Salvadoran cuisine facts for kids
Salvadoran cuisine is the unique style of cooking from the country of El Salvador. Its roots come from the ancient Native American groups like the Lenca, Pipil, and Maya people. Many dishes use maize (corn), and you'll also find lots of pork and seafood. Later, new ingredients were added after the Spanish arrived.
El Salvador's most famous food is the pupusa. It's a thick, handmade flatbread made from corn or rice flour. Pupusas are stuffed with yummy fillings like cheese, chicharrón (ground cooked pork), refried beans, or loroco (a special flower bud from Central America). You can also find vegetarian pupusas with squash or garlic. Some places even make them with shrimp or spinach! Pupusas are usually served with salsa roja (a cooked tomato sauce) and curtido (a pickled cabbage salad). Another popular dish is Pollo encebollado, which is chicken cooked with onions. Salvadorans also enjoy local cheeses like queso duro (hard cheese), queso fresco (fresh cheese), and cuajada.
Two other well-known Salvadoran dishes are yuca frita and panes rellenos. Yuca frita is deep-fried cassava root. It comes with curtido and chicharron, sometimes with pepesca (fried baby sardines). You can also have yuca boiled instead of fried. Panes rellenos means "stuffed bread" and they are warm submarine sandwiches. The turkey or chicken is marinated, roasted with special Pipil spices, and then pulled apart. This sandwich usually has turkey or chicken, tomato, watercress, cucumber, and cabbage.
Other tasty Salvadoran foods include carne guisada (beef stew with potatoes and carrots), carne asada (grilled steak with a salsa called chimol), and pasteles de carne (meat pies). For holidays like Christmas, people often eat pavo salvadoreño (roast turkey with sauce). You might also find ceviche de camarones (shrimp cooked in lime juice) and pescado empanizado (breaded, fried fish). Salvadoran chorizo is a fresh, short sausage, usually tied in pairs.
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A typical Salvadoran breakfast with egg, beans, cream, plantain, and chorizo.
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The pupusa is a dish from Mesoamerica. The oldest proof of pupusas comes from a 1,400-year-old Maya site in El Salvador called Joya de Cerén.
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Salvadoran style Alfajor cookies.
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Salvadoran chorizo with lime.
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Yuca can be fried or boiled. The oldest evidence of cassava farming also comes from Joya de Cerén.
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Loroco is a plant from Mesoamerica used in many Salvadoran dishes, like pupusas.
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Izote flower is a Mesoamerican flower used in Salvadoran cooking. It's often mixed with scrambled eggs or lemon.
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Salvadoran tortillas are a main part of the diet. They are thicker (5 mm) than Mexican tortillas and about 10 cm wide.
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Salvadoran style chorizo.
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Alguashte is a seasoning made from ground pumpkin seeds. It likely has Maya origins.
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Güisquil filled with melted cheese.
Types of Tamales
El Salvador is famous for its different kinds of tamales. These are usually wrapped in plantain leaves. Some popular types include:
- Tamales de elote: Made from fresh corn.
- Tamales pisques: Stuffed with black beans.
- Tamales de pollo: Filled with chicken and potatoes.
- Ticucos: Also known as "Travelers" tamales.
Delicious Soups
Soups are very popular in El Salvador for everyone!
Sopa de pata is a special soup made from cow tripe, plantains, corn, tomatoes, cabbage, and spices. It's considered a local treat.
Sopa de res is a hearty soup with beef shank, beef bones, carrots, plantains, corn, potatoes, and zucchini.
Gallo en chicha is a unique soup made with rooster, corn, and a sweet ingredient called dulce de tapa.
Sopa de pescado is a fish or seafood soup with corn flour, tomatoes, green peppers, and other spices. People often eat it on Good Friday.
Sopa de pollo is a chicken stew with tomatoes, green peppers, guisquil, carrots, potatoes, and consommé.
Sopa de gallina india is a chicken broth with vegetables. Some people add lorocos and cream to it.
Sopa de frijoles is a simple red bean soup.
Sopa de chipilin is a chicken soup with chipilin leaves and vegetables.
Salpicón de Res
Salpicón or picadillo is a dish made with finely chopped beef, fresh mint, and onions. Some people like to add rice to it.
Sweet Desserts
A variety of pan dulces, or sweet pastries, are very popular in El Salvador.
Some common Salvadoran desserts include:
- Semita de piña: This is a pastry with pineapple jam in the middle.
- Quesadilla salvadoreña: A type of pound cake made with rice flour and a salty cheese called queso duro blando. It's topped with sesame seeds.
- Torta de yema: A pound cake made with wheat flour and flavored with cinnamon.
- Marquesote: A light sponge cake flavored with cinnamon, sometimes anise. It's served in long slices.
- Salpores: Cookies made from rice flour and cinnamon. They have a crumbly texture.
- Poleada or manjar de leche: A white pudding made from milk, cornstarch, and sugar, flavored with vanilla.
- Arroz con leche: Rice pudding flavored with anise seed or raisins.
- Empanadas de platano: These are torpedo-shaped dumplings made from very ripe plantains. They are filled with vanilla custard, fried, and then rolled in sugar.
The dulce de leche in El Salvador is soft and crumbly, almost like sugar crystals.
Fruits are also eaten a lot, especially mangoes, coconuts, papayas, and bananas. Sometimes, fruit is served with ice cream and a sprinkle of cinnamon.
Refreshing Drinks
Teenagers often drink cocas (soft drinks) like Coca-Cola. Both young and old enjoy coffee, which is El Salvador's main export. Viejitas are biscuits that people dip in their morning coffee.
A very popular soda from El Salvador is Kolashanpan, which tastes like sugar cane. Minutas are shaved ice treats with fruit-flavored syrup. Horchata is a drink made from rice milk and spices like cinnamon, peanut, sesame seeds, and morro. Both are popular on hot days.
Licuados are like minutas but with fresh fruit and sometimes milk added. Frescos (short for refrescos) are like lemonades or other sweet fruit drinks. Other drinks include Arrayán, Chuco, and Chilate. Another favorite is ensalada ("salad"), made from pineapple juice with tiny pieces of fruit like apples, marañón (cashew apple), mamey, and watercress.
Tamarindo juice is enjoyed all over El Salvador. You can buy coconuts from roadside stands. They are usually cut open with a machete, and a straw is put in so you can drink the coconut water.
Seafood Delights
Salvadorans eat many different kinds of seafood. Salvadoran ceviches are made with clams, oysters, fish, shrimp, snails, octopus, squid, and a black clam called conchas. These cocktails and ceviches are prepared with a tomato and chopped onion sauce or a dark sauce called Salsa Perring (which is how locals say Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce). Both are sprinkled with lemon juice.
Salvadorans also enjoy fried crabs and lobsters, or fried fish with garlic and lemon. Shrimps are eaten roasted, al ajillo (with garlic), or in butter. There's also a seafood soup called mariscada, which has fish, clams, octopus, squid, shrimp, and crab.
See also
In Spanish: Gastronomía de El Salvador para niños
