Cooking and culture gloriously collide in this tropical garden of Eden

A low-flying toucan is the first clue that this is no ordinary cooking class. An impromptu salsa lesson confirms it.

“Forward step, and back,” calls our host Giselle Perez, breaking from stirring a pot of boiling cassava to share her dance moves.

She has the moves: Giselle Perez, one of the founders who has lived in the community for 32 years.Credit: Lebo Lukewarm/Intrepid Travel 

Beyond the open-air pavilion, farmland gives way to forest, its thick canopy weighed down by the torrential downpour which has been beating down for the last hour. While some of our group continue to fold empanadas, and others grind cacao beans to make hot chocolate, all are swinging hips in time to the music. Perez’s display of pura vida – a pure or simple life – is impossible to resist.

This collision of cooking, culture and conservation comes to life in the Juanilama Agro-Ecologica Community in the far north of Costa Rica. Here, 28 close-knit families – led by a band of strong-willed matriarchs – have created a sustainable rural tourism project beyond compare. Their story is one of courage, determination and true grit – all served with a side of salsa.

A low-flying toucan is the first clue that this is no ordinary cooking class.Credit: iStock

“Our lives changed in 1991,” says Yamileth Soto Mendez, one of the four remaining founders. Handing out mugs of scalding hot chocolate, she recounts the early days, when the Costa Rican government gave a large parcel of land to be distributed equally among 125 families who had been identified as living with economic hardship.

“We started from zero,” she says. “Yes, we had been gifted land, but it took six years until we had running water and another five to get electricity. Only then could we apply to the government for prefabricated houses.”

Today, these little homes are painted in a riot of colours, their cheery facades peeping through the evergreen like a garland of hibiscus flowers. As she talks, the rain begins to ease, the forest leaning in to listen to her stories of hope and triumph.

“Right from the beginning, we set aside 19 hectares of virgin jungle for conservation,” says Mendez. “The rest we cultivated for crops and livestock.”

Some members of Costa Rica’s Juanilama community.Credit: Lebo Lukewarm/Intrepid Travel

Life was unimaginably hard – so hard that 40 per cent of the families left in the first year.

Those that remained worked tirelessly to transform this small patch into a garden of Eden. A break in the weather lets us down kitchen utensils for a stroll through Mendez’s garden, where she points out turmeric, peppercorns and oregano – all of which we’ll use later to flavour our meal. Pineapples stand to attention in tidy rows while lemons and limes hang from branches like Christmas lights. Everything sprouts, blossoms and blooms, infused with the pungent aroma of crushed leaves, foraged from the forest to be used as mulch.

Our small group of 10, on a tour with Intrepid Travel, has taken a sidestep from Costa Rica’s tourist trail to see first-hand the benefits tourism can bring to rural communities. “I had no opportunity for education,” says Mendoza. “But now my daughter is a high school teacher and my son is studying geography at tertiary level.”

While we are here for a cooking class, other groups on longer itineraries may stay the night, each hosted by different families. Activities include hiking to a waterfall, learning about plants as traditional medicine or making soap from natural products.

Community cooking in Costa Rica’s Juanilama community.Credit: Lebo Lukewarm/Intrepid Travel

Back in the kitchen, we split into two groups – one to prepare enyucados, a rural dish of cassava stuffed with chorizo, and the other to make empanadas with chicken or black beans. Other women step in to guide our hands and share their stories; there’s Elaina, who specialises in making paper from leaves, Sandra, who makes clothing, and Sofia, who hosts visitors in her home. All are bound to the 19-hectares of forest which makes everything possible.

“We are a group of women who chose this path for empowerment,” says Mendez. “And we will keep going.”

THE DETAILS

Fly

United Arlines operates flights from Sydney and Melbourne to Los Angeles, with connections to San Jose in Costa Rica, via Houston. See united.com

Tour

Intrepid Travel’s 15-day Classic Costa Rica, starting and ending in San Jose, costs from $2160 a person, twin share. See intrepidtravel.com

More

visitcostarica.com

The writer was a guest of Intrepid Travel.