Pepperpot & Garlic Pork!

Pepperpot

Pepperpot and garlic pork are among the must-have dishes in Guyana at Christmas. The unique thing about both of these dishes is that they get better with age- just like a good steak, wine, cheese or cured meat. Almost every home on Christmas morning has these dishes on the breakfast table. Click here to read how these dishes are made and aged.

As I’ve said in previous posts and columns, Guyana is made up a 6 races. The dish pepperpot has its origins with our Indigenous peoples (Amerindians). Here are some facts:

1. The key ingredient in pepperpot is cassava casareep, made from the juice extracted from grated cassava.
2. It takes the juice of 60 pounds of grated cassava, boiled for hours to produce one-10oz bottle of casreep.
3. The Indigenous peoples had no refrigeration and so they used casareep for its preservative properities (that is why pepperpot can be left on the stovetop, reheated daily for days and not spoil).
4. The indigenous peoples used lots of pepper sometimes instead of meat to make pepperpot, hence the name.
5. Cassava is gluten free, high in fibre and low in fat.
6. Casareep can be used as a browning agent in a variety of dishes such as stews, pelau etc.

Pepperpot, though traditionally eaten with cassava bread (made from the pulp after squeezing for the juice to make casareep) is more popularly eaten with homemade bread.

For info on how you can get casareep in your neck of the woods, please contact Annette Arjoon of the Guyana Marine Turtle Conservation Society, here.

Garlic Pork

Garlic pork, came from our Portuguese ancestors, it’s a pickle. A paste of fresh thyme and garlic are used to season thin slices of pork and then the meat is soaked in a solution of distilled vinegar, water and salt for weeks before its pan fried, sliced and served. You can read the column for more info.

Thyme-garlic paste

Pickling garlic pork

Recipes for both of these dishes are available, just send me an email.

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Bee and I would like to thank you for helping us to kick things off on the new blog, Forgive me my nonsense… do drop by again, we love to hearing from you.

By the way, Charlotte at the Great Big Veggie Challenge has been on a quest to introduce her family, particularly her 7-year-old son, Freddie, described as veggie-phobic, to eating and enjoying a wide variety of vegetables. Since they are going through the alphabet and are now at the letter P, the veg is Plantain. So if you have a plantain-recipe or plantain post and would like to share it, send it to Charlotte. Next week as she moves on to Q, she’ll be looking for Quick vegetable recipes, if you have any, you know what to do.