In the north of Europe, you could eat rice pudding as a warm meal instead of as a dessert! But origin this dessert comes from the Muslim world and was imported into Spain when the Muslims conquered the South of the Iberian Peninsula. It was brought by the Spanish to Latin America during colonial times and voila! here we are. Classic Arroz Con Leche is a variation of rice pudding that is sweet and cooked with milk, evaporated milk, and sweetened condensed milk and topped with cinnamon.

Plantain atol is a delicious traditional Guatemalan drink that is prepared with ripe plantains, water, cinnamon, and sugar.

Boxbol is a nutritious traditional Ixil (ethnic group in Guatemala) dish prepared with cornmeal and squash leaves and served with a delicious squash seed sauce and tomato salsa. Ixiles typically use the leaves from the squash güisquil (pronounced whiskeel) which is in the chayote family. The corn is soaked and cooked in water with lime (the mineral, not the citrus!) and a little bit of ash to produce nixtamal, which is then ground into masa (cornmeal dough). The masa is expertly wrapped in the güisquil leaves and boiled for 10 minutes.

Buñuelos or bunuelos are balls of fried wheat-based dough, crisp on the outside and soft on the inside. The dough is commonly flavored with anise seeds and fried in hot oil, akin to doughnuts. They can be savory or sweet and come in different shapes and sizes. Guatemala’s version of buñuelos is a round ball of dough, fried, then bathed in a golden syrup made from brown sugar and anise.