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Herbs and spice
DINING & ENTERTAINMENT GUIDE - JAN 2005
Herbs and spice
Make Bahamian food nice
When it comes to hot and spicy, tangy and zesty, dulcet and piquant, Bahamian cooks have an innate talent for transposing a dish from the mundane to the memorable.
Spices, herbs and seasonings are perhaps the most important ingredients in Bahamian cuisine.
Spices, defined in the dictionary as aromatic vegetables used for flavouring, most often take the shape of peppers in a bewildering variety of shapes, sizes, colours and zing. Bahamian cooks use them any which way ? raw, frozen, dried, ground, powdered or whole.
Bahamians make pepper sauce by the gallon ? in Nassau alone there are dozens of different varieties, including D?Vanya?s Junkanoo Hot Pepper Sauce and Belmont Farms Pepper Sauce.
Most commonly used peppers in The Bahamas are the green, red and yellow sweet garden variety. Sweet peppers are dried and ground to make paprika. Hot peppers such as goat, banana, bird peppers and a host of others are used fresh or dried and ground as cayenne or chili.
Black & white pepper
Black and white pepper seasoning is made from the berries of the tropical climbing shrub Piper nigrum. The dried unripe berries make black pepper, which is more aromatic and flavourable, while the skinned ripe berries are used to make white pepper. The berries retain their zest almost indefinitely, but tend to lose aroma and flavour when ground or crushed. Hence, savvy Bahamian cooks use it freshly ground.
Although any dish can be made ?hot,? a dish that?s synonymous with hot is curry, and Bahamians make full use of it in curried goat, conch, chicken and lobster, using a zillion combinations of spices and seasonings.
A basic curry includes varying amounts of turmeric and at least two of ginger, cayenne, coriander, cardamom, black pepper and cumin. Turmeric (or tumeric, as they say in the Caribbean) imparts the colour, and can be used in other dishes in place of saffron. It also adds a delicate mild flavour. The amounts of the other ingredients depend on taste and tolerance.
Curries can be specially mixed to complement and enhance the dish being served. A dry mix is used for meat coatings. Other hot, mild or sour combinations can be fashioned for fish, fowl, rice, beans or vegetables.
A flavouring trick
Herbs play a relatively small part in Bahamian cuisine, possibly because the flavouring can be a little too subtle. One trick used by Bahamian cooks to enhance the flavour of dried herbs is to soak them for 10 to 30 minutes in a liquid incorporated in the recipe ? lemon juice, beef or chicken stock, wine, oil, vinegar, milk or even water. This reconstitution can raise the culinary level of a dish from good to excellent.
Thyme is by far the No 1 herb in The Bahamas, used mainly to flavour rice, especially peas ?n rice. Bay leaves are also popular, while allspice is the preferred seasoning for souse, a Bahamian soup.
Aromatic glory
One area where herbs come into their own is Bahamian-brewed tea. While many Bahamians make their own ?bush? tea, herbal teas are also manufactured here. One company, Island Rose, offers herbal custom blends evoking island memories such as Cat Island chamomile, Bimini mint, Rum vanilla and Exuma lemon.
Another interesting culinary application of spices in The Bahamas is the range of pepper jellies and other spicy jellies. These are available in souvenir shops and grocery stores and make wonderful, inexpensive and tasty souvenirs.
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