Trini Fried Bake or Jamaican Johnny Cakes

Really yummy and easy to make Caribbean styled fried roti.

One of my most favorite Trini foods is what we call fried bake, you can see the authentic way of making and serving it at the Trini Gourmet blog.

However since I would never to all of that on my own, I use Grace Johnny Cakes to make my bakes, and it’s just a matter of adding milk to the mixture and then frying in hot oil. One thing that I noticed was that if I go with the directions on the package, it comes out really sticky, and if you have extra flour, that’s perfect, but if you’re like me and don’t stock flour, you can just save a little of the mix to use as a flour substitute and add a little less milk.

Try it! Yum!!!

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Trini-style chicken & provision soup

Day 1, Week 3

I grew up eating soup like this, and referring to the ‘vegetables’ as provision. In fact… I never knew about any other type of soup until I was a teen!

Ingredients:

1 chicken (cut into small pieces)
2 potatoes
4 sweet potatoes
2 cassavas (yucca)
2 green figs
2 plantains
� cup dahl
3 stalks of celery

green onions
3 carrots (cut into slices)
1 onion (chopped)
garlic (crushed)
hot pepper
� head of cauliflower
6-8 okra
goldenray butter

Guidelines:

The first thing you need to do is semi-cook the chicken…
Season the chicken with onions, garlic, pepper and salt
In a medium size saucepan, caramelize about 2 tbsp of sugar
Add the chicken pieces, remove from heat once they are about half-way cooked

Caramelize � cup sugar in a large pot, add carrots, celery, dahl, chives and then all the other veggies (cut up into bite-size pieces), except okra
Cook a little, and then add the semi-cooked chicken

Add the okra
Add water until all veggies are covered
Boil on medium heat until the veggies are tender
Once the soup is about done, chicken is cooked, and the veggies are tender, add the goldenray butter
Add salt and pepper to taste

You can substitute the chicken for any kind of meat… we LOVE it with beef, and maybe ox-tail – recipe courtesy of my mom, and her mom…

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Rice & Dahl & Chicken

Day 4, Week 2

Now, in Trinidad this is a very common meal, like VERY common. And although you may thing that dahl would be prepared by mainly East Indians, this is not the case in Trinidad… almost everyone can make dahl and curry chicken!!

Ingredients (dahl):
1 3/4 cups dahl
1 tbsp Turmeric
1/2 garlic bulb (crushed)
1 small onion (chopped)
1 whole scotch bonnet pepper

salt to taste
1 tbsp oil

Guidelines:

In a large pot, fill half with water and let it boil
Add the dahl to the boiling water
Then add in the onion and garlic, pepper and salt
Add the turmeric and oil and let it boil on medium-high heat

The dahl will melt somewhat as the mixture reduces, just let it cook for about 1 1/2 hours, mixing well (so it does not stick), and adding water if necessary
When the mixture has the consistency of soup (very much like split pea soup), heat a small about of oil and garlic in a deep spoon and carefully pour into the dahl
The pepper will remain in the cooked dahl and you may at that point burst it into the dahl, keep it to eat with the food, or discard… just be careful with it!

Sorry if it seems a bit complicated…

Ingredients (chicken):
1 whole chicken (washed and cut into small parts)

green onions
curry powder
garlic

Guidelines:

Heat a small amount of oil in a pot, then add the chicken
Add 2 tbsp of curry powder, the chopped green onions and garlic
Drizzle some oil on the top and mix well
Add salt and pepper to taste

Cook on medium heat for about 1 1/2 hours and add water when necessary

This is my un-complicated road to west indian style curry chicken!

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