NAVIGATING THE WHAT/WHERE/WHEN OF DINING IN YUCATAN can be a daunting process. The what often doesn’t coincide with the when, much less the where! You may feel a craving to have a nice Italian lunch in Centro near your hotel – well, good luck! More frustrating still is looking for a Yucatecan specialty for the evening meal. You are not likely to find it – at least not of any quality. One really needs a matrix to plot out what kind of food can be had at what time of day. Read on for some helpful tips:

IN ORDER TO HELP YOU PLAN YOUR MEALS while traveling through Yucatán, we have organized the following reviews according to the restaurants' schedules. Desayuno is an early breakfast often eaten at 6am or before children leave for school. Almuerzo is a mid-day snack enjoyed at around 11am. Comida fuerte is the main meal of the day, which families enjoy together between 2pm and 4pm. Cena is often a light meal, eaten at 9pm or later. Modern “Americanized” tastes have introduced the relatively recent concept of dining out at night, in which case one would probably go lighter on the comida fuerte.

Some of the best authentic Yucatecan restaurants are open for three meals a day: desayuno,almuerzo and comida fuerte, with hours from roughly 6am until 4pm. These are usually the typical Cocinas económicas (translated literally “economical cooking”). Cocinas económicas often function in the front room of a private family home, providing income to the household and employing several family members.

It is difficult to find authentic Yucatecan cuisine for cena; instead, restaurants that serve cena either offer an international menu, or feature more modernized Mexican or Yucatecan menus catering to changing tastes and tourists.

NOTE: Our star qualification system is not intended to be referred to across categories. In other words, a three-star cocina economica is in no way meant to compare to a three-star formal dining establishment. The stars should be considered only for the sake of comparison to other entries within the same category.