Eating in Venezuela is an exciting and rich experience. Venezuela has many different styles of food and counts with thousands of great restaurants in all the major cities and towns of Venezuela.

Although Venezuelan dishes are traditional that can be found in nearly all local restaurants, there are a wide variety of world’s cuisines available like Italian, Chinese, French, etc. The most common foods used in the Venezuelan cuisine are the rice, chickens, yucca ("yuca"), bananas and black beans.

Here are some most popular Venezuelan dishes:

Arepas – A flat cornmeal patty which is grilled, baked, or fried. They can be filled with a number of ingredients such as chicken, ham, cheese, beef, chicken, ham, sausage, shrimp, cheese, etc.

Hallaca - Traditional christmas dish made from chopped beef, pork and chicken with green peppers, onion, garlic, tomatoes, raisins, olives and various herbs and spices all mixed into maize dough. It is then wrapped in banana leaves and steamed.

Hervido - This soup combines beef, chicken or fish with potatoes and other Venezuelan vegetables depending on region.

Cachapa - Thick, slightly sweet pancake made with maize and served with mozzarella-type cheese (queso guayanesa).

Cachito - Hot croissant filled with chopped ham and or cheese.

Empanada - Deep-fried cornmeal turnover filled with chicken, ham, cheese, fish (baby shark included) or meat.

Meats - Meat is very common in almost every dish. Vegetarians in Venezuela are out of luck. Beef tops the list, but deer, capybara, goat, rabbit, lamb, and chicken are also on the menu.

Fruits are abundant in Venezuela, we can find fruits like Mango, papaya (lechosa), avocado (aguacate) oranges (naranja), guava (guayaba), passionfruit (parchita), banana (cambur) coconut (coco), pineapple (piña), melon (melón), and soursap (guanábana).

Venezuelans favorite drinks are batidos, a thicker juice, and milkshakes (merengada) and sugar cane juice with lemon (papelón con limón) and fresh coconut milk.

Hard drinks like the beer are very consumed in the country and the most popular brand is Polar. Rum, the commonly found spirit, comes in several varieties and is mixed with coke to make Cuba libre, a favourite drink amongst Venezuelans.

Coffee is domestically produced in Venezuela and is the most common hot beverage. It is always offered to visitors as a welcome drink.