Veracruz is one of the places with the greatest culinary traditions in Mexico, and its condition as a port city, opened to the flavours of the world, and the crossbred proper of the colonial period, are the exquisite origins of the varied, rich and amazing gastronomy of this region.

The list of local dishes is extensive and characterised for the peculiar taste of the spices used on their preparation, and for the exclusive and almost unmatchable quality of its sea fruits, main ingredients in the food of Veracruz, catalogued as first class.

One of the best results of this regional inventiveness is the pescado a la veracruzana, a portentous dish on which several floured fillets sauté in butter are taken to the oven, and then covered with tomato sauce, pepper, garlic and onions.

On your spoon-and-fork tours through the restaurants of the first port in Mexico, do not fail to ask for the fish in escabeche, the octopuses on their ink, the empanadas of shrimp, the fried fish and the chilpachole, a stew whose main ingredient is the jaiba (crab).

Travellers will find excellent alternatives throughout the state at mealtime; north of the city, in the Town of San Rafael, they will find dishes with clear French influences; while more to the south, in Catemaco, they will try the delicious fried Mayan cichlid; if you wish to try something more daring, taste the dishes based on monkeys.

Mexican whims also have a preponderant place in the gastronomy of Veracruz, so do not miss the tamales of black mole, fish and chepil (a wild plant of small leafs that is used to season some stews); the soup of chochoyotes (balls made of maize dough) and the crackling chapulines (grasshoppers).

When the time for dessert comes, the best thing to do is fall under the spell of the exotic ice cream of rose petals, of the honeyed chickpeas, the sweetened sweet potato, or the gollorias, a sweet made with walnut and sugar.

And for après la meal, there is nothing like the aromatic coffee of the zone, one of the best in the world, being the Great Café of the Parish, founded in 1881 and refurbished in the 1920s, the traditional place where to taste it (340 Insurgentes Veracruzanos Avenue).