A Bajan Menu



International Recipes

logo

marga@lacabe.com





It's been a pretty warm summer here in the Bay Area so I didn't mind cooking a Caribbean cuisine for the third time in a row (my other recent experiences were with Bahamian and Anguillan food). The light cuisine of the islands seemed to fit perfectly my mood and my fantasies.

Bajan food, as the food of the other islands, is a blend of the old and the new, the imported and native. Its culinary traditions harken back to England and Africa but have evolved to take advantage of local products. As it's to be expected, fish is ubiquitous in Bajan diet, as are pork and chicken. Fruits and vegetables such as cassava, breadfuits, pawpaws, guavas and mangoes also have a predominant place.

For my exploration of Bajan food I wanted to make dishes that were both typical and relatively easy to make. For the first time I prepared the entire meal while taking care of my little baby, so simplicity was of the essence. Fortunately it wasn't too difficult to find recipes that would fit both requirements.

As an appetizer I settled on fried flying fish with cou-cou (a cornmeal mash) because that's Barbados national dish. I couldn't find flying fish so I just substituted with another white fish. As an entree I settled on an easy roasted pork dish - perhaps not the best thing to make during the summer but fortunately it was a pretty cool day. As a dessert I went for a bread pudding as most of the other desserts I found seemed to be cakes and I'm not much of a baker - this unfortunately was a poor choice as the bread pudding did not turn out.

Comments

Bajan Food Links