Pacific Coast Gastronomy

This dish consists of hot soup made with albacore, cassava, onion, and cilantro. It is usually served with fried plantains and sometimes served with rice and bread.

This dish originated in the city of Guayaquil as a cheaper alternative to the ceviche. The dish grew popular the 1970s, especially after being a famous remedy for hangovers.

This is one of the most traditional dishes in Ecuador, and you can find it all around Ecuador in huecas, markets, and restaurants.

Ecuadorian ceviche is fresh, sauce-filled, and delicious. The dish is served by the bowlful and is meant for one. However, you will need to know a few things before ordering some for yourself.

The most common sauce used for ceviches in Ecuador is a heavily citrus-flavored, tomato-based sauce. Usually made with fresh tomatoes, lemon or lime juice, orange juice, salt, and pepper. Red and green peppers, red onions, and cilantro are also used to add flavor and texture. Some little hole-in-the-wall restaurants have ketchup on the tables to use instead of fresh tomatoes.

Some ceviches, like octopus, are only dressed with freshly squeezed lime juice, and topped with sliced red onion and chopped tomatoes.

Ceviche is usually served with pop corn, tostados, and chifles.Tostados are salty, crunchy, toasted corn kernels. Chifles are fried green plantain chips. These can either be added to ceviche or eaten separately, but either way, ceviche is one of a kind and a delish dish to enjoy.

This stew made with goat or sheep meat is a Creole dish. The meat is cooked in a mixture of fried vegetables called refrito, and then a fermented liquid is added and reduced until it becomes a sauce.

Goat meat can be seasoned with and fermented in chicha de jora, naranjilla, or beer juice. The reason these meats are cooked in fermented liquid is actually a culinary trick to eliminate the smell that comes from the meat and soften it. In Salinas, people also add tamarind into the fermentation process.

The name originated in Ancon when diners saw a delicious dish served after the soup and soon asked for the “segundo” (second dish). The local cooks then started calling the dish “seco”. Seco can be found in restaurants along the road to the Pacific coast.

Bolón de verde or bolón is a traditional Ecuadorian dish made from green plantain.

The first signs of the bolon de verde actually emerged in Cuba, as a dish called banana fufu, which is basically crushed banana mixed with pork rinds.

In Ecuador, the dish is slightly more complex. It consists of a ball or "bolon" the size of a fist made from roasted or fried green bananas that are mashed, and then kneaded firmly and mixed with a filling like pork or cheese. You can either eat it directly or fry it for a few minutes until it is slightly toasted on the outside.

This food is usually eaten in the late afternoon or at breakfast along with a cup of coffee. There is a cheese only version or a bolon de verde with both cheese and pork.

This is a traditional dish from the province of Esmeraldas made with coconut and seafood served with rice, patacones, tomato, avocado, and lemon. The dish is 200 years old and the original recipe used many types of wild meat in combination with fresh coconut pulp and seafood.

Varieties of this dish include: Encocado de shrimp, Encocado de pescado, Encocado de crab, and Encocado de prawns.

This dish which was created by the Zarumeño ancestors is prepared by mixing mashed green banana with egg and cheese, and sometimes pork rinds.

The Zarumeño ancestors, roasted the plantains in fathoms making the texture toasted and burned in parts. Then, they crushed the plantains with a stone and after being crushed, the black spots could be seen imposed on the normal color of the banana, similar to the skin of the tiger, earning this dish its name.

Tigrillo can be found throughout the province and is often had with a cup of coffee.