A block up from the pier on Heroes there’s a state book store on the corner of Carmen Ochoa St. It has a name, but there is nowhere you can read it from the street with naked eye due to idiotic positioning. Alas, the public sector. Worth a look for unusual books, including a whole department on the Maya world.
A block WEST of this store is desert heaven at La Michoacana, but take a stroll south on Ochoa for some tasty and unusual eats. About a block down on the left is La Invencible, a very good bakery with great varieties of invicible bread and goodies. Mexican style, you use tongs to load up a tray, then take it to the register. But next door is really worth looking out for, El Pavo Dorado. They have some unsual Yucatan stuff, which I’ll get to, but mostly this is absolute paradise for anybody (oddly not unlike myself) who loves turkey sandwiches and has been in Mexico long enough to crave one. Strangely, although the turkey was practically invented in this area (and first eaten by Europeans here, forget that Plymouth Rock thanksgiving jive), it is almost impossible to find it in Mexico except in processed "ham" blocks with names like "Fud" and "Jam". But HERE, at the Gilded Turkey, you can get it just about anyway you want it. They have turkey sandwiches, turkey tortas, turkey tacos, turkey salbutes, turkey panuchos, turkey stew with or without eggs (¿?). My advice is avoid the sandwich (lousy Bimbo brand "wonder" bread). Also pass on the normal turkey torta for $10 pesos. It comes on a roll, but is picked to pieces, the way they like to do. Spring for the $18 peso special filet sandwich, it’s the hot setup. Thick slabs of white breast. Yummy. And you don’t even have to watch the damn Lions try to play football.
The only way I can tell you what a salbut or panucho is, you have to try one. No big deal, but very regional. Try their weird little tamales instead. Or top off your sandwich with a $3 peso empanada, a sort of poptart or popover or what-have-you. Stuffed with melted cheese, or for kicks, cazon, meaning chopped up shark. Tell your friends about your shark danish snack.
For desert, get the platano cubano—a tiny banana stuffed with cheeze then fried, then topped with cream. It doesn’t look like a banana; it looks like an egg. Very tasty. They also have horchata and jamaica and smoothies and all sorts of cool drinks. It may not look like much (even the turkey looks like left over Thanksgiving decor), but it delivers good, conversation piece chow for cheap.