Breadfruit & Salt Fish Patties

These patties can work for any meal, including afternoon Tea (well, particularly if you are from the Caribbean) 😊. They are great as a snack too. You can make the lot into a meal by simply serving them with a green salad. Make the patties smaller and you have an appetizer - this recipe is versatile. Click here for details to make these Breadfruit & Salt Fish Patties.

No deep frying involved. Keep the patties warm in a low-heat oven. Recipe.

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Day 5: Alternative Breakfast

Recipe: Breakfast Casserole

While this is the time for the traditional stuff, it is good idea to mix things up. This casserole can be served for a late breakfast or brunch.

Those returning home from the cold for the holidays would welcome a plate of salt fish; add a couple of sunny-side up eggs with creamy yolks to mix in with the fish. Serve with homemade bread.

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Channeling Dr. Seuss' Green Eggs

I. Love. Broccoli. I eat the stems raw after removing the fibrous outer skin, and steam the moss-like heads and eat them just like that. Whenever I steam broccoli (which is often), I always leave back a few florets to cook with eggs. Sometimes it's fried eggs with broccoli and other times, I add cheese to the mix. So good!

To keep the broccoli green after steaming, and for this fry up, here is what to do:

• Add water to a saucepan and insert a steam rack (metal racks are for perfect for this). Cover pot, place over medium heat, and bring to a boil.
• Drop in broccoli, cover and steam for 4 minutes - longer if you like your broccoli softer.
• Remove broccoli and place on wire rack to cool. Leaving the broccoli in the hot pot even with the heat turned off will continue to cook the broccoli - it will turn to mush in your mouth when eaten and dull green, in colour.

You got this right? If you want specific directions for cooking the eggs and broccoli, click here.

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Ditch The Mayo For This Egg Salad

Creamy with a hint of inherent sweetness, avocados make an excellent substitute for mayonnaise for certain salads. Coleslaw, tuna, potato, and egg salads are among my favorites to use this fruit as a cream-based dressing. Sometimes I add it 2 ways - as a dressing and as one of the main ingredients by cutting the avocados into chunks or slices.

This salad is certainly a different kind of green eggs.

Click here for the recipe.

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Cheddar-Scallion Biscuits

Best on the same day they are made, these soft, savoury, cheesy biscuits with herby scallions are excellent with pats of butter melting into the leafy layers. Yum!

Want to make them? Get the recipe here. Enjoy!

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We Call It Fried Eggs

One of the main things I set out to do as a food enthusiast is to put our own food in front of us; it matters not which part of the region you are from. My goal is simple - appreciation. It is my hope that through the appreciation of our bounty, variety, and freshness, that we will strive to cook at home more often, buy what we produce, pass along cooking techniques that can only be learnt by doing, and share know-how that cannot be found in a cookbook.

Sometimes the familiarity of our food can make us think that it is simple, ordinary, and unflattering. Way too often, it takes outside sources to make us realize that what we have is special and that it is food/dishes to be celebrated and uplifted. A few years ago I watched as a very famous TV chef rubbed her hands in glee in anticipation of a guest coming on her show to make Mexican-style scrambled eggs. Her enthusiasm was infectious so I stayed glued to the show; I'm always looking for new and different ways to cook familiar ingredients. When I saw the dish being made - onions, tomatoes, minced hot peppers being sautéed with beaten eggs mixed in - I laughed, not in mockery, but with the pleasure that I already knew how to cook eggs like this :)) I grew up on this stuff!

What I took away from the show is that what is ordinary for someone is extraordinary for another, and, that we must constantly showcase and celebrate all of our food. Over the years, my preference for the ways in which I like my eggs has meant that I have not had this style of fried eggs in years. I made it the other day, and having not eaten eggs this way in such a long time, it brought back warm memories of growing up in Guyana. The eggs were absolutely delicious. I don't know why it has taken me so long to get back this childhood favourite.

Here is how I made it.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 tablespoon oil
• 1/2 cup chopped tomatoes
• Finely minced hot pepper, to taste
• Salt to taste
• 2 scallions, white & green parts, sliced wafer thin
• 2 large eggs, room temperature, lightly beaten

DIRECTIONS

1. Add oil to pan and place over medium heat until the oil is hot. Toss in tomatoes and hot pepper along with salt to taste, stir to mix then reduce heat to low and cook until the tomatoes are soft.
2. Mix scallions with eggs and then add to pan with tomatoes; raise the heat just a little and cook, gently scrambling the eggs with the tomato mixture. Cook until the eggs are cooked through with big tender pieces of egg.

NOTE

• Use white/yellow onions in place of scallions and parsley or finely minced Chinese celery (aka known as Guyanese celery), leaves only for the herb flavour.

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Barbados @ 50 - Bakes

Bakes (fried dough) is something each state in the region has in common, and though they may look similar, each one is different. The bakes featured in this series are the traditional ole-time Bajan bakes made with flour, sugar and water. I added a bit of cinnamon for flavour. No leavening agent is added to these bakes. There is a modern version of these Bajan Bakes as explained by the late renowned Bajan writer and academic, Austin Clarke. A pat of butter, milk and baking powder lighten these bakes.

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Barbados @ 50 - Salt Bread

Each country in the region has its signature bread roll which is separate and apart from their signature loaf bread. Round bread rolls called Salt Bread is Barbados' signature rolls. These rolls, while they can be eaten plain or with butter and jam, are turned into cutters. A cutter is a salt bread that is sliced crossway and stuffed with a filling. Whatever that filling is becomes the name of the cutter. For example, if the filling is cheese, it becomes a cheese cutter, fried fish, a fish cutter, sliced ham, ham cutter etc. If 2 fish cakes are stuffed between the cut salt bread it is known as "bread and two".

As with many other things, each household and individual has their preference of bakery where the salt bread is made. And all salt bread are not created equal. What I mean by this is that people look for different things in salt bread. Some like the roll to be hard while others like it soft; some like it dense while others prefer it light.

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Barbados @ 50 - Breakfast

There are many breakfast spots all around Barbados where you can stop and get a hot meal. After an early Saturday morning trip to Bridgetown market to stock up on fresh fruits and vegetables for the week, I stop by at one of the cook shops in the market to get breakfast. With my breakfast in hand,  along with a bottle of fresh local fruit juice, I get a newspaper and drive out to the beach to enjoy my breakfast and read the papers.

Coconut Dumplings, Cornmeal Dumplings, Fried Salt fish © Cynthia Nelson

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Eating My Fill of Fruits

It may seem strange to talk about summer when the Caribbean enjoys summer-like weather all-year round. However, we do feel the difference in the atmosphere as it is hotter at this time of the year, and fruits, especially favourites like mangoes, pineapples, and a variety of melons are plentiful.

Friends with fruit trees share their bounty, so too do neighbours. Buying fruits at this time of the year is a bargain. I bought cantaloupe for as little as BDS $1-dollar per pound. This is the perfect time of the year to cook, eat and drink fruits. Don't forget to puree some of it and freeze so that you can make your favourite desserts and drinks until the season comes around again.

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Guyana @ 50 - Liver & Onions

When you live in a multi-cultural society like Guyana, your meals are diverse. For example, you could eat an Indian dish for breakfast, Chinese for lunch and Indigenous for dinner. Each meal takes you on a journey around the country. Sunday morning breakfast for us was fried (sautéed) bolanger/baigan (eggplant) with bread. I hated it. Liver & Onions was a favourite in many households; now this is the kind of Sunday morning breakfast I could get behind.

Liver & Onions ©Cynthia Nelson

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Guyana @ 50 - Roti

In Guyana we make several types of roti(s), and though the influence is from India, we have definitely put our stamp on this favourite flat bread with the use of leavening agents such as powder and yeast, depending on the type of roti made. We also mostly use all-purpose flour for our roti(s) even though wholewheat roti(s), especially sada are increasingly popular.

Our roti(s) are plain such as our Paratha or Dosti roti or they can be stuffed as is the case with our Dhal Puri and Aloo (potato) roti. Potato roti is one of those roti(s) that is meant to be eaten on its own due to the savoury spiced filling of mashed potatoes.

The photograph of this the 31st day of the Guyana @ 50 Food Photo Project shows potato roti being cooked on a tawah.

Potato Roti Cooking ©Cynthia Nelson

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Guyana @ 50 - Porridge

Porridge is a well-loved breakfast food. Hearty bowls and cups of various grains are turned into creamy goodness and spiced with cinnamon sticks or fresh bay leaves. Barley, sago, oats, plantain, cream of wheat, and flour porridge are among the more popular ones. Cornmeal porridge is also known as Cornmeal pap.

Cornmeal Porridge ©Cynthia Nelson

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Breakfast Avocado Bruschetta

With advancements made in growing and planting food, in many countries, certain fruits and vegetables can be found all year round. While it is a plus for some, it seems to fly in the face of seasonal food. What do you think?

Here in the Caribbean, even though we have a year-round tropical environment in which certain produce thrive, they are not necessarily available all the time. At various times of the year it gets too humid, too wet or too dry. Butterflies, and other insects that are prevalent at varying times throughout the year affect the planting and harvesting of certain foods. The soil itself needs time to recover from each planting as well as the plants and trees from harvesting. It is the same with seafood, at different times of the year you get only certain types of fish. In very many ways, we continue to eat seasonally.

Avocados/pears/zaboka are currently in season. Open-air markets, supermarkets, and small roadside stalls are all stocked with the pear-shaped to round, green to purple fruit in varying sizes. We like to eat it simply - halved with a sprinkling of salt or just as is. Another way is to serve it sliced along with breakfast or lunch. I especially like it on toast - mashed or sliced.

Made in the style of a bruschetta, I toasted artisan-style homemade bread then rubbed the crust with cut garlic, layered the sliced avocado and dressed it with the limey-brine of Lime Pepper Sauce, along with freshly ground black pepper. The softened pepper from the pepper sauce was mashed lightly with the back of a spoon and carelessly smudged over the avocado.

On another occasion, I mashed the avocado and added thinly sliced green onions/scallions along with some of the Lime Pepper Sauce and generously smeared it over toast.

How do you like to eat your avocados/pears/zaboka?

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Bacon of the Sea

One of the many pleasures of life is having good friends, especially those that share your interests. Julius Gittens is one such friend.

On a fine Saturday morning a few weeks ago, Julius arrived at my place and we had a foodie exchange. I gave him fiery hot bird peppers and he surprised me with a back of Bacon of the Sea. You should have seen him, armed with an insulated bag to keep the goodies at the right temperature. I was immediately intrigued.

Bacon of the Sea is a smoked fish product made in Grenada. It is naturally smoked sailfish strips. Packaged just like bacon, it sells itself as a bacon substitutes for those who do not consume pork or are looking for a healthy alternative to regular bacon. With strict instructions not to cook it for more than 30 seconds, Julius was off. He had more stops to make on his Bacon of the Sea tour.

A week later, I cooked the bacon substitute. Once defrosted, I followed the package instructions of heating a pan with a little oil and sticking to the overall cooking time of 30 seconds. Cooked longer (and I did do that just to test it), the 'bacon' becomes stiff but that is not such a bad thing because you can then chop it into bits, like bacon bits.

As you can see in the picture from the package, the fish is redolent with the signature, brown, smoked hue. However, once it hits the pan, it turns opaque (see photo below) and there is a slight hue of pink. One of the surprising things for me is that it smelt a little like bacon while it was cooking. Maybe it is because of the smoke-cured process.

As I tasted the bacon, it reminded me of smoked salmon. I enjoyed it and would definitely buy it if I had ready access to the product. What I especially liked is that I found the portion in the package to be quite generous. There were 13 strips in the packet (I counted).

If you are interested in the sautéed tomatoes on the plate, here's what to to:

So, Jules, when you making another delivery?

For more information on Bacon of the Sea and how you can access the product, please check out the following:

Southern Fishermen Association Inc.
Grand Mal
St. George's
GRENADA
website: www.southernfishermen-grenada.com
Email: southfish@spiceisle.com
Tel/Fax: (473) 435-1693

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Breakfast SWEET POTATOES

These little bite-size roasted sweet potatoes are a treat - at breakfast, as a snack or as a side dish. Most of the times when I make them this way, I serve them in place of English breakfast potatoes.

The 'recipe' is a no-brainer.

• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
• Take out a rimmed baking sheet and drizzle with a neutral-flavoured oil.
• Wash and scrub the sweet potatoes, pat them dry and then cut into 1-inch cubes/pieces. 
• It is not necessary to season these sweet potatoes, you can cook them as is but I like to give them a little spice so I use a favorite all-purpose seasoning mix that already has in a little salt. Sprinkle with seasoning and toss well.
• Spread in an even layer on the baking sheet. Drizzle some oil over the sweet potatoes and roast for 25 - 30 minutes.
• Remove from oven, let cool for 5 - 10 minutes in pan before removing and serving.

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Breakfast Potatoes

Hi Everyone,

I trust that 2015 has been treating you well so far.

If you've been following this blog for a while, you will know that I am not big on making resolutions, but every now and then, throughout the year, I make an attempt to eat breakfast. I am the kind of person that wants to wake up each morning and be surprised by what I find on my plate for breakfast. While I am quite content to eat the same thing 2 to 3 days in a row for lunch or dinner, that is not the case when it comes to breakfast. I seek variety: savoury and sweet (more savoury), heavy and light, liquid and solids.

Here's the thing, because I want breakfast to be a surprise and something different daily, I find that I cannot plan what I want to have for breakfast the day or night before, this generally results in me not having breakfast at all. If I am not rushing to get out of the house, invariably, I'll have tea.

The other day I got up and felt like eating potatoes for breakfast. Ah, a rare occasion that I actually knew what I wanted to eat for breakfast. These potatoes were done cooking in under half an hour. I like that.

There's no particular recipe. All you need are potatoes, oil or butter if you prefer, salt and pepper. I used a dry all purpose seasoning for my potatoes and finished them off with chopped chives.

Scrub or peel some potatoes and dice them

Heat a pan (cast iron works great) with 2 tablespoons oil until smoking hot and add the potatoes to the pan and spread it out in an even layer. Do not touch it, let it cook for 5 minutes to get brown on the parts that are in direct contact with the pan

Meanwhile, sprinkle the seasoning along with some salt and freshly ground black pepper

Toss the potatoes to let other pieces brown. Let it cook for another 5 minutes

Cover the pan, turn the heat to low and let steam-cook for 15 minutes. Remove the cover, shut off the heat and garnish with chives or thinly sliced green onions

I had mine with a fried egg.

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Back With a Favourite Breakfast

It was not like me to disappear unannounced but it happened and I apologise. It was one of those situations where you missed a scheduled posting and then it stretched into a longer period of time. I ditched Facebook and Twitter for the same period of time too. I ain't gonna lie, though I missed you, I enjoyed being away :-)) But I am back and slowly getting into the rhythm of blogging again.

The MY FOOD Project has been ongoing behind the scenes but the interviews will continue to be posted effective from next week Wednesday.

Today I am sharing with you one of my all-time favourite ground provisions - cassava (aka yucca). This is the veggie version, it can also be cooked with salt fish. Yum! This method of preparation is called 'boil & fry'. The cassava is first peeled and boiled then 'fried' really meaning a sauté. I did something a little different  this time around - I let the tomatoes cook low and slow until they became pulpy and sauce like. I also wanted the flavour of garlic to be more pronounced so instead of crushing and finely chopping, I grated the garlic making it a paste. Add it (the garlic paste) the same time with the tomatoes so that it can cook through well. The recipe is here, just leave out the salt fish.

Talk to you again, soon!

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Tomato-ee Eggs

If you've been reading me for a while you will know that I do not like to make my own breakfast. You will also know that breakfast, for me, can never be the same thing day after day. In other words, I'm not the type of person that can have cereal everyday for breakfast, or oats, eggs, or even the same fruit every morning. If I had Harry Potter's wand, I'd summon something different every day and breakfast would easily become my favourite meal of the day. Alas, I'm only a muggle.

With college closed, and having some time to dilly-dally in the mornings, I set about making myself breakfast. I felt like eating eggs but I wanted it to be saucy so that I could drag my bread through and  mop up my plate, hence this tomato-re eggs.

There's no particular recipe, you just need to get some tomatoes, a couple of eggs, salt and pepper and a sprinkling of green onions or chives which pair well with eggs and tomatoes.

Start by chopping up the tomatoes finely. Heat some oil in a pan, add the tomatoes along with salt and pepper to taste and cook the tomatoes until they are soft, and can be mashed easily with the back of a spoon. Lower the heat after you add the tomatoes so that they can cook gently. Once the tomatoes are mashed and become a pulpy sauce, break a couple of eggs and add them to the pan and cook to your preference. No need to add any more salt and pepper as there should be enough seasoning in the tomatoes. Garnish with chives or thinly sliced green onions and eat!

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Pancakes Galore!

Shrove Tuesday, also known as Pancake Day is this Tuesday (March 4). Even if this is not an occasion you observe, pancakes are good any time right? Therefore, take your pick of pancakes.

REPLACE BUTTERMILK IN RECIPE WITH REGULAR MILK OR WATER

BUTTERMILK PANCAKE RECIPE

STIR IN CHOC-CHIPS JUST BEFORE MAKING PANCAKES

DUTCH BABY PANCAKE RECIPE

MAKE INDIVIDUAL SMALL DUTCH BABY PANCAKES WITH THE SAME RECIPE

DRESSED DUTCH BABY PANCAKES

GUYANESE-STYLE PANCAKES

LIGHTLY DRIZZLE WITH SYRUP & ROLL IN CASTOR SUGAR

GET A LITTLE FANCY AND MAKE CREPES

EXCELLENT WITH FRUIT AND SWEET FILLINGS

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