Sancocho is Panama's national dish and the answer to most problems. It is a slow-cooked soup of chicken on the bone with root vegetables — ñame (yam), yuca, and otoe (a local taro), seasoned with culantro (not cilantro — a broader-leafed herb with a more intense flavour) and served with white rice on the side. The broth is clear, deeply savoury, and profoundly restorative; Panamanians eat it at Sunday lunch, after a night out, when ill, and as general fortification against the heat.
The best sancocho is found in fondas — small local canteens, often family-run, found throughout the city outside the tourist neighbourhoods. They are not hard to find; they are where Panamanians eat every day. Ask a taxi driver or hotel staff where they go for sancocho and you will get an honest answer. The price will be low, the portion generous, and the context will be right: plastic chairs, fluorescent light, a TV showing the news, and a bowl of soup that tastes like someone's grandmother made it.
There are fondas in the neighbourhoods around El Cangrejo and San Francisco that serve good sancocho; the Casco Viejo has versions at higher prices in nicer settings, which are still worth eating, but the fonda experience is different.