Venezuela

🇻🇪Venezuela

Ají Dulce

Small wrinkled chilli that looks like a habanero and smells like one but carries almost no heat, the aromatic base of every sofrito.

🇦🇷Argentina

Alfajor

Argentina's national cookie: two tender cookies sandwiched with dulce de leche, coated in chocolate or rolled in coconut. Industrial and artisanal versions are sold in every kiosk.

🇨🇱Chile

Alfajores

Two cookies filled with manjar (dulce de leche), sometimes coated in chocolate or powdered sugar, a beloved Chilean treat.

🇨🇴Colombia

Arepa

Round, flat griddled corn cake that anchors every Colombian table, eaten plain or split and stuffed with cheese, egg or meat at any hour. Griddled, fried or baked depending on the region.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Arepa Dominó

Arepa filled with black beans and crumbled white cheese, the black and white giving it its name.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Arepa Pelúa

Arepa stuffed with shredded beef and yellow cheese, so hairy with strands of meat that it gives the arepa its name.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Arroz con Coco

Rice cooked in coconut milk with papelón, cinnamon and cloves until thick and dark, served warm or cold.

🇻🇪Caracas, Venezuela

Asado Negro

Beef round browned in burnt papelón until it goes nearly black, then braised for hours in the resulting dark, faintly sweet sauce.

🇩🇴Dominican Republic

Besitos de Coco

Dominican 'coconut kisses': small, round coconut macaroons of grated coconut, sugar, and egg whites, baked until golden. A bakery and home sweet, chewy and intense.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Bienmesabe

A Venezuelan coconut cream cake of rum-soaked sponge layers, coconut-vanilla custard and a thick topping of Swiss meringue dusted with cinnamon.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Bollo Pelón

Ball of maize dough wrapped around seasoned shredded beef, boiled and served under a tomato sauce with grated cheese.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Bomba

A Venezuelan filled doughnut of German origin, similar to a Berliner, filled with custard, jam or chocolate, dusted with sugar, a popular sweet treat.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Buñuelos de Yuca

Venezuelan buñuelos de yuca are cassava-and-cheese fritters fried until crisp and served with warm papelón syrup.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Cachapa

Batter of grated fresh sweetcorn cooked on a griddle into a thick, sweet pancake, folded over queso de mano and butter.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Cachitos

A Venezuelan crescent-shaped pastry similar to a croissant, filled with seasoned ham, a popular breakfast and snack item, often eaten with coffee.

🇧🇷Amazonas, Brazil

Canangucha

An Amazonian palm fruit native to Colombia, with purple skin and oily, orange flesh. Used in juices, ice cream, and oil, a staple of the Amazon diet.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Caraotas Negras

Venezuelan stewed black beans simmered with onion, bell pepper, garlic, cumin and Worcestershire sauce, the essential bean component of pabellón criollo.

🇻🇪Llanos, Venezuela

Carne en Vara

Llanero beef is seasoned, threaded onto wooden stakes and slow-roasted beside an open fire until the outside chars and the center stays juicy.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Carne Mechada

Flank steak boiled then shredded by hand and cooked down in onion, pepper and tomato sofrito — the beef in pabellón and in half the arepa fillings.

🇨🇴La Ceiba, Colombia

Casabe

A thin, crispy yuca flatbread of indigenous Amazonian origin, made from grated, pressed, and toasted bitter yuca. A staple accompaniment to fish and stews.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Catara

Indigenous sauce from the Amazon and Guayana made from yare — the pressed juice of bitter cassava — reduced with chilli and, traditionally, bachaco ants.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Cazón Frito

A Venezuelan coastal dish of seasoned school shark (cazón) fried until crisp, served with lime, tostones or arepas, a popular eastern seafood specialty.

🇻🇪Zulia, Venezuela

Cepillado

Cepillado is Zulia shaved ice packed into a cup and drenched with fruit syrup, sometimes finished with condensed milk.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Chicha Andina

Thick drink of rice cooked soft and blended with milk, sugar and cinnamon, served cold with condensed milk and cinnamon on top.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Chicha Criolla

Chicha

A sweet, creamy Venezuelan rice drink of boiled rice blended with milk, sugar, cinnamon and vanilla, served ice-cold, a popular street and beach beverage.

🇻🇪Maracaibo, Venezuela

Chivo en Coco

Goat stewed in coconut milk with papelón, onion and pepper until the sauce thickens and turns sweet-savoury — a Zulia and Falcón dish.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Chuao Cacao

Cacao de Chuao

Criollo cacao grown in the coastal village of Chuao, reachable only by boat, and among the most sought-after beans in the world.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Chupe Andino

A Venezuelan Andean cream soup with shredded chicken or hen, cheese, potatoes, vegetables and cream, a hearty, warming mountain specialty.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Cocada

Coconut flesh blended with its water, milk, ice and sugar into a thick cold drink sold from beach and roadside stands.

🇻🇪Falcón, Venezuela

Cocuy

Cocuy pecayero

Spirit distilled from the roasted heads of the cocuy agave in Lara and Falcón, protected by origin and made the same way for centuries.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Dulce de Coco

A Dominican dessert of grated coconut, milk, sugar, and cinnamon, cooked until thick and creamy. Served cold, a roadside and colmado staple, sweet and coconutty.

🇦🇷Buenos Aires, Argentina

Dulce de Leche

Argentina's national sweet: a thick, creamy caramel of milk and sugar slow-cooked for hours. Eaten by the spoonful, spread on toast, or used in alfajores, cakes, and ice cream.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Dulce de Leche Cortada

A rustic Venezuelan llanero dessert of milk curdled with lemon, then slowly simmered with sugar, cinnamon and cloves until thick and golden. Served at room temperature or chilled.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Dulce de Lechosa

Green papaya cooked slowly in papelón syrup with cloves until the strips turn translucent and amber — a fixed part of the Christmas plate.

🇻🇪Venezuela

Empanada de Cazón

A Margarita corn-dough empanada filled with seasoned cazón and fried until crisp.

🇨🇴Colombia

Empanadas Colombianas

Colombian fried empanadas of yellow cornmeal dough filled with beef, chicken, or potatoes, served with aji (salsa). Crispier and smaller than Argentine versions.