Jamaican jerk marinade + recipe + remembering the Caribbean

I made Jamaican jerk chicken the other day and featured it on our daily changing lunch menu. It read: Jamaican Jerk Chicken – Spicy Grilled Chicken Skewer, Caribbean Coconut Peas n’ Rice, Steamed Vegetables,Grilled Banana. I’ll probably make it again this week so I will take a picture then and post it on the blog…

Hot chilies!

Some say the star of jerk marinade are the scotch bonnet chilies of the Caribbean – considered some of the hottest chilies in the world. Although the chilies are important to the marinade, you can use any chili available to give it heat – even dried chili flakes or cayenne pepper! The real key ingredient in jerk marinade is the allspice. In my humble opinion, allspice in combination with other dried spices (nutmeg, cinnamon, pepper and clove) and fresh ingredients (scallion, garlic, ginger, coriander, fresh thyme & the all important chilies) define jerk marinade.

The “nutmeg fruit” from the tree at the botanical gardens in Kingston, St. Vincent. The nutmeg is inside the brown seed covered by red mace. The spice is ready to harvest when the fruit splits open.

I love making this marinade from scratch. It is 100% better than the jarred ones loaded with MSG that you can buy in the grocery store and 1000 times better than the powdered jerk seasoning made with who knows what. My recipe for jerk marinade was one I learned from the Jamaicans I worked with at Amanyara in Turks and Caicos.  The ingredients are rough estimates and should make around a cup of marinade enough for 1 kilo of pork or chicken. Whole dried spices are better to use but if you don’t have them I’ve included the ground spice equivalents. When using whole spices, use a coffee or spice grinder and grind them into a powder.

Jamaican Jerk Marinade

Ingredients

4 cloves garlic, chopped

2 shallots, chopped

3 stalks spring onion, chopped

a handful of fresh coriander/cilantro (leaves and stems), chopped

a 3 inch piece of ginger, peeled and chopped

2-3 scotch bonnet or habanero chillies, chopped (more chili, more spicy!)

3 tablespoons whole allspice, ground (2 tablespoons ground)

5 pieces whole cloves, ground (1/2 teaspoon ground)

2 fresh nutmeg, ground (about 2 teaspoons ground)

1 cinnamon stick, ground (1 tablespoon ground)

2 dried bay leaves

1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves taken off the stem, chopped (or 1/2 teaspoon dried)

1 tablespoom sugar

the juice of 2 limes

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1/2 cup vegetable oil

salt and black pepper to taste

Procedure

1. Blend everything together to make a thick paste.

2. Pour over chicken or pork and allow to marinate overnight. A Jamaican Sous Chef  I had worked with adds more stems of fresh thyme, rosemary and bay leaves, plus chicken base (or crumbled chicken bouillon cubes) to the marinade and meat.

3. Grill meat over live coals.

Jerk Chicken Breast with Avocado-Papaya Salsa, Guava Dressing

Here’s how we made it at Amanyara back in 2008. A bit posh compared to the real deal … but it works for the lunch menu of a luxury, boutique resort in a tropical island. Here we served it with a guava sauce to play on the islands theme, but many times I’ve had it it was served with some gravy I’d rather not know the recipe for.

Jerk chicken take away at the BVI Emancipation Festival smothered in some unknown gravy

Jerk pork in an oil drum grill

The thing to use for grilling the jerk chicken or pork is an oil drum grill. Here’s a picture of Milton Harris, Sous Chef at Peter Island Resort in the BVI using one to make jerk pork. Milton covers the pork with “piment” leaves (or the leaves of the allspice tree), before shutting the lid and allowing the pork to steam a little bit in the grill.

Jerk prawn skewers on the grill

I love using jerk marinade on prawns as well. Here’s Terry grilling some at the live action station at Deadman’s Bar and Grill at Peter Island Resort during the Wednesday Caribbean Night back in 2010.

At a Jamaican party I went to once in Provo, the cook doused the chickens on the grill with Red Stripe beer, before shutting the lid. That was probably the best jerk chicken I’ve had – the results were so good! The chicken was served with “festival bread” which is a deep fried quick bread, hot sauce and washed with ice cold Red Stripe beer.

So what to serve with jerk grilled chicken, pork or shrimp? Well there’s that festival bread. Recipe here.

Laurel’s peas n’ rice

There’s peas and rice or beans and rice. Here’s one made by the lunch cook Laurel over at Peter Island Resort. I asked Laurel how she makes it, and her response was, “I don’t know… I just make it!” But she then went on to share the ingredients: butter, finely chopped onion, finely chopped red and green bell peppers, finely chopped carrot, long grain rice, pigeon peas, chicken broth (made with chicken bouillon base).  I like to make mine with all of these (real chicken stock when I have it), plus coconut milk, a few bay leaves, a few sprigs of thyme and with pigeon peas or kidney beans.

Breadfruits being roasted on an open fire

And then there’s breadfruit roasted on an open flame. Like this made by my Sous Chef at the Cotton House Mustique, Arris Jacobs, at an excursion to the Tobago Cays in St. Vincent and the Grenadines last year – my favorite islands in the Caribbean!

Me and Arris having a Hairoun in Vincy

 

Island rabbits

One of the more curious local ingredients I’ve come across here in the islands are rabbits. Rabbits were available to us at Peter Island back when I was working there a few years ago. There was a local rabbit farm in Tortola with the animals being raised more for pets than for meat. Through our contact with the Department of Agriculture we were able to buy rabbits off the farmer and have them butchered at the local abattoir. Here they are ready for cooking.

We ran rabbits a few times as a special before actually putting it on the menu. Our British Executive Chef, Lisa Sellers, grew up eating rabbit so we often would turn it into potted rabbit. Basically braised rabbit, slow cooked in wine and mirepoix, deboned and pulled, finished with cream, then filled in a ramekin and topped with melted butter. We would serve it cold with some melba toast. Here they are seasoned and marinating (local grown parsley and rosemary, garlic, peppercorns and dried bay leaves) overnight before we slow cooked them for hours in our old, 80’s style, Alto-Shaam food warmer .

As for me, I never ate rabbit growing up in the Philippines (there were more interesting animals to cook…lol). But I did grow up eating fried spring rolls – a lot of them. So this dish appeared on the menu Local Rabbit Spring Rolls with Housemade Ginger-Plum Chutney. I used Lisa’s potted rabbit as the filling, wrapped them in spring roll wrappers, and deep fried them.

Some people have an aversion to eating rabbit just because it reminds them of Bugs Bunny or cute Easter bunnies. Putting them inside a spring roll wrapper or inside a ramekin, as for potted rabbit, has helped us to sell it on the menu. What you can’t see won’t hurt you, right? Although we did try once to serve it at our Caribbean buffet. It was a Thai recipe (similar to the short rib recipe in past blog posts) cooked in coconut milk, with all local-grown lemongrass, basil and ginger. People thought it tasted like chicken…

Two years ago a book was published featuring recipes from chefs of the British Virgin Islands – Taste: Recipes from Acclaimed BVI Restaurants and Chefs. Chef Lisa put the two recipes mentioned on this post and it appeared on the book as Rabbit Duo: Potted Rabbit and Rabbit Spring Rolls. Here’s an online link to the book:   http://issuu.com/alookingglass/docs/tastebvi

Picture by Dan O’Connor of aLookingGlass Books.

A funny story about rabbits and our rabbit farmer in Tortola. About 6 months before the busy holiday season, I had mentioned to our contact with Department of Agriculture to tell the farmer that we will be needing a lot of rabbits by December and through to spring the following year. We were planning to stock the rabbits in the freezer so we’ll have a continuous supply during the busy months (December to April). Every month I would remind her to tell the farmer. Come December, I wondered why we were not receiving the amount of rabbits I expected. I called the Department of Agriculture around Christmas and the response: “Sorry chef, the farmer forgot to put the male and female rabbits together a few months ago. He’s only starting to breed them now.” Well Sah! Perfect example of island time! 🙂

Romesco sauce recipe

I’ve been seeing and making different versions of this sauce for the past 10 years. Finally, I found the perfect recipe (I forgot the name of the book … no lawsuits please), tweaked it and this is the one I use at work. My friend Dawn has asked me for recipes and suggestions on what to make for Christmas gifts this year. I told her to give them romesco sauce with a list of all the things you could do with it. A side dish to one of our specials last night was roasted fingerling potatoes tossed in romesco, and it’s on our menu as a marinade and sauce for lamb. Roast chicken, grilled shrimp, fried calamari, a dressing for pasta salad … lot’s of uses! This is my new Mang Tomas (lol – only Filipinos will get that comment)! Thanks Keenan Fifield (Peter Island’s Marina Manager) for the pictures of roasted vegetables and sea bass glazed in romesco sauce.

Romesco Sauce
Yield: 3 cups

Ingredients:
3 large plum tomatoes
2 large red bell peppers
1 medium onion (unpeeled)
4 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 dried ancho chile*
1/2 cup sliced almonds
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons Sherry wine vinegar
1 slice wheat bread, toasted, cut into 1/2-inch cubes (about 1/2 cup)
1 teaspoon smoked paprika

Procedure:
Preheat oven to 400°F. Toss tomatoes, bell peppers, and onion in small baking dish with 2 tablespoons olive oil. Roast until partially charred, turning every 15 minutes, about 45 minutes. Cover with foil; let stand 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in small skillet over medium-high heat. Add chile; fry until darkened and slightly puffed, turning once, about 30 seconds. Transfer to small bowl. Add enough hot water to cover. Let stand 30 minutes. Peel and seed ancho chile, tomatoes, and bell peppers; place in blender. Peel onion; coarsely chop and add to blender.

Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in small skillet over medium-high heat. Add almonds; sauté until lightly toasted, about 1 minute. Transfer to blender. Add 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil, garlic, vinegar, bread, and paprika to blender; blend to coarse puree. Return pureed mixture to the pan and over low heat simmer slowly until the olive oil starts to come out.  Season with salt and pepper and allow to cool. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Cover and chill. Bring to room temperature before serving.)

*No ancho chiles? Use pepper flakes.

Local, tropical island fruits

Mangoes and passionfruit from the local farms in Tortola, star fruit from our sous chef James’ tree – all put to good use on our cheese plates today.

There is a disconnect between what guests expect to eat on remote tropical islands and what is available on-island. I recall one time in Turks and Caicos a guest wanted to eat and drink a young coconut on the beach – an idyllic island activity (or so the guest thought… and yes, that’s what people who live on islands do on a daily basis, right? Right?). Typical of true hospitality professionals, the guest assistant said, “yes we can have that for you” and passed the message on to the kitchen. The next day, we had young coconuts in the kitchen with stickers on them that said “Thailand”. Little did the guest know that Providenciales is an arid island with little agriculture to speak of (including the most proliferate of desert island produce – coconuts). But we made it happen and “sold the dream” even if the coconuts were from half a world away.

We are lucky in Peter Island and the BVI in general that the soil is richer and the climate better for growing produce. Coconuts and other tropical fruit like mangoes, papayas, bananas, soursop, tamarind, etc. abound. And while the farmers are still struggling to have a legitimate industry in producing and selling local produce, the government is helping out by rounding up the people who do farm on a small-scale and selling  these to the resorts in the area. We try to take advantage of this as much as we can (even if the cost of the produce is sometimes prohibitive) and encourage other chefs in the area to do the same. The idea is that if more people support the government farms, a profitable industry of local grown and sourced produce will be readily available. Already there is talk of greenhouses being built on the government’s dime.

I’ll stop now before I sound all political and preachy about these food issues – which some people can really take to the extreme. Anyway, those mangoes I used today looked so good that I started missing Philippine mangoes. I think those are the best in the world and if someone disagrees with me then I suggest they go to the Philippines from April-June each year and see if they cannot be convinced otherwise. From the large, juicy carabao mangoes, to the tiny finger ones that are so delicious I can eat a whole sack full, whether ripe or green, hands down – the best mangoes are from the Philippines…

And the best recipe I can think of right now for these mangoes are the legendary Crepes Samurai of Cafe Jeepney at the Hotel Intercontinental in Makati. Some links to the recipe:

http://fildishes.blogspot.com/2007/08/hotel-intercons-crepe-samurai.html

http://trueconfection.multiply.com/journal/item/6

I digress (I’ve had a few after work glasses of wine while writing this post) … the point of this post is to support your local farmers and buy local produce because they will be better than any gassed and artificially ripened, imported ones…

Views from the kitchen at Crow’s Nest Villa

The Villa Chef was away over the weekend so I had to cover and cook at the Crow’s Nest Villa. Cooking there is great – the view from the kitchen is amazing. I wish I had a better camera to capture it – all I had was my cheap mobile. Nonetheless, here are the pics. The 15-hour villa chef work days aren’t so bad, when the view from the office is this.

Looking out from the kitchen sink…

That’s Ms. Keturah – the morning butler, waiting for the guests to wake up so we can serve them breakfast…

I always dilly-dally when I take out the trash. I take a few minutes to soak in the view of Deadman’s Beach and get some fresh air…

A yacht passing through. The guidebooks to the Virgin Islands say the BVI has “some of the most beautiful sailing waters in the Caribbean”. This is no understatement especially on clear, sunny and breezy days (my favorite kind of weather). And to think the day this pic was taken it was slightly overcast.

A closer view of Deadman’s Beach on Peter Island. This is looking down from the parking area at Crow’s Nest.

So life is not so bad, I must say…