dining

One of the basic secrets of surviving on next to nothing, whether in Panama or anywhere else, is to gain a knowledge of and appreciation for the cheap basic staples of several different cultures, and to vary your diet around these staples in hard times. Of course, where you are and what season it is will often determine the price and availablity of many of your options.

In Panama rice is the preferred staple and we consume a lot of imported wheat products, but we have all sorts of tubers (in addition to potatoes and sweet potatoes, there are ñame, yucca, ñampi and otoes), piva nuts (a/k/a pixbae or piba or peach palm) and corn in its various forms.

If you live or work in a working class neighborhood, odds are someone will come by in the morning shouting “Sí hay bollos” and lugging around a large tub filled with green things. Or else on the corner there will be someone sitting next to such a tub, selling little bundles wrapped in cornhusks or banana leaves.

These are bollos, corn meal mush boiled smooth but very thick. Usually it’s just corn meal, a little oil, a little salt, wet but with with very little water left in it. In Chorrera and other parts of Panama Oeste, they’ll make them with bacon grease. Get into any fancier additives and you are approaching tamales. Typically, a quarter gets you a bollo about the size of your fist, but more oblong in shape.

These go well as is, or with condiments like salt, ketchup, or hot sauce.

You can also buy a bollo in the morning and put in the fridge for lunch, then take it out a few hours later, slice it into little medallions, and fry it in oil until crispy on the outside.

If you find yourself living in poverty in Panama, you really don’t want to try living on bollos alone. That’s a good short cut to malnutrition. However, if you make bollos your main staple and supplement it with a good assortment of fruits and vegetables, you will be eating an adequate diet. Add a little bit of seafood, meat or poultry and you will be eating much like Panama’s first nations did for thousands of years before the Spaniards came.

since Bollos are one of the least greasy street foods available here, and they don’t spoil so readily as meat, fish or chicken, that makes them safer to eat.

(Yes I know. There are tourist guides that tell you to never eat street food. The Health Ministry warns you not to eat anything served by anyone not displaying a food handler’s permit. Generally these warnings are alarmist, but you do want to take note of the condition of the food you buy and how it is handled, especially with regard to more perishable items. A food handling ID is a good thing to see.)

If you are visiting Panama and eager to know its popular culture, or if you live here and are trying to swim in the mainstream, you will want to get to know the street food and certainly you’ll want to try bollos.

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