What to Eat: 

Puerto Ricans cook the best pork in the world!  An island favorite is roast suckling pig (lechon asado).  Everyone roasts pork at Christmas, but you can find wonderful pork all year long in every town and city.  My personal favorite is The Parrot Club's pork sandwich, but mofongo with pork is a great second.  Other specialties that should not be missed:  pastelon (ripe plantains layered with seasoned ground beef and served with rice), arroz con pollo (chicken -- or some other meat -- served with rice and often cooked in coconut milk), serenata (codfish in a vinaigrette sauce with tomatoes, onions, avocados and tubers), sorrullos (corn fritters), chicharron (pork cracklings), biftec criollo (PR steak), tostones (fried plantains), mofongo (plantains...often served with pork, chicken, or shrimp in a garlic butter sauce), flan (wonderful custard), guayaba con queso (candied fruit slices with cheese), and anything with local fruits -- mango, papaya, passion fruit, bananas, pineapple, and grapefruit. 

Where to Eat:

A favorite place to eat in Puerto Rico is Old San Juan.  There are so many wonderful restaurants in the old city.  Try the Parrot Club for lunch or dinner (located on Fortaleza Street).  Prices are inexpensive.  La Bombonera (San Francisco Street) is terrific for breakfast.  It is a traditional Puerto Rican cafeteria-style bakery, sort of like a diner.  They make mallorcas that melt in your mouth and serve local Yauco coffee.  You can also get a good arroz con pollo and the price is cheap.  The Hotel El Convento's El Picoteo has a great tapas bar (located on Cristo Street).  Il Perugino, across the street  from Hotel El Convento, is located in a restored home.  Go there for pasta if you get a craving for Italian.  They offer a good selection of wines, but the price is on the expensive side.  Baru, located on San Sebastian Street, has an eclectic mix of Caribbean and Mediterranean foods, tasty and great atmosphere at moderate prices.  Amadeus, also on San Sebastian, serves traditional Puerto Rican dinners and makes a delicious ceviche, all at moderate prices.  And Aguaviva is fantastic!  The restaurant has a trendy decor and serves delicious seafood in the Latin style.  Expensive, but worth it. 

 For an international flavor try Dragonfly (Asian-Latino), great sushi, expensive; Tantra (Indian) on Fortaleza Street, also expensive; or La Chaumiere (French) on Tetuan. 

Outside Old San Juan some really great places include the restaurant at the Horned Dorset near Mayaguez.  Very expensive and a long drive unless you are staying on that side of the island.  Su Casa, at the Hyatt Dorado Beach, has a lot of history and generally serves a good meal (although the Hyatt is scheduled to be closing end of May, so I suspect the restaurant will also close).  Lots of people love Ajili Mojili in the Condado, but I think it's a bit expensive for local fare that you can get many other places.  All the major hotels have fairly decent restaurants.  There's a Ruth's Chris Steak House in the Inter-Continental, The Palm in the El San Juan, and  the Ritz has a pretty good restaurant, but Metropol (across the street from the Ritz in Isle Verde) is a great local favorite and cheap, too.  It's Cuban, has a packed parking lot almost every night, and gives huge portions.  Don't miss the tres leche cake!!  (There are three Metropols in PR).  If you stay at the El Conquistador and tire of its numerous eating places (they're expensive, too, by the way), hop in a cab and head to nearby Fajardo for dinner in one of the local cafes.  My favorite is the Happy Oyster, right on the water.  Cheap, delicious food -- especially the shrimp mofongo served in the traditional mofongo goblet and smothered in garlic butter sauce. 

For those people that come in a budget, Puerto Rico has the widest variety of restaurants made for taste, price and style. You can go from the little place down in Piñones or Luquillo to the most expensive in Santurce and San Juan.  If you go anywhere in the island you will find your fried food such as Taco de jueyes o langosta (crabmeat or lobster tacos), Bacalaitos (Codfish fried dough), alcapurrias de carne, pollo o jueyes (made with ground plantains and other veges and filling); dulce de coco (coconut candy)....etc.  When going to Luquillo, you will see this line of concrete huts and many cars and motorcycles in front, called the "KIOSQUITOS" where you can have the coldest beer or the drink of you choice with the best "fritura" (fried food).  When you go to Ponce and adjacent areas, you will find good such as ostras (oysters) to eat from the vendor in the corner.  In Ponce you will also find Mark's Restaurant at the Melia Hotel, wonderful chef!!!  Reservations recommended.  To stay in Guanica (near Ponce) you have the Copamarina, good food, nice place to stay at a med price budget.  In Rincon there are several hotels such as the Rincon by the Seas (really in Añasco), nice area, excellent budget hotel and good places around to eat.

In San Juan some favorites include Jose, Jose in Condado; Parrot Club, Sonne, La Chaumiere (expensive) in Old San Juan; Bravamar Rio Piedras, El Pez Dorado in Caparra Mall (a little of everything, excellent fish, meat, tostones, avocado salad..... everything is good), in Fajardo, Pasion por el Fogon and a little place outside el Conquistador Hotel (good and cheap) with good puertorrican food; in Isabela, Eclipse at Villa Montaña; in Caguas there are many good restaurants, one of them Los Olivos. 

Don't follow always what the Tourism Office tells you, some of the Gastronomique places are awful!  However, there are a few very good ones, e.g., Buen Cafe in Hatillo, just west of Arecibo. Always ask around!  Puertorrican people are very friendly and most will find a way to comunicate with you if they don't speak the language.