Rock La Casbah!

La Casbah is a great restaurant to check out while in Bocas del Toro. It is located at the far end of the main strip as you are headed out of town. It has a great outdoor seating area on the road to people watch and you can still see what is going on in the open-air kitchen. Best of both worlds for me. The restaurant was pretty full when we arrived and the host/owner/only server seemed to have his hands very full. But this must be a common occurrence because he is on top of his game with a full house. We felt fully attended to the whole meal, which is not common in a lot of places in Central America. Even hunting down a very cool bag of ice to chill off the warm red wine (wine connoisseurs don’t be offended- its hot here, we like chilled red wine). We started off with three appetizers: Gazpacho, dates wrapped in bacon and tuna Carpaccio. All three were great! Anything wrapped in bacon is always a good choice and the crispy bacon with the sweet dates was an easy home run. The gazpacho was creamy and nicely balanced the sherry vinegar and sweet tomato flavor. It came with a side of croutons and diced red onion and red and green peppers. I like the idea of adding crispy elements to the smooth base. The tuna Carpaccio was served with red onion, green peppers, Parmesan, tomatoes, basil and good olive oil. The flavors were all there and strangely did not overwhelm the thinly sliced tuna. If anything the dish needed a bit more citrus and fresh ground pepper. We forged on with main dishes of sole (fish of the day) served with a cucumber coconut sauce and the house special of Greek chicken, which is stuffed with goat cheese and prunes and topped with a sundried tomato sauce. The chicken was nicely cooked (not dried out which restaurants tend to do when stuffing) and the sundried tomato sauce paired well with the prunes but the goat cheese was lost amongst the strong flavors. I enjoyed this entrée over the fish of the day though. Sole is a very delicate fish and it needs a light non-overbearing sauce. Serving the creamy and heavy coconut cucumber sauce with a heartier fish would be divine but the sole was bogged down. But with the great preparations of all the other dishes this just entices me to go back one day and try the next fish of the day. While in Bocas del Toro you must try La Casbah! Even just for appetizers and wine, it’s a great restaurant!