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Jamaica / Special Interests / Food and Cooking

By Deana Bellamy , James Henderson

The food you are likely to come across in Jamaica is fairly typical of the British Caribbean. In the hotel dining rooms and in the restaurants catering primarily to the tourist trade you will usually find the same often “international” fare. There may be some local flavours, but the food tends to be targeted at the largely American and British visitors and so it is usually fairly bland and often unadventurous. In fact many of the ingredients are imported too, despite Jamaica’s fertility. Restaurants may be themed, say Italian or Mexican, but in fact there are surprisingly few top independent restaurants even in the main resort towns. Only a few of the hotel dining rooms have pretensions to sophisticated international cuisine. There are of course many fast food chains, some American and some Jamaican, but the style is still the same.

If you look a little further afield, though, there is plenty to discover. The island has fantastic fruits to begin with. There are bananas, pawpaw, mango (including varieties Julie, Bombay and No 11), pineapples and exotics such as soursop and sweetsop, guineps and guavas, otaheite apples and endless varieties of citrus including lime, lemon, orange and grapefruit, ortanique and ugli fruits, which is named for its knobbled, warty skin. Of course there is the coconut, which can be used in a huge variety of ways, but there are also cashews and peanuts. Fruits are widely served as juice and in desserts, particularly in ice creams.

Jamaican vegetables tend to be quite heavy and starchy and they are not really what most travellers want to eat in a hot climate. They are interesting though, and you will see them for sale if you visit the market. You will find yam, a tuber that grows underground beneath a shaggy vine; cassava, another root vegetable that was used by the Arawaks; and the sweet potato. There are many sorts of vegetable bananas and there is even one vegetable that you will find in a tree. The breadfruit starts off standing upright like a lollipop and then hangs down in a starchy green cannonball which thuds to earth. Untypical perhaps is the chocho, a light green, pear-shaped vegetable that can be used in salads.

Jamaican food may not be what you might want to eat for a week while on holiday. It tends to be quite thick and is often heavy, a stew served with a volley of hefty vegetables or rice. It is worth a try though, and although you may get a night at your hotel in which they serve a buffet of local dishes, you can also find some restaurants around the tourist towns that serve specifically Jamaican food. Just a few restaurants around Jamaica use the island’s exceptional ingredients in an inventive way. For a list of dishes, see below.

The Jamaicans also love their street food. The best example of this is jerk (also below), but you will also find stalls at the roadside where they have fried chicken and festival, fry fish and bammy or a corn soup. If you see vendors standing at the roadside (particularly at Black River and holding small bags with pink produce, these are “swims” or peppered shrimps. Tasty but hot (and don’t put your hand near your eyes).

If you are interested in learning how to prepare local dishes, and are staying in a villa then you can ask the cook to show you how to prepare food in Jamaican style. There are currently no cookery courses available on island, but some of the larger resorts have culinary demonstrations for guests as part of their weekly activities.

Some of the favourite Jamaican dishes you might come across include:

Ackee and Saltfish – Jamaica’s national dish and usually eaten for breakfast. The peach-coloured fruit of the ackee tree has cream-coloured flesh which, when cooked, looks and tastes not unlike scrambled eggs, with a hint of avocado. This is sautéd with flaked saltfish (dried salted cod which has been soaked and then boiled), onions, green pepper, scotch bonnet pepper, thyme, tomatoes and seasonings. The unripe ackee is poisonous so before use, the pod should always be allowed to open up and ripen naturally (revealing its shiny black seeds). You can buy canned ackee.

Bammy – a flatbread made from deep fried cassava flour, often served as an accompaniment to escoveitch fish.

Run-down – a creamy and piquant sauce made from coconut cream, scotch bonnet pepper, garlic, onion, thyme, chopped tomato and allspice, which is then simmered with fish or seafood, with whole mackerel the traditional choice, served with boiled green bananas, yam, roast breadfruit and dumplings. Run-down also works well with chicken.

Curry Goat – a mild curry made with goat on the bone served with chutney and either plain boiled rice or rice and peas.

Duckanoo - also known as Tie a Leaf and Blue Drawers, duckanoo is a popular sweet pudding steamed in banana leaves. Its main ingredients are cornmeal, grated coconut, grated sweet potato, green banana, spices and brown sugar.

Escoveitch Fish – usually a whole fried fish such as tilapia (a freshwater fish caught in Jamaica) or red snapper filets, served with a pickle-like sauce, made with vinegar, scotch bonnet peppers, garlic, onions, thyme and pimento seeds, which is heated and served over the fish and some extra sliced onions. Traditionally served with bammy, see above.

Bun & Cheese - really a loaf of sweet bread with mixed dried fruit, fruit peel, mixed spice, cinnamon and nutmeg (not unlike a tea bread or very dense fruit cake) that is traditionally enjoyed at Easter with sliced cheddar cheese, like a sandwich. However it is so popular that it is eaten year round.

Festival – a slightly sweet, deep fried dumpling stick, eaten with jerk.

Jerk – a method of cooking and marinating meats that originated with the Maroons, runaways that held out against British rule for nearly 200 years in the interior of Jamaica. To preserve meat they had hunted, it was marinated in a mixture of spices, wrapped in leaves and slow-cooked in a hot stone pit or sometimes cooked over pimento wood fires. Today Boston Bay is “the home of jerk” and has several jerk “pits” at the roadside, serving pork, chicken and local sausage grilled en-mass over open fires, using a selection of local woods – pimento wood is seldom used, being expensive and hard to come by. The jerk seasoning is a mixture (recipes vary) which basically consists of scotch bonnet peppers, scallion, pimento (allspice), thyme, salt, allspice, nutmeg, garlic, vinegar and sugar, which is then used for marinating whatever is to be grilled. The jerk of your choice is hacked into bite-sized pieces, literally, with a huge cleaver, for easy eating and can be accompanied by a festival (slightly sweet, fried dumpling) or a piece of baked yam, sweet potato or breadfruit, and is usually drunk with an ice cold Red Stripe. For those who like their jerk really hot, ask for some jerk pepper sauce to dip into. To find out more read our article What is a Jerk Centre?

Jamaican Jerk Seasoning can be found in larger supermarkets in the UK. The main brands are Walkerswood, Grace and Dunn’s River - see below.

Patty – the Jamaican patty is a popular lunchtime fast-food, and the equivalent to a hamburger or a sandwich in other climes. It is made from a slightly crusty, pastry dough formed into a semi-circle envelope/turnover and filled with hot and spicy ground meat filling. The most popular flavour is beef, but you will also come across chicken, lamb, prawn and saltfish as alternatives. There are two main patty chains in Jamaica, Tastee’s and Juici’s, and each has its fans. Tastee’s is the original and has been in the business for over 30 years, and for many is the patty of patties. If you do fancy a patty, don’t leave it until too late in the afternoon as they tend to sell quickly – around 100,000 patties are sold in Jamaica every day.

Rice & Peas – actually kidney beans or gungo bean and not peas, mixed with rice cooked in coconut milk, and seasoned with garlic, thyme and spring onion. Sometimes scotch bonnet pepper is added.

Solomon Gundy – the main ingredient is smoked herring which is mashed together with peppers and seasonings to make a spicy paté-like mixture which is then eaten on crackers (water biscuits), or used in cooking.

Stamp and Go – known by different names on other Caribbean islands but hugely popular nevertheless, these are basically fish fritters. Sometimes they are known as fishcakes. They are made from saltfish, mixed into a flour-based batter with spring onion, seasonings and scotch bonnet pepper, then deep fried. They are best served hot, and are almost always served at rum punch or cocktail parties, with a hot pepper dipping sauce.

Some of the Jamaican food products you might like to consider buying:

Blue Mountain Coffee - Jamaica Blue Mountain coffee is some of the most famous in the world. The beans must be grown on the slopes of the Blue Mountains within specified elevation restrictions – coffee grown outside these are known as High Mountain Supreme, Jamaican Prime or Jamaica Select according to the Jamaica Coffee Industry Board. The Arabica coffee beans are handpicked, with 100% pure Blue Mountain coffee coming from Mavis Bank (whose factory handles 40% of the island’s coffee and markets its own roasted beans as Jablum and its green beans exported in wooden barrels as M.B.C.F.), Silver Hill, Moy Hall and Wallenford (Government Station) Estates. Many regard it as the world’s finest coffee. It is certainly among the world’s most expensive. Named brands selling pure Jamaican Blue Mountain ground or coffee beans in shops island-wide, are Jablum and Country Traders. Around 85% of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee is exported to Japan, 10% to North America and the rest goes to Europe or the Caricom countries, so if you are a coffee fan it is worth while stocking up whilse on island. Prices are considerably less than what you would pay at home.

Mavis Bank Coffee Estate, Blue Mountains - Tours of the estate to see the various processes of drying and roasting coffee are available on working days, best by appointment.

Busha Browne’s - A range of products made in Jamaica which includes jerk seasoning, sauces, jams, jellies (including pepper jelly) and chutney’s.

Pickapeppa Sauce - A brown sauce made in Jamaica since 1921 and originating from Shooter’s Hill near Mandeville. It is made from a mix of sugar cane vinegar, tomatoes, onions, mangoes, raisins, tamarind, peppers and secret spices, then aged in oak barrels for one year.

Rum - You will find rum on sale island-wide, much of it duty free. The most famous rum in Jamaica is probably Appleton and their flagship is Appleton Estate V/X, a smooth blend of 5 to 10 year old rums. A tour of the factory and estate includes a tasting session, and there is a gift shop with rum and souvenirs for sale. Other rums include Tia Maria, a coffee liqueur made from rum, Blue Mountain Coffee, vanilla and cane syrup.

Walkerswood - For a taste of Jamaica back home, Walkerswood is the island’s top brand of Jamaican seasonings and sauces. Their range includes Jerk Seasoning, Jerk Marinade, Dried Jerk Seasoning and Escoveitch Sauce. They are available in supermarkets, souvenir gift shops and at the airports.

Food and Cooking on Jamaica

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Looking for inspiration?

  1. Sample some fiery jerk chicken or pork at one of the many stands in Boston - the home of jerk 
  2. Take a tour of Appleton Estate, Jamaica's oldest rum producer
  3. Spend the day exploring Dunn's River Falls & Park
  4. Enjoy a round of golf at one of Montego Bay's five, 18-hole courses
  5. Immerse yourself in local culture and pay a visit to the Bob Marley Museum in Kingston

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