Belizean stewed chicken simmered in a rich, reddish recado sauce of achiote, tomato, and onion until fall-apart tender.
Belize
Rice and beans
Rice cooked together with red kidney beans in coconut milk and thyme so the grains turn pale brown, plated with stewed chicken, potato salad and fried plantain.
Belize
Belizean tamales: seasoned masa filled with chicken or pork and recado, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed until firm.
Southern Belize, Belize
Rice cooked slowly with coconut milk, sugar and spice until it goes sticky and holds a spoon, a Garifuna sweet made for celebrations.
Barbados
A dark, rum-soaked fruitcake of dried fruit, brown sugar and spices, the traditional Christmas cake of Guyana and the Caribbean.
Southern Belize, Belize
Grated green banana rolled into balls and simmered in coconut milk with fish, a thick Garifuna soup eaten with cassava bread.
Jamaica
Amaranth leaves steamed down with onion, tomato, thyme and scotch bonnet, eaten at breakfast with dumplings or as a side.
Trinidad and Tobago
Grated cassava, coconut and pumpkin baked with sugar, spice and evaporated milk into a dense, chewy slab.
Belize
Chicken and hard-boiled egg in a jet-black broth coloured by recado negro, a paste of chillies burnt to charcoal and reground.
Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico
Yucatecan pulled pork slow-cooked in citrus and achiote, then wrapped in banana leaves until fall-apart tender and deeply red.
Belize
Queen conch diced fine and cured in lime with onion, tomato, cilantro and habanero, scooped up with tortilla chips.
Bahamas
Minced conch folded into a peppery batter with onion and sweet pepper and dropped in oil as golf-ball fritters.
Northern Honduras, Belize
Sopa de caracol
Queen conch simmered in coconut milk with green plantain, yuca and cilantro until the shellfish softens and the broth turns pale and sweet.
Belize
Small yellow nance fruit with a strong cheesy-fermented smell and a sweet-sour taste, eaten raw with salt, stewed in syrup or turned into wine.
Belize
Chunks of coconut boiled in dark sugar until they candy, sold in ragged lumps rather than neat squares.
Southern Belize, Belize
Green banana grated with coconut milk, wrapped in the banana leaf and boiled into a dense savoury parcel — the Garifuna tamale.
Belize
Fresh sweetcorn grated with coconut milk and sugar, tied in a corn husk or foil and boiled until it sets into a soft sweet block.
Southern Belize, Belize
Garifuna cassava bread: bitter cassava grated, the poisonous juice squeezed out through a woven ruguma tube, then the meal sifted and baked on a griddle into a large brittle disc.
Jamaica
Johnny cake
Round of flour dough fried until it puffs and browns, split and filled with saltfish, callaloo or fried plantain for breakfast.
Belize
A triangle of soft wheat dough dropped into hot oil so it balloons hollow, split and filled with beans, egg, cheese or stewed chicken.
Belize
A crisp fried tortilla spread with refried beans and covered in grated cheese, shredded cabbage and pickled onion.
Belize
A Belizean dish of roasted or stewed gibnut, a large Central American rodent prized for its tender, pork-like meat; famously served at royal visits.
Northern Honduras, Honduras
Garifuna bitters: roots, bark and herbs steeped in cane spirit for weeks until nearly black, drunk in shots as a tonic and a hangover cure.
Southern Belize, Belize
Garifuna dish of whole fish stewed in coconut milk with okra and basil, served beside a mound of green and ripe plantain pounded together in a mortar.
Aruba
Johnny cake; a traditional Aruban fried bread; made with flour, water, yeast, lard, and sugar; fried in oil; served with cheese or bacalao (salt cod); a popular snack and breakfast item; a feature of roadside snack-bars; a staple of Aruban street food
Belize
Habanero sauce made near Dangriga since 1981 from carrots, onion and local peppers, on every restaurant table in Belize in a row of heat grades.
Jamaica
Brown-skinned fruit with grainy, malty brown flesh tasting of brown sugar and pear, eaten when it gives to a thumb.
Northern Belize, Belize
Street tacos from Orange Walk, Belize: soft corn tortillas piled with stewed chicken, cabbage slaw, and a bright tomato-onion salsa.
Belize
Corn masa turnovers filled with mashed refried beans or seasoned fish, deep-fried and topped with a pickled onion and habanero relish.