Located just below the westernmost tip of Jamaica is Savanna-la-mar. The graceful capital of the parish stretches to the east and west of a wide avenue that leads a mile from the beachside market to a cluster of modern uptown shopping malls. It is a conglomerate that resonates with both traditional rural infrastructure and modern consumerism. The beachside market is powered by surrounding farms where produce is organically grown, freshly harvested and shipped Wednesday night by clever small business developments for sale before dark on Saturday. This traditional supply line carries food for workers in nearby resorts as well as for visitors themselves and feeds the city’s resident workers and its economy. A survey of products in the crowded market reveals the truth of the saying that Jamaica is the center of the world.
Approaching Savanna-la-mar from the east coast highway at harvest time, loaded trucks may happily slow your car down and carry berry-bearing branches from a native Jamaican forest tree to process them into world-famous spice blends. At the market, the scent of aromatic pepper wafts from the burnished dark green leaves on twigs stacked on the sides of open stalls. These may be outflanking other products that were indigenous to the island and were cultivated by the Taínos before the arrival of European adventurers. The best known are the golden ears of corn, which are usually sold wrapped in long light green leaves and dark amber pineapples with their crown of dark green spikes. Less commonly found off the island are dense spherical purple star apples, unmodified giant papaya, and guavas twice the size of pears. Custard apples, sour sops, sweet sops and blackberries, all clusters of seeds coated in rich pulp and wrapped in textured skins, are presented as native fruits of Jamaica, although they now grow in all tropical latitudes. The chewing tobacco rolls, as well as the fresh loose leaves, remind us of the origin of a widespread habit derived from sacred Amerindian ceremonies, while the round bammy cakes are the processed yucca of the Taínos, separated from the poisonous juices to make their staple food edible and easily transportable. . They are available in glass cases along with crispy and spicy fried escovitch fish.
Other stalls in the market specialize in flavors imported by Spanish settlers between 1509 and 1633. Juicy, coiled roots of ginger nestle around cans of carefully packed moist sugar or may have been squeezed into jugs of cane juice using Spain’s importation of the north of Africa. A variety of citrus fruits, sold in abundance, come from extensive orchards, some of which were originally Spanish property. Navel oranges are bold and voluminous. Ortaniques, squeezed a little flatter than a sphere, invites the buyer to squeeze its pulp for its richness in vitamin C. Tangerines are bright orange in color and crumble when touched. Lemons are thick-skinned and knobby and limes range from yellow to deeper green, allowing you to select them for sweeter or more tart flavors. Grapefruits can have pinkish or creamy flesh depending on their variety, and luckier shoppers will find ugly fruits that were grafted from orange and grapefruit to capture liquid sunlight in their smooth, flowing interior. Although pomegranates also came from Spain, they were adopted and renamed “pomgonuts” and are easy to find in the market. The grapes, also originally planted by the Spanish, are increasingly available from roadside stalls, although they can now be imported from the Americas.
If a hot drink in the morning is your goal rather than refreshing juices, pressed “country chocolate” balls can be purchased to be grated in boiling water. This use of cocoa, introduced from South America and planted as cocoa walks during the Spanish occupation, is often flavored with nutmeg, from Mauritius, and cinnamon, from Ceylon, both brought by the East India Company to Jamaica a century after the Spanish departure. You may want a cooked breakfast of breadfruit, brought back by Captain Bligh on his second botanical voyage after the disastrous Mutiny on the Bounty. His first specimen, according to legend, was planted by a stream in Bluefields and still survives. If you want a soft meal that fills you up, you’ll buy a green fruit or, if you prefer a sweetness comparable to roasted chestnuts, you’ll buy a turned breadfruit to bake whole or fry into spears. This self-perpetuating crop has protected many generations of Jamaicans from hunger and malnutrition as it was brought from the Polynesian islands along with jackfruit, otaheiti apple and many other less common fruit varieties freely available to customers From the market.
The capitalists of Bligh’s day were not alone in their concern to feed penniless mouths. Enslaved plantation workers cultivated their own gardens on five-year leases that allowed them to clear outlying land and plant plantains and banana suckers, hills of yams, and vines of melons and squashes. The results of their work prepared for the crops of the towns of freedom in those hills that, to this day, supply the Sabana-la-mar market. Not to be forgotten is the native ackee tree, whose seed stalks are dug out of the pod to accompany salt cod, transforming a sailor’s hard fare into a gourmet’s delight in a way developed only by Jamaicans.
The knowledge of the Moravian missionaries and other immigrants from Germanic lands effectively propagated delicately flavored rose apples like those of Cairn Curran, and deep purplish sorrel flowers used for Christmas drinks, sauces, teas and jams and provided arrowroot for picky eaters. . His era also brought indentured workers to the cane fields of eastern India, and with them prized mangoes such as the East Indian and Bombay varieties that fetch high prices in the market. These travelers also brought marijuana, known locally as ganja, an herb with strong medicinal properties but whose sale is prohibited due to various social complexities. Sadly too, economic pressures have reduced the amount of local rice once produced by the descendants of these same immigrants, but, hidden in odd stalls, researchers can still find a few pounds for sale.
Rich green bunches of callaloo and spinach are kept fresh in the market by liberally sprinkling them with water, and in addition to these refreshing mounds, a variety of other vegetables are sold, from the ubiquitous cabbages, carrots, beets and turnips to tropical foods like chops. guys. , pumpkins, sweet potatoes and Chinese papchow. While rosemary and thyme feature in old English folk songs and salt potatoes were brought back to their homelands as a delicacy called “Irish potatoes,” tomatoes, onions and skellion are such standards of Jamaican cuisine that they are sold in especially practical packages at carefully affordable prices. costs for customers in the busy market.
Stroll through this market with me in your imagination while you save up for that pungent experience of smells, sounds and rainbow colors of a Caribbean market. Prepare your taste buds by shopping the world’s food islands of multinational supermarket chains and experiment in your own kitchen with a few selections from your local Jamaican takeaway to guide you. Read West Indian children’s books to your children and grandchildren and curl up with Caribbean novels on chilly nights to soak up the culture that fought for freedom, revel in the fertility of its hills and celebrate its cuisine with world-renowned enthusiasm. The central spinning point of the center will draw you in by thought or deed as you savor the riches of the world brought to the center as fuel for your spirit or body.