Titiyas.Kelaguen.Empanadas.

Titiyas = Tortillas

Kelaguen = Ceviche

Empanadas = Empanadillas

Ayuyu = Cangrejo

I'm fascinated with food. Especially Chamorro food, which bares a strong resemblence to Spanish food (there's a strong Spanish influence due to their 300+ year reign over Guam and the CNMI from 1565 to 1899), except it's jam-packed with carbs and sodium - why do the bad things taste sooo good? Here's an example of a chamorro dish - one which my brother and I were greeted with upon arriving in Saipan.

Fried reef fish, chicken, titiyas (or tortillas), rice, finadeni and starfruit ko'ko' (pickled starfruit). The little side dish is finadeni, a staple condiment in the CNMI. It's made of soy sauce, lemon juice (or sometimes made with vinegar, lime juice, lemon powder, etc.) and a red pepper paste (often called tinian pepper, made of crushed red peppers, garlic, water and salt).

My aunt ordered empanadas from a local mom and pop shop. They were so orange - it was blinding! Chamorros make good use of the achote seeds - we use it for seasoning rice, porridge (chalakilis) and as you can see in the photo above, sometimes the color from the rice bleeds onto the empanada wrapping.  

On my last night in the island, we had some of my favorite dishes: coconut crab, chicken kelaguen (similar to ceviche) and papaya ko'ko' (pickled papaya).

There's nothing like indulging in some island goodness in the sticky hot breeze with the dragging wail of an authentic Chamorro song playing in the background. Feels like I'm a kid again.