Best 21 Dishes and Drinks from Yucatán: A Culinary Deep-Dive

The Yucatecan cuisine is a blend of Mayan, Spanish, and Caribbean influences. Its dishes often include specific spices and ingredients that give them their unique flavor. Among these are sour oranges, habanero chilis, axiote seeds, and so-called “recados” (specific spice mixtures). Here are some of the most popular Yucatecan dishes you’ll come across during your travel through the Yucatán peninsula.

1. Huevos Motuleños (“Eggs from Motul”): A Classic Breakfast (V)

Let’s start with breakfasts and small dishes. Huevos Motuleños is a typical breakfast dish that you can also find throughout Mexico. Fried eggs are served on (often fried) tortillas. The dish is then topped with a mild tomato sauce with ham and peas. It’s typically served with some slices of fried banana.

2. Salbutes: Fried Tortillas with Shredded Chicken or Turkey

Fried hand-made tortillas topped with a variety of ingredients, such as shredded chicken or turkey, lettuce, tomato, cucumber, onion, and avocados. Salbutes are often served as a snack or appetizer. They are similar to Panuchos (see below), but in comparison, Salbutes are softer.

3. Panuchos: Crunchy Fried Tortillas with Shredded Chicken or Turkey

Fried hand-made tortillas topped with a variety of ingredients, such as shredded chicken or turkey, beans, lettuce, tomato, and habaneros. Panuchos are often served as a snack or appetizer. They look almost the same as Salbutes, but in comparison, Panuchos are crunchier and filled with a paste of beans.

4. Sopa de Lima: Refreshing and Light Lime Soup

Sopa de Lima is a light refreshing soup that can be a starter or your main course. It contains pieces of shredded turkey, lime juice and slices, and crunchy fried tortillas cut into slices. Add habanero sauce for the extra kick.

5. Escabeche Oriental (“Oriental Marinade”): Chicken or Turkey Broth

Escabeche Oriental is a dish typical for Valladolid. It’s made with chicken or turkey marinated in a mixture of sour oranges, chiles, and spices. The ingredients are served in the broth used for cooking the turkey or chicken.

6. Papadzules: An Enchiladas Variation with Hard-Boiled Egg (V)

This variation of enchiladas contains hard-boiled, chopped eggs wrapped in corn tortillas, bathed in a creamy pumpkin seed sauce topped off with a mild tomato sauce. A delicious vegetarian option. You can also order it with a topping of fried Longaniza sausage (then it’s, of course, no longer vegetarian).

7. Queso Relleno: Stuffed Cheese in a Wheat-Based Sauce

Edam cheese stuffed with a mixture of ground meat, raisins, capers, and olives, seasoned with a unique blend of spices. It’s served in a wheat-based white sauce called “Kol”. This dish is a relatively modern dish inspired by European immigrants as it uses Edam cheese.

8. Cochinita Pibil (“Buried Pork”): Slowly Cooked Tender Pork

Pork wrapped up in banana leaves that is traditionally cooked underground for several hours in an earth oven (called “Pib”). Before the cooking, the meat is marinated in a zesty blend of sour orange juice, achiote paste (giving it a beautiful reddish hue), and spices, then traditionally slow-cooked in an underground pit lined with banana leaves. The result is fall-apart tender, intensely flavorful meat. It’s served as a dish on its own, or as the filling for tacos and tortas (sandwiches) with pickled red onions.

9. Mukbilpollo (“Burried Chicken”): A Tamales Variation with Chicken

This dish is usually reserved for special occasions like the Day of the Dead end of November, which is called Hanal Pixan in Yucatan. It’s a tamale-like creation where marinated chicken, along with a corn dough called masa, is wrapped in banana leaves and cooked underground. The slow cooking process gives the dish an earthy, smoky flavor, and makes the outside of the Mukbilpollo a bit crunchy.

10. Relleno Negro (“Black Stuffing”): Turkey in Black Sauce

This dish is made with wild turkey or chicken, achiote, and spices. The meat is cooked in a black sauce made with burnt tortillas, habanero chilis, and sour oranges. Relleno negro is often served with rice and beans. The black color that is due to roasted chili peppers takes some getting used to, but the dish is delicious!

11. Dzic de Venado: Spicy Shredded Venison

Shredded venison (deer) marinated in sour orange juice, habaneros, and spices for several hours before being cooked. Dzic de Venado is often served with rice and beans and can be spicier than most of the other dishes mentioned here.

12. Poc Chuc: Marinated Pork Steak

A pork steak that is first marinated in sour oranges and habaneros and then grilled or fried. Poc Chuc is often served with rice and beans.

13. Lomitos de Valladolid: Pork in Tomato Sauce

Pork that is marinated in a flavorful garlic tomato sauce before it’s fried or grilled. As this dish is cooked slowly, the meat is very tender and juicy. It’s served in bite-sized pieces of meat bathed in tomato sauce. As the name says, a specialty of the colonial town Valladolid.

14. Longaniza de Valladolid: Sausage from Valladolid

This pork sausage is so popular that you can often find it outside of the Yucatan state, not only in Valladolid. The sausage consists of a mixture of pork, spices, and sour oranges.

15. Pan de Cazón: “Dogfish Bread” Without Bread

This dish is often found at seafood restaurants and is made with shark meat. Contrary to what the name says, it’s not bread, but several tortillas that are layered like lasagna and filled with shark meat topped off with tomato sauce.

16. Kibis: A Lebanese-Heritage Snack

Kibi is a Yucatecan variation of the Lebanese Kibbeh and thus a rather modern dish. Kibis are made with ground beef, bulgur wheat, and spices, and then fried or baked. In seafood restaurants, ground beef is replaced with ground fish. Kibis are often sold as a snack at the beach or as botanas (appetizers) in restaurants. They’re often topped off with cabbage salad.

17. Marquesitas: A Yucatecan Crispy Waffle Dessert (V)

Marquesita is a traditional sweet snack or dessert made of a thin crepe that is filled with a variety of ingredients, such as grated cheese, Nutella, and fruit. The crepe is then rolled up and grilled so it becomes crunchy like a thin waffle. Marquesitas aren’t normally served in restaurants, but rather at stands that you can find on main squares or frequented boulevards and side streets.

18. Sikil Pak (also “Sikil P’aak”): A Vegetarian Dip (V)

This veggie dip is often served as an appetizer with tortilla chips. It’s made with toasted pumpkin seeds, cilantro, and toasted tomato. A great vegetarian snack!

19. Empanadas de Chaya: Fried Corn Pastry with “Tree-Leave Spinach” (V)

Empanadas are common throughout Mexico, but Empanadas de Chaya are made with chaya leaves, corn dough, and a variety of other ingredients. Chaya is sometimes described as “tree-leave spinach”. The chaya leaves are cooked and then mixed with the corn dough, often along with other ingredients, such as cheese, meat, or beans. The empanadas are then baked or fried.

20. Chaya con Limón or Piña: A Refreshing Chaya-Drink with Lime or Pineapple

This drink is made by blending chaya leaves with water, and often lime or pineapple. It’s sweet and refreshing. If you don’t want it too sweet, ask for less sugar (“con poco azúcar”). Chaya are leaves from a specific tree that is used in Yucatan for many dishes, like the empanadas de Chaya or Chaya soup.

21. Xtabentún: A Traditional Mayan Liqueur

Xtabentún is an ancient Mayan liqueur made with honey, anise, and rum. Xtabentún is often served as a digestif. It’s also a basis for cocktails.

Sounds delicious?

The Yucatecan cuisine is definitely one of my favorites. Lots of flavor and variety – there’s something for everyone. Make sure not to miss out! For recommendations on restaurants in Yucatan, check out my other posts on various travel destinations in Yucatan.