I had been dying to go to Vieques for a few years now after hearing how laid back and gorgeous it was. Plus there was a new W Hotel there (which I know, kind of seems to ruin the unspoiled nature of this island but I did really enjoy it there), so I was lucky enough to get a decent IATA rate in Dec for a few days and check it out. It's a fairly quick plane ride from NYC to San Juan (3 1/2 hours) and then it's a 20 min puddle jumper plane ride away to Vieques. So you can leave your house and be on the beach by the afternnon which is amazing.
Surprisingly, for a tiny island that you can drive around in less than 45 minutes there are lots of food options. I was scared at first that I would be stuck to the confines of the hotel, but there were actually so many great places that I left with a few places still on my list to check out. As I was doing research before the trip, one place that kept coming up as one of the newer/nicer places was the restaurant at the newly designed El Blok Hotel. Surprisingly, they were also on OpenTable, so I booked a reservation for the 1st night we were there (although the restaurant was pretty empty, so it wasn't really needed). Unfortunately we got to the restaurant at night, so we couldn't really see the cool design but it's definitely very modern and unique in structure. The restaurant is run by Jose Enrique, a 2 time James Beard award winning chef, and the menu is a modern take on traditional Puerto Rican food. Allison and I ended up splitting the ceviche and swordfish and Deanna got the soup of the day, a large salad and a side of fried eggplant nuggets. The ceviche was tuna based and was definitely different than the traditional version - this one had coconut milk in it which made it a bit sweeter instead of tangy and sour, but I enjoyed it none the less. The swordfish was huge and grilled very well - sometimes swordfish can be super fishy and greasy but this one was grilled to a nice tender texture. It was served with a delicious local green salad and these addictive little fried eggplant nuggets, which was essentially the inside of the eggplant, battered and fried. It's easy to pop 30 of them in our mouth without even realizing it. Deanna's salad looked great and very fresh - we were surprised at how fantastic all the local greens were. This one came with local farmer's cheese and breadcrumbs. Her soup was a smoked onion and potato based broth which she said she also really enjoyed.
For dessert, we had to go with the churros and you could see that they were freshly made because they were pipping hot when they arrived at the table. They weren't covered in sugar and cinnamon like they typically are but they made up for it by giving us giant bottles of chocolate, dolce de leche and condensed milk to pour on our plates. The churros were soft but crunchy and the perfect vehicle for my sweet sweet mixture of condensed milk and dolce de leche. Sweet perfection.
Overall, it was a very enjoyable and contemporary way to kick off our vacation. I suspect that as PR moves out of rainy season, this place would be more crowded, but it was nice to be able to really relax and enjoy a fancy meal in such a low key island with no crowds. Total bill: $125 for 3 people with tax, tip and drinks
Photo Credit: Architectural Digest
El Resuelve Carretera 997 Km 1, Vieques, Puerto Rico 00765 3 Forks
On our 2nd day in Vieques, we rented a Jeep (yay!) and drove down to the local beaches. On our way there, the nice guy at the car rental place recommended that we check this place out for lunch because it's super authentic and very local. Right up my alley.
He wasn't kidding when he said it was authentic and local. It's right off the side of the main road and it's not flashy and has a very mom and pop feel to it. The menu is mostly in Spanish and even though I understand bits and pieces for Spanish I had a hard time figuring out what to eat. The nice lady behind the counter didn't speak tons of English and I didn't want to bombard her with lots of questions. I had really wanted to get an empanada but they were super fried looking and I was headed to the beach, so I tried to be good and instead split a salad with grilled chicken and an octopus salad with Allison. Deanna got rice and beans which came with a side of fried plantains. This was definitely by far the cheapest place we ate all vacation and if I had the chance to go back (which I would) I would definitely order differently.
The side salad was totally fine, nothing special. The grilled chicken was marinated in peppers and onions and while tasty and moist was a bit heavy on the salty side. I was expecting the octopus salad to be similar to what I had in Croatia where it was served cold and closer to the rare side. But this was a very warm and very cooked through octopus salad with the same peppers and onion mix. It was good, just not what I was expecting. I realized I still prefer the cold version instead. I had a few bites of Deanna's food and while it wasn't anything fancy, I could see how this was more of what I probably should have gotten. The fried plantains were excellent and perfectly fried and served with 1,000 Island dressing which I know sounds totally weird and gross, but it strangely worked for me.
I left feeling a bit bummed that I should have stuck with my original thought of an empanada and rice and beans but in my sad and pitiful quest to try to be more healthy, I went for a mediocre salad instead. While this place wasn't mind blowing, it is worth a stop on the way to the beach and it is a nice respite from the more touristy places in Esparanza. Total bill: $23 for 2 people
Photo Credit: Yelp
Bili Restaurant Calle Flamboyan 144, Esperanza, Vieques, Puerto Rico 00765 4.5 Forks
When you're in Vieques, the "downtown" area is known as Esparanza which is essentially a very short street with 5-6 restaurants jammed by the waterfront. This is the busiest road on the whole island but if you actually saw what it looked like you would fall down laughing because it's barely 1/2 a street block in NYC. In any case, you will find a nice selection of casual touristy friendly restaurants there that range for bar food to upscale. We had been to Banana's for happy hour and as you would expect from that name, it's more of casual bar but I will say that they had a very delicious and tangy snapper ceviche ($13.50) that I would highly recommend. Plus for HH, you can get $4 margaritas and watch the sunset or go during regular hours and get a Corona for $3.50.
As for dinner, we opted for Bili's which is bit on the nicer side. The waitress was super sweet and nice and walked us through the menu. Everyone here on the island is incredibly friendly - I guess why wouldn't you be when you live on a tiny super relaxed island?! We all split a fresh house salad to start ($10) - Deanna will want me to mention that the salad came with these adorable small serving tongs that made splitting the salad really easy. Again, the salad was awesome and very fresh tasting. Who knew PR had such great vegetation? Now for the best part of the meal. Allison had ordered a side of the root vegetable mash to start. We all took a bite and it was like my head (and heart) exploded. It's basically mashed potato but made with yucca, cassava, yams and other root veggies. But this was made with like 20 sticks of butter and the different flavor profiles of the root veggies made it taste less starchy than a regular potato and they had a hint of sweetness to it. We were all obsessed with this dish. I know I use the word "addictive" a lot on this blog but I would seriously kill for this dish. Luckily for me, my mahi mahi ($26) came on a bed of this mash as well as some plantain mojo. I would have been happy just eating another pound of the mash but mixing it with the nice white flakey fish was delicious too. I loved the pop of sweetness the plantains gave to the dish as well - I cleaned up every last bite of this dish.
I'm not sure how I left any room for dessert but I did. We got a blueberry shortcake which was basically a strawberry shortcake but with blueberry (duh). The shortcake was nicely done - it was dense but still flakey and paired nicely with cold ice cream. Sadly the mash was starting to really take its toll on me and I couldn't really eat more than a few bites but I would definitely recommend it. I was really surprised at how fantastic the food was here. Usually when I'm traveling to the Caribbean or other islands, the food isn't really all that and it's really expensive. I've been extremely pleased with how great the food has been so far - especially on a teeny tiny island like Vieques where the total population is barely 9,000 people. Total bill: $150 for 3 people with tax and tip
Photo Credit: Yelp
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