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Caribbean cuisine

Cuisine of the Caribbean

Caribbean cuisine is a fusion of West African, Creole, Amerindian, European, Latin American, Indian/South Asian, Chinese, Javanese/Indonesian, North American, and Middle Eastern cuisines. These traditions were brought from many countries when they moved to the Caribbean.

History

As a result of the colonization, the Caribbean is a fusion of multiple sources; British, Spanish, Dutch and French colonized the area and brought their respective cuisines that mixed with West African as well as Amerindian, Indian/South Asian, East Asian, Portuguese, and Arab, influences from enslaved, indentured and other laborers brought to work on the plantations.

In 1493, during the voyages of Christopher Columbus, the Spaniards introduced a variety of ingredients, including coconut, chickpeas, cilantro, eggplants, onions and garlic.

Caribbean dishes

Ingredients that are common in most islands' dishes are rice, plantains, beans, cassava, cilantro, bell peppers, chickpeas, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, coconut, and any of various meats that are locally available like beef, poultry, pork, goat or fish. A characteristic seasoning for the region is a green herb-and-oil-based marinade called sofrito. Ingredients may include garlic, onions, Scotch bonnet peppers, celery, green onions, and herbs like cilantro, Mexican mint, chives, marjoram, rosemary, tarragon and thyme. This green seasoning is used for a variety of dishes like curries, stews and roasted meats.

Traditional dishes are so important to regional culture that, for example, the local version of Caribbean goat stew has been chosen as the official national dish of Montserrat and is also one of the signature dishes of St. Kitts and Nevis. Another popular dish in the Anglophone Caribbean is called "cook-up", or pelau. Ackee and saltfish is another popular dish that is unique to Jamaica. Callaloo is a dish containing leafy vegetables such as spinach and sometimes okra amongst others, widely distributed in the Caribbean, with a distinctively mixed African and indigenous character.

The variety of dessert dishes in the area also reflects the mixed origins of the recipes. In some areas, black cake, a derivative of English Christmas pudding, may be served, especially on special occasions.

By location

Anguillian cuisine
Antigua and Barbuda cuisine
Aruban cuisine
Bahamian cuisine
Barbadian cuisine
Cayman Islands cuisine
Cuban cuisine
Curaçaoan cuisine
Dominica cuisine
Dominican Republic cuisine
Grenadan cuisine
Guadeloupean cuisine
Haitian cuisine
Jamaican cuisine
Martinique cuisine
Montserratian cuisine
Puerto Rican cuisine
Saint Barthélemy cuisine
Saint Kitts and Nevis cuisine
Saint Lucian cuisine
Trinidad and Tobago cuisine
Turks and Caicos Islands cuisine
Virgin Islands cuisine

References

[http://www.bahamabreeze.com/menus/cuisine/ "Cuisine."] {{Webarchive. link. (2011-09-28 (Caribbean.) [http://www.bahamabreeze.com Bahamabreeze.com]. Accessed July 2011.)
"Caribbean Green Seasoning Recipe".

Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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