Michelle Loubon

Pin­ing for a dis­tinc­tive flavour like roucou used to flavour stews, Guyanese-born but Bar­ba­dos res­i­dent broad­cast jour­nal­ist/food writer Cyn­thia Nel­son de­cid­ed to pen Tastes Like Home. It's part Caribbean cook­book/part mem­oir.When she moved to Bar­ba­dos in 1988, Nel­son re­mem­bers the nos­tal­gia which pro­pelled her to­ward mar­kets and su­per­mar­kets in search of much sought af­ter foods.Pre­vi­ous­ly, she had la­belled them "taboo" or flat­ly re­fused to taste them.

Nel­son said: "When I moved to Bar­ba­dos (St Michael's) I found bo­di (snake beans) and carail­li were not wide­ly avail­able. It was tough to find those items. I was miss­ing those in­gre­di­ents...not so much the dish. I was miss­ing a unique taste, a sauce, a sea­son­ing that went in­to mak­ing the dish."She added: "I missed the cas­cadu­ra. I could not find seim. Seim crawled over fences at home (George­town). I didn't see jack­fruit or ja­mun. I missed those veg­eta­bles and fruits that were unique to a par­tic­u­lar place."

Switch­ing to taboo foods

Be­fore her epiphany to write, con­coct, col­lect and cook au­then­tic recipes, Nel­son had to con­tent her­self with lo­cal Ba­jan cui­sine.As the land of the Kai­teur Falls grew dis­tant and she set­tled in the land of the Har­ri­son Caves, Nel­son said: "It wasn't Guyana. Bar­ba­dos had be­come a merged space. I had to im­merse my­self in the cul­ture. I fell in love with Ba­jan fish cakes. It was like man­na." To com­pound it, Nel­son missed the cor­nu­copia of fruits and the abun­dance of veg­eta­bles sold in Guyanese mar­kets. Even­tu­al­ly, her taste buds grew to love taboo foods.Nel­son said: "Taboo foods be­came loved. Be­cause I couldn't get some of the things I had turned up my nose at, when I did get it I grew to love it."Pump­kin, a sta­ple at Hal­loween cel­e­bra­tions, was one such veg­etable.

An­oth­er was salt­ed fish cooked with toma­toes, sweet pep­pers and onions. It of­ten ac­com­pa­nies a pot of ground pro­vi­sions like dasheen, can­died yams and green ba­nanas. Topi tam­bu, an all-time favourite among root crops, was scarce."I picked up the salt­fish and I had no idea what I was go­ing to do with it. It re­mind­ed me of home and my fam­i­ly. I nev­er liked salt­fish. I start­ed cook­ing salt­fish. I start­ed en­joy­ing salt­fish," said Nel­son.Spar­row's Ode To Salt­fish sprung to mind-"When you out to eat all salt­fish sweet."Dur­ing her vis­its back home, Nel­son even found she had an affin­i­ty with Bour­da Mar­ket. She had of­ten re­coiled at the ba­bel. Weav­ing her way through the stalls, fe­male ven­dors men­ac­ing­ly dan­gled na­tive fruits like gru gru beff and gri gri. Sur­prised at her new-found epi­cure­an de­lights, Nel­son opined: "Some­times it takes be­ing away to ap­pre­ci­ate what you did not as a kid."Her suit­case was stacked with black pud­ding, grey snap­per and an­char.Like Ja­maican po­et Claude Mc Kay's Flame­Heart, she had be­gun to ap­pre­ci­ate "the time when the pur­ple ap­ples (caimites) come to juice/and the pi­men­to's flow­er­ing and fruit­ing."

Writ­ing Tastes

Re­ly­ing up­on her re­search and writ­ing skills which she had honed as a jour­nal­ist, Nel­son set about com­pil­ing recipes. They aimed to re­in­force and nour­ish "Caribbean­ness."Again, Nel­son re­it­er­at­ed it was her nos­tal­gia for na­tive Guyanese food which led to Tastes Like Home. She would even tele­phone her moth­er Bar­bara Cae­sar and aun­ty Bet­ty Singh for ad­vice on cook­ing "soul foods."Nel­son said: "Mom­my liked a va­ri­ety of sauces. Aun­ty Bet­ty was in­to roasts and pies. Aun­ty fetched ba­nana leaves and made goose­ber­ry syrup. She was in­to the lo­cal Cre­ole cook­ing... African cui­sine and In­di­an dish­es."

The ground­work had­be­gun in earnest.

"I jot­ted down the foods and se­lect­ed recipes. I start­ed a blog. Peo­ple in the di­as­po­ra con­nect­ed with the food mem­oir. They start­ed to e-mail me ask­ing, 'Do you have a place where you have every­thing?' "I start­ed writ­ing a col­umn in the Stabroek News. When I got the of­fer to write the book it just seemed as if every­thing came to­geth­er. So that's how it came about."She ad­mit­ted there were culi­nary chal­lenges.She got but­ter­flies in her stom­ach when she brewed her maid­en jug of mau­by."I was scared. I was hop­ing the mau­by would not be a dis­as­ter. Did I put too much anise? I would be stand­ing an hour and a half mak­ing a dish like Mar­ried Man's Pork...sea­soned with sweet basil and thyme, and silent­ly hop­ing it would come out right."

Nel­son not­ed Tastes Like Home gives glimpses in­to her life grow­ing up in the Caribbean. As she shares the vi­gnettes, she said: "There are cer­tain foods I as­so­ciate with cer­tain mem­o­ries. You can look and see the recipes and the sit­u­a­tions I am de­scrib­ing. Peo­ple in the Caribbean can con­nect." Nel­son al­so ex­am­ines some of the "food mores" that are pe­cu­liar to the Caribbean peo­ple.For ex­am­ple, the prac­tice of set­ting pep­per sauce and man­go chow in the sun to cure. An­oth­er pen­chant was mak­ing a con­coc­tion of sea­son­ings like Span­ish thyme-fresh­ly culled from a back­yard gar­den.Chick­en breasts were of­ten mar­i­nat­ed overnight be­fore it was popped in­to the oven.

Nel­son said: "I have al­ways found home­made sea­son­ings give a dish its sig­na­ture taste."One of the un­der­ly­ing themes in Tastes Like Home is the de­sire for Caribbean peo­ple to eat lo­cal.Nel­son said: "It fits right in with my plat­form about eat­ing what you pro­duce and hav­ing an ap­pre­ci­a­tion for your in­dige­nous foods and recipes. You would not find gourmet or run-of-the mill foods. I have pep­per pot from the Amerindi­an com­mu­ni­ty. The casa­reep is in­dige­nous. It's pre­sent­ed in a way that is unique and spe­cial."When Nel­son's not mak­ing June Plum juice, she busies her­self teach­ing broad­cast jour­nal­ism at the Bar­ba­dos Com­mu­ni­ty Col­lege. "Cook­ing and food pho­tog­ra­phy are my hob­bies. It doesn't seem like work be­cause I en­joy it. But it does take up a lot of time and re­quires great ef­fort."

About the book

The book is di­vid­ed in­to Food Mem­oir and Recipes. The glos­sary ex­plains words like chunkay-adding meat or fish to a hot pan which al­ready con­tains spices. Colour pho­tographs ac­com­pa­ny ro­tis, cou cou and dhals.Tri­nis savour okras in callaloo. Nel­son presents it in met­tagee-a na­tion­al dish of Guyana-which is cooked in co­conut milk.Food­ies flip­ping the pages would be en­ticed by a smor­gas­bord of de­lights like kaloun­jie (bit­ter stuffed gourd). It's dot­ted with gua­va cheese and pots of high­ly fra­grant and aro­mat­ic bay leaf and cin­na­mon tea recipes.Fore­word writer Prof Vib­ert Cam­bridge, School of Me­dia Arts and Stud­ies, Ohio Uni­ver­si­ty, paid ku­dos to Nel­son's gift to the kitchens of Caribbean peo­ple.Cam­bridge said: "Nel­son has made a case that Caribbean cui­sine helps to main­tain link­ages be­tween Caribbean peo­ple in the di­as­po­ra and their home so­ci­eties. It al­so helps to win new friends for the Caribbean. You will be con­nect­ed with the ex­tend­ed Caribbean fam­i­ly and the joy of prepar­ing and shar­ing a meal."

• Tastes Like Home can be pur­chased at Nigel R Khan Pa­per Based and Mo­hammed's Book­stores.