Celebrated primarily in the U.S. and Canada, Thanksgiving is a day set aside to give thanks. In the US, it’s celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November; in Canada, the second Monday in October.
As with all celebrations, food figures prominently, more specifically, turkey with stuffing, accompanied by cranberry relish, macaroni and cheese, string beans, sweet potatoes, and pumpkin or pecan pie. We’re not big fans of turkey, so in our house, we usually serve some of our favorites: fish, seafood, pork, mutton.
Unfortunately, I have no photos of past meals, but I do have several of meals I’ve had during my travels. Some were in restaurants, others were at friends’ homes.
So in observance of the holiday in the U.S., please enjoy this selection.
Meals from My Travels – Happy Thanksgiving!
Canada
Tortillas, TorontoCrab cake with salad, TorontoSeafood, Toronto
Umbria is a landlocked region of central Italy that is known for rolling hills dotted with castles and fortresses interrupted by lush valleys, and medieval towns that have remained largely unchanged for centuries.
The mighty Tiber River flows through Umbria, and Lake Trasimeno, one of Italy’s largest can be found there. Rich agricultural lands yield black truffles, tobacco and olives, and its vineyards produce fine wines. These make Umbria an ideal destination for anyone interested in eco-tourism.
Romantic, and beautifully preserved, Verona is a UNESCO World Heritage City and one of the most sought-after destinations in Italy.
It was once a Roman colony, was conquered by the Goths, and was the site of several battles. The French, under Napoleon, occupied the city, as did the Austrians.
Arena
Verano has also been featured in literature. It was the setting for three of Shakespeare’s plays – Romeo & Juliet, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, and The Taming of the Shrew, and was also mentioned by Goethe and Stendhal.
All this has given Verona a colorful history, making this city of just under 80 square miles, a walking museum of cathedrals, monuments, and architectural gems from Ancient Rome, the Middle Age, Scaliger and Austrian periods.
The patty is probably the best known fast food in Jamaica. This meat- or sometimes vegetable-filled meat pie is favored by rich and poor, young and old – for lunch, or a snack or sandwiched between a coco bread, a soft buttery roll, a meal.
Said to be a direct descendant of the Cornish pasty, the Jamaican patty is made most often with beef, which is enclosed in a
Jamaican Patty
flaky shell that has been brushed with egg yolk or tumeric, depending on the baker, to give it a reddish-yellow color.
The patty has evolved over the years and now comes in a variety of fillings – chicken, shrimp, lobster, fish, vegetable, callaloo, ackee and cheese. Beef, though, still remains the favorite.
Patty is big business, with as you can imagine, hundreds of patty shops around the island and in Jamaican communities abroad. Many popular eateries, like Juici Beef here, began as patty shops. (Juici Beef is now in all fourteen parishes and has a factory in Canada. Tastee, another popular patty place has several locations on the island and distributes in the Caribbean.) Golden Krust, which started in New York and now has about 120 franchises in the U.S. credits a substantial portion of its revenue to patty sales. It now supplies patties to Wal-Mart, the New York Public Schools, and correctional facilities.
There’s an art to eating a patty. Fresh from the oven, it is hot enough to cause burns. In fact, some restaurants in New York, display a sign right above the patty oven to warn customers.
My preference is to let the patty cool a bit before digging in. But usually by the time I reach for a patty, I’m quite hungry and maybe because I’m hungry, I think I convince myself that my hunger will insulate my tongue. No such luck. I’ve been burned several times!
A friend of mine opens hers up so the filling can cool faster, then she eats it with a knife and fork.
So the key to eating a patty, is to take your time. And if you’ve made a patty-coco bread sandwich or, as we used to call it in high school, a coco-pat, go even slower — the coco bread doesn’t cool the patty down any faster.
If you’ve had a Jamaican patty, do share your tips for eating it.
Crackling Pig Roast. The words evoke images of celebration, of good times and cheer. So as my sister was reading the announcement in the local paper, I was making plans to be there. I was so intrigued by the idea of a pig roast and the menu that Chef Gari Ferguson had created that I almost showed up a week early!
The Menu –
Whole Smoked Crackling Roast Pig
Green Papaya Slaw
Pickled Red Onions
Hard Dough Rolls with Honey Butter
Smoked Sweet Potato
Mac & Goat Cheese
BBQ Onions
Tangy Tamarind Glaze
Coconut and Lemongrass Sauce
Mango Scotch Bonnet Sauce
On the evening of, we were among the first to arrive. People started trickling in in twos and threes and before long, all the tables were full. Then I watched as the pig was brought in and carefully laid on the table, four young men doing the honors.
Crackling Roast PigCrackling Roast Pig
Chef Gari presiding over the crackling roast pig.
I selected green papaya slaw, hard dough rolls with honey butter, and mac and goat cheese. Contrary to the name, the green papaya wasn’t green. It was those orange-looking strips peeking out below the pork.
Crackling Pig Roast
The pig was tender and succulent, and so tasty that I went back for seconds — it was, after all, all-you-can-eat.
Crackling Pig Roast
Another view of my plate. That’s the glazed onions in front, mac and cheese in the background.
G’s BBQ had its second crackling pig roast this week but I wasn’t able to go. It’s now planning to make it a monthly event so if you like pork and are in the Kingston area during the next month, be sure to check them out.
G’s BBQ
The Marketplace
67 Constant Spring Road
Kingston 10
Mondays-Saturdays, 12 noon to 10:30 p.m.
876-906-4393
Check G’s for the current price.
This is my submission to this week’s Budget Travelers Sandbox Travel Photo Thursday series. Be sure to check out other photo and story entries on their website.
As I looked for photos for today’s Travel Photo Thursday, I was surprised by all the photos I’ve taken of food. But I shouldn’t have been.
I love looking at food, the way it’s presented, the interplay of colors and textures, even the shape of the plate it’s presented on. As I look at these photos, I recall something Solange, my almost-mother-in-law, used to say, “La nourriture doit plaire a l’oeil avant de plaire a l’estomac (Food must please the eyes before it pleases the stomach).”
So dig in and enjoy!
Ackee and Salt fish Breakfast (New Jersey/Jamaica)
I took this photo of a brunch I had at Max, a little Jamaican restaurant in Hackensack, NJ. That’s ackee and salt fish, Jamaica’s national dish. It’s also been listed on the Top 10 National Dishes by National Geographic. Here it’s accompanied by fried breadfruit, avocado, and dumplings.
Crab Salad (New York)Pulled Pork Sandwich (New York)Tapas (London)Fish and Chips (London)
British comfort food – Fish and Chips.
Steak and Fries (France)
I never would have expected to have steak and fries in Paris but my friend Karen said the restaurant had been highly recommended. I’m not big on steak so I was a little hesitant but this did not disappoint.
Steak & Ale Pie (Lacock, UK)
I’m always up for trying something new and this Steak & Ale pie sounded interesting. It was delicious. I’m glad I tried it.
Mexican Paella (New York)
Mexico puts its own spin on the paella.
Dessert (New York)
My favorite dessert: sorbet and fresh fruit.
Mango Sorbet (New York)Fresh Fruit
This is my submission to this week’s Budget Travelers Sandbox Travel Photo Thursday series. Be sure to check out other photo and story entries on their website!
Food is an integral part of our lives. And on Thanksgiving, we give thanks with one of the biggest feasts of the year.
Thanksgiving isn’t an official holiday in Jamaica though some Jamaicans who’ve returned home have brought the tradition with them. What we have that’s similar is harvest. At the harvest, members bring produce to their church to receive a blessing from the priest.
Honey bananas
These bananas are called honey, because they’re naturally sweet, sweeter than regular bananas. They are also smaller than average bananas, probably a half or two-thirds in size, and are quite popular in Jamaica. Honey bananas sell fast despite the fact that they’re usually more expensive than regular bananas.
Green bananas
These bananas are called green to differentiate them from the yellow ones, which most people are familiar with. Green bananas are boiled and often eaten with steamed fish, ackee and salt fish or other meats. It’s also used to make porridge, dumplings or put in mannish water soup, a soup that is made from the head and intestines and other parts of the goat. It is believed to be an aphrodisiac.
Avocados
We picked these avocados at the home of one of my cousins. Since they weren’t quite rips, we wrapped them in newspaper to speed up the process.
Breadfruit
The breadfruit was brought to Jamaica by Captain William Bligh between 1780 and 1786. Roasted, it is is the perfect accompaniment to ackee and salt fish, our national dish. It can also be eaten boiled, fried, used in soups, and made into chips. For roasting, I prefer them a little ripe or turned. They are a little sweeter and softer. In soups, I prefer them what we call, young, meaning not ripe. Breadfruit can also be referred to as full, ready.
Ackee
The main ingredient in ackee and salt fish, our national dish, ackee was brought to Jamaica from West Africa. It’s ackee season now and the trees are laden with fruit. Ackees contain a poisonous gas and must be opened before they are picked.
Jamaican cooks and chefs have been experimenting with how they prepare ackee. Moving away from the traditional marriage with salt fish, ackees can be curried, or used in bruschetta and cheesecake.
A basket of food
A bountiful harvest of fruits, vegetables and produce. Happy Thanksgiving!
A Jamaican breakfast is usually a pretty substantial meal. It can consist of any of the following: boiled green banana, fried plantain, dumplings, Johnny Cakes, roasted breadfruit (when in season), Festival (a Johnny Cake made of flour and cornmeal), avocado (when in season) and yam with either steamed fish, ackee and saltfish, callaloo or callaloo and saltfish, corned beef, sardines, etc. Sometimes, there might be porridge made from oats, cornmeal, banana, plantain, peanut, etc.
Ackee, saltfish, dumplings, roasted breadfruit and avocado
I took the photo of a breakfast I had a few weeks ago at Max, a Jamaican restaurant in Hackensack, New Jersey. I went there specifically for the ackee and saltfish, a true treat, and No. 2 on National Geographic’s Top 1o National Dishes. I had it with Festival, fried roasted breadfruit, boiled dumplings, a slice of yam and a slice of avocado. Needless to say, I couldn’t finish it!
Getting real jerk pork is one of the things I look forward to when I’m in Jamaica.
What’s Jerk?
Jerk is a style of cooking that originated on the island back in the late 1950-60s. Traditionally, spices such as garlic, mace (the outer shell of the nutmeg), thyme, cinnamon, scallion and Scotch Bonnet pepper were mixed together and rubbed into pork that was then slow-cooked in a pit fire of pimento wood. The pimento gave it its signature flavor.
Jerk pork was very popular when I was a child. As I wrote in an earlier post, I remember the Jerk Man going door to door on his bicycle selling jerk pork – it was only pork then.
Perhaps because of the influence of the Rastafarians and the fact that cooking this way is a complicated and time-consuming process, it almost disappeared.
When it returned in the late 1970s, enterprising chefs had figured out how to approximate the flavor that is derived from the pimento wood. As a result, jerk went international. It also became widely and wildly interpreted. (I’ve even seen it served with ketchup!)
Since my arrival roughly three weeks ago, I’m been on a hunt for real jerk. So far, I’ve visited several establishments, each proudly advertising mostly pork and chicken, but only once have I not left disappointed. My biggest dissatisfaction was with Border Jerk, a little spot on the border of Westmoreland and Hanover, my favorite spot – their rendition is now severely compromised.
By far the worst I’ve had was at the Jerk Center in Ocho Rios – the pork didn’t even look cooked.
To their credit, all these places offer bottled pepper for people, like me, who want it hotter but even the pepper has been watered down.
When I complain, my friends tell me to get away from the North Coast and the places where visitors frequent. They are probably right.
I’m pleased to report that I did get some real jerk on Saturday night in a little joint near Runaway Bay in St. Ann. But by the time I found it, near 11 p.m., I was so hungry I forgot to take a photo of it.
In the meantime, my search for real jerk continues. I just hope they don’t start watering down my rum and coke!
