El Trapiche de Nayo

El Trapiche de Nayo Review

This rustic open-air restaurant with a panoramic valley view serves the kind of food Ticos eat at turnos (village fund-raising festivals), including hard-to-find sopa de mondongo (tripe soup). Easier to stomach are the gallos (do-it-yourself tortillas) stuffed with hearts of palm, root vegetables, and wood-fire-cooked chicken. On Saturday, raw sugarcane is pressed in an antique mill and boiled in huge iron cauldrons to make smooth sobado, a molasses-flavored fudge. Service is leisurely, to say the least, but there is lots of birdlife to watch in the surrounding trees while you wait. The restrooms have been upgraded, so it's a decent pit stop, too. It's open 7 am to 7 pm daily.