Little Miz English : Jamaica Jerk Chicken and More!

The Food of Jamaica

I love trying new food when I travel. Jamaica has a lot of fruit that we don’t have in the US. One of the things I was able to do while in Jamaica was to visit a farm in the country. We went to Trelawny (which is where Usane Bolt is from). My friend’s friend’s father owns the farm and took us on a tour. It was about three hours away from Portmore and took us even longer since we got lost a couple of times. The road up to the farm was a bit scary as it was a narrow road with sharp curves where you couldn’t see if another car was coming.

When we arrived, we were greeted with a traditional Jamaican bush stew. This is a stew that is literally made in the middle of the farm. The farmer takes fruit and vegetables from his crop and tosses them into a pot on a campfire. The stew was served in a bucket (I’m still not entirely sure where my spoon came from—I probably don’t want to know J).

After our bush stew, our guide took us all over the farm. He gave my friend loads and loads of fruit. He gave her plantains, bread fruit, yams, sugar cane, pimento leaves, ginger, and pumpkin. He loaded up his donkey to carry all of the fruit out of the farm to our car. I was very grateful for the car air conditioning! Then it was back down the windy road to home.

I learned a lot about the fruits of Jamaica. Farming in Jamaica is very different than in the US. The farmers simply plant their fruits and vegetables in random locations throughout the hills. In the US, our farms and gardens are usually in straight rows and organized so similar vegetables are by each other. Despite the seclusion of the farm and the quiet solitude of the hills, there was great cell phone reception J as there were towers and lines close by. Communication technology has crept into every corner of the planet!

The toll road in Kingston

Andrea stoning mangoes (you throw

Avocados are called pears in Jamaica and pears are called American pears because they don't have our pears.

Hiking to Andrea's father's farm

All the fruit Andrea's father had collected for us.

The farm shack where Andrea's dad takes naps.

Plantains are heavy!

Bush soup!

My bucket of soup.

A handy farming tool :)

Jack Fruit

Tobacco leaves

Andrea's Father cow

Sugar Cane

The snail shells are white in this part of Jamaica. I never saw one with a snail in it so see what they look like.

Hmm....

I was a bit confused how to eat sugar cane. You bite off a piece and chew it until all the juice is gone and then spit out the chunk.

Loading the fruit on the donkey.

The donkey all loaded up with fruit.

A hardware store

Very Rastafarian!

All the fruit in the back of our car.

Trelawny's countryside

A Jerk chicken stand

A bus stop

Yep, right in the middle of the road, the taxi driver pulled over to take care of some business. When you gotta go, you gotta go :)

A cemetery

A country house

These signs are all over Jamaica. They are very motivating!

Some of my favorite dishes in Jamaica were jerk chicken (the original BBQ that was invented in Jamaica), Ackee and Saltfish (a traditional breakfast meal), Bammy (grated cassava fruit), Johnny Cakes (which are dumplings) Festival (a fried dough) and fried plantains. I loved the mangos! One of my favorite thing to eat was Bread Fruit. This is a fruit that grows on trees and you fry it and put salt on it. It was a really cheap food that was used to feed the slaves who worked on the plantations. One fruit that did not look appetizing was Noni. This fruit is placed in a glass jar and it sweats a liquid that you drink. The juice is supposed to be very good for you. It looked awful in the jar. We ate a lot of patties (which are little beef/chicken filled pastries that are fried). We also had Coco Bread, which was a sweet bread, kind of like a scone (there was no chocolate). By far my favorite meal was at my friend’s mother-in-law’s house where she made us yummy chicken, pasta, salad, and ice cream for dessert. She is a great cook! There is a traditional drink in Jamaica called Ting. It is made from grapefruit. A few years ago, Tang sued Ting over the use of their name, claiming it was too close to theirs. I also loved the guava juice and coconut water. The best part about visiting a new place is trying new foods and flavors.