Chef Adriana Casco welcomes you to her beachfront restaurant for a hands-on cooking class featuring regional, tropical favorites with a modern touch. Overlooking Playa Piuta, Geckos Café & Grille is located just 20 minutes from the pier and is known for fresh, flavorful cuisine in a stylish, open-air setting. The chef embodies Costa Ricans’ “pura vida” ethos – living life simply, in a relaxed way, focused on the good – and brings those sensibilities to the kitchen. During your lesson, Casco will show you how to select quality tropical ingredients and to use nutritional science in planning a menu that is both healthy and delicious. Then she will guide you through preparing a main course of Costa Rican-style chicken accompanied by patacones (fried plantains), rice and beans, and other dishes. You’ll also get to sample some refreshing hiel, a tradition homemade beverage flavored with lime juice, ginger and sugar. When the food is ready, everyone sits down to dine together with your choice of beer or wine. A memorable gastronomic-cultural experience that you’ll want to recreate for others back home.
A chef-restauranteur imparts her country’s “pura vida” ethos along with traditional tropical cuisine that showcases the finest, freshest ingredients.