Ballahoo

We didn't have a lot planned for our time in St. Kitts. We had an earlier dinner so we didn't want to travel too far from the ship, and we decided not to take a taxi to the beach, as much as we love beaches especially in winter, because we had gotten quite a bit of sun (and sunburn) the day before in Barbados. We spent most of our time just strolling around parts of Basseterre with M's parents and then stopped in at Ballahoo, a very centrally located spot, for lunch.

We didn't have much experience with Kittian cuisine so we weren't sure what to expect. Some sites on Google that we are looking at now tell us that it is Caribbean with Trinidadian and British influences, which makes sense to us now that we've tried it. (As a side note, unclear if it is Kittian or Kittitian, and if it's the second, this is not meant to be offensive, but Google isn't giving a definitive answer.) We just went with what sounded good.

M ordered the chicken roti which she really liked. The flavoring and sauce on the inside tasted a little like the chickpeas from Trini-Paki Boys, which was good because that's one of our favorite parts of the chicken over rice there. (We absolutely noticed similarities with Trinidadian cuisine, even if we didn't know about it then!) Inside the roti wrapper, there was shredded chicken with mashed up curried potatoes and carrots, and then the whole thing was very lightly griddled. The curry flavor here was so good. The fries were fine, nice and crispy, but especially good when dipped into the extra curry sauce on A's plate.

A got the lunch special which was chicken curry. The curry flavor in his dish didn't taste the same as M's roti, but was more of a yellow curry with coconut milk. The chicken was a leg and thigh, and the meat was so tender that it fell off the bone. On the side, there was a generous helping of green beans and carrots and some rice with green peas, both good, along with a salad of romaine, tomato, and cucumber with olive oil and vinegar that was nothing special but refreshing. It was a very hearty lunch plate with great flavor.

After eating, we couldn't decide which curry we liked better between the roti and chicken curry. Both were so good, but different. We were very pleased with our dishes at Ballahoo. M's parents got a barbecued chicken leg and a chicken avocado club sandwich, and seemed happy with those. We were pretty happy we went for the Caribbean dishes though.

Not only did we have good food at Ballahoo, but we had a nice view looking out into town and people watching, basking in the sunlight of a beautiful Caribbean winter day. We would recommend a visit here.

La Case à Glace

Martinique was an interesting port. Most of the people on the ship with us absolutely hated it there, constantly complaining that there was nothing to do, everything was closed, no one spoke English, and more. Fort-de-France wasn't a very developed cruise port compared to some of the others we had visited, but we felt like people were being a little bit unfair. Sure, being in Martinique was a little more challenging, especially if you didn't speak French, but why should you expect every person you meet in another country to speak English? Yes, things seemed to close early because it was a Saturday (which meant I couldn't mail my postcard), but you can't expect people to change their entire culture and lifestyle just because your ship decides to show up. The refusal of so many people on the ship to push their boundaries and accept a different way of doing things aggravated us so much (and not just in relation to Martinique).

Anyway, back to our day in Martinique. We had planned from the start to go to the beach, knowing that it was one of the things we could definitely do on a Saturday. We had heard some good things about Anse Mitan, so that was our intended destination. After a brief walk around town, we got on a ferry to the beaches which was going to stop there and also at Anse à l'Ane. Despite our original plan, we ended up going to Anse à l'Ane instead because the majority of the ferry got off at Anse Mitan and in addition to the crowds, we weren't feeling drawn to it. Anse à l'Ane was quieter, had far less people, and was a much more peaceful beach day for us. The weather wasn't perfect; it was cloudy and sprinkled a bit, but it was nice to just relax on the beach and do nothing for a little while.

Eventually we decided to eat lunch. There weren't a ton of options on the beach, but we saw a bunch of people, including some who looked like locals, at one of the beachside restaurants called La Case à Glace. We were pretty excited about lunch, partially because things on other tables looked good, partially because we were hungry, and partially because it would give us an opportunity to attempt to communicate in French. I don't speak a ton of French, and my pronunciation is horrible, but I had tried to practice a little bit before our Martinique day, knowing that we wouldn't have internet and couldn't completely rely on our phone apps.

We scanned the menus (all in French) and tried to figure out what to order. I asked for the poulet au coco (coconut chicken), since that sounded good and I knew what it meant. The server (in French) told me that I shouldn't get that but instead the colombo de poulet. I had no idea what that was but agreed. They were the same price, so it wasn't like she was trying to get more money out of us. What arrived was a plate of rice with a little salad and a big bowl of chicken curry, three drumsticks with potatoes and carrots. The chicken was wonderful, very soft and tender, and it just fell off the bones. The curry sauce had a lot of flavor but not as much spice as we thought it would from the aroma and look of it. I was pretty happy with my meal, especially considering I had absolutely no idea what it was going to be. But that's part of the fun of eating a meal in a new country for us, being surprised by how great something is that you have no expectations about.

A ordered the plat du jour (daily special), which was the poulet boucané. That was even better than my chicken curry. It was a smoked, barbecued chicken thigh and leg that was topped with chopped vegetables for which we have no better description than that it was a like a French pico de gallo. It also came with rice, green beans, and a small salad. The flavor of the chicken was so good, just a perfect amount of smokiness that wasn't overpowering. The rice for both of us was fluffy and nicely seasoned, maybe made with chicken broth. This smoked chicken was so good, and we tried to savor every bite since we knew we would never be able to replicate it at home. We've found a recipe online that looks similar, but there's no way we can get those flavors with the equipment we have. Looking it up, we learned that it seems to be a style of cooking out of the French Caribbean islands like Guadeloupe, so it was perfect that we were able to enjoy it on our Martinique day.

Overall we had a nice time in Martinique. It wasn't our favorite port but we actually appreciated it for being unfamiliar and different. It's one of the things we like the most about visiting other countries - being out of our element, expanding our horizons, exercising the foreign language sections of our brains (and even better, without sacrificing any physical comforts). This meal did all of those things. There were people at a neighboring table that tried to talk with us, and our French wasn't nearly good enough for that, but they seemed nice. I was able to understand and answer the server when she asked if we wanted any dessert like ice cream (which we declined, despite the name of the restaurant). We managed to order and check for food allergies in French.

Then there was the fact that I had no idea how to ask for the bill in French and we sat around for a while trying to figure it out (and also wondering why we hadn't thought to look it up in advance) until we just walked up to the register to pay with some other people. Even though this meal was just as long ago as our other Quantum entries, it's obvious that this experience imprinted on us much more than many of those, and the entire reason is because of the way it affected us as people, pushing us out of our comfort zone. Isn't that part of what travel is all about?

Taloula Mango's

The second stop on the Quantum was St. Maarten. After breakfast, we headed into the port, grabbed a cab, and made our way to Maho Beach. We were hoping to see more than one beach during our time in St. Maarten, but between the weather and limited time, we only made it to Maho. That was our priority though, since we really wanted to see the planes landing at the airport, especially the giant KLM one. It was fun, even if we were huddled under the umbrellas at the bar in the pouring rain, and later under towels we had taken from the ship as blankets for warmth. After we watched many planes land, we took a cab back into Philipsburg, walked around a little bit, and then decided to get some lunch at Taloula Mango's, which was located on the Philipsburg boardwalk.

Taloula Mango's bills themselves as a Caribbean cafe, and most of what we found on the menu were pastas, sandwiches, and other standard cafe fare with a Caribbean accent. To start, we got an order of the Caribbean conch fritters (6 for $10.25, prices as of two years ago and we think in USD) to share. These were described on the menu as "tender conch minced with red and green peppers with a touch of fire in a cornmeal batter served with two Caribbean dipping sauces." One of those dipping sauces was sweet and the other seemed like a yellow curry mayonnaise.

The conch fritters were kind of crunchy on the outside, maybe a little bit over-fried, but the filling was good. You could even see the pieces of conch inside. We really liked dipping the fritters into the yellow curry mayonnaise.

A chose to get ribs for lunch, more specifically the one from the tapas section of the menu called "good ass baby back snack" ($10.95). The menu noted that this was "one slab of deliciously marinated fall off the bone baby back ribs." A really liked these and thought they were cooked well and had a nice char flavor. They didn't exactly fall off the bone, but they also didn't take much effort to eat.

I decided on the jerk chicken caesar wrap ($8.25) for my lunch. That was described as "classic caesar salad rolled in a toasted spinach tortilla with jerk chicken," and came with sides of red cabbage slaw and watermelon. Pretty sure I gave the watermelon (or most of it) to A, but the cabbage slaw was nice and crisp. The jerk seasoning on the chicken was pretty light, not as spiced as most jerk rubs we've had before, making it more like a regular, nicely seasoned grilled chicken wrap, but that was fine for lunch.

From our seat on the second floor at Taloula Mango's, we were able to see the beach and take in the atmosphere of the boardwalk, which was pretty fun. It was so nice to be able to escape winter and sit in the open air with ocean breezes while we ate and drank some lemonades to rehydrate. While the food may not have been the most exciting we had on our trip, it was solid and we were happy with our choice.

Cocoa Jerk Tofu

Have you ever found one of those recipes that just grabs your attention from the moment you read it and then as soon as you taste it, you're just instantly in love with it? That was the case for me with the cocoa jerk tofu from the Superfoods for Life: Cacao cookbook. Even though I had a long list of possible recipes from the cookbook for the Week 7 challenge (since everything sounded so good), I kept coming back to the cocoa jerk tofu. I'm so glad I did, as it was a truly wonderful dish.

I often make adaptations to recipes for things that we have at home or things that we like, but when I saw the list of ingredients for the sauce here, I tried to stick to it as closely as possible. (If you want to see the original, it came up in Google Books when I searched the recipe name ... or just get the book.) One of the hardest things to get right in a dish is the seasoning, especially the balance of the seasoning, so I figured I would try the recipe as-written to give it its best chance. Amazingly, we had all the sauce ingredients at home already, which is awesome, because now it means I can make it whenever I want as long as I pick up tofu (or some other protein) and some peppers and onions!

For the sauce, I used (and I actually measured for once since I wanted to get the balance exactly as intended):

- 2 tsp Madras curry powder
- 1 tsp chili powder
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp allspice
- 2 tbsp sriracha
- 1/3 cup cocoa powder
- 1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce
- 1/3 cup vegetable broth (for me, really 1/3 cup water + small spoonful of Better than Bouillon)
- 3 minced garlic cloves
- 1 tbsp agave nectar
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 tbsp hoisin sauce
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp ground oregano

The list looks long, but there wasn't anything to actually "prep" other than the garlic. Everything else came straight from the jar, bottle, or container, so it was much easier than it looks.

The non-sauce ingredient list was really short: 1 container of firm tofu, 1 yellow onion, 1 red bell pepper, and 1 green bell pepper. Very easy. Adding this to the sauce, the approximate cost of the recipe was $7.92. It made a good amount of food, so that was a pretty fair price. (It does need a grain or something else on the side, so tack on another $1 or $2 to the total.)

Making the cocoa jerk tofu was really easy. The process reminded me of another baked tofu recipe (here) that I really liked that I also did for one of the cooking challenges. Make the sauce, add the tofu and vegetables, bake, done. It really was that simple. Perfect for a weeknight meal because there is so little work involved! To make the recipe:

1. Mince the garlic and add to a small bowl with all the other sauce ingredients. Mix well.

The original recipe said to blend all of this in a blender, but I just used a spoon and a small bowl and it was completely fine. The only thing that would even really be broken up in the blender is the garlic and we didn't care if there were garlic pieces in the sauce. I mince garlic fairly small as it is, so why waste the blender?

2. Slice the onion and peppers into thin slices. Cut the tofu into blocks (or squares, whatever you want). I tried to make sure the pieces were thin enough to soak up as much sauce as possible.

3. Mix the tofu and vegetables into the sauce so that everything is well-coated. Let it sit for a little bit.

And here's where reading comprehension comes in again (just like here and here). I was reading the recipe right before I was going to start prepping and I saw that I was supposed to let the tofu and vegetables sit in the sauce for an hour. Oops. I didn't notice that the first time around when I read it. I ended up letting it sit for about 15-20 minutes as I let the oven preheat and I did some work. Maybe it would have been even better if I let it sit for an hour, but 20 minutes seemed fine if you're in a rush (or didn't notice the marinating instruction).

4. Bake at 400 degrees for about 40 minutes, stirring everything halfway through. The original recipe called for 30 minutes of baking and then some broiling, but skipping the broiling and just baking a little longer seemed fine to us. It really wasn't the most attractive dish coming out of the oven, but who cared what it looked like when it tasted so good?

Wow. That was basically our reaction once we tried this dish. It was fantastic! We had both tried a little bit of it before it went into the oven and the sauce was incredible. There were so many nuances to it because of all the different ingredients and you could definitely taste the chocolate, but the flavors were also so balanced. It was even better when it came out of the oven because the heat came through much more than it did when the vegetables were raw (not sure why). We absolutely loved this. I started thinking that maybe I should start adding cocoa powder to everything if it was going to come out this well. So much flavor and completely vegan as well, so we were good to both our taste buds and the environment.

This dish is definitely going on our "make again" list and it's the type of dish that would go into a rotation if we had one, because it's quick and simple to prep, we usually have all the ingredients other than the fresh stuff that we can easily get, and it was so delicious. We loved this so much that it was hard to believe that the other dish we made that night from the same book, which we'll talk about in the next Week 7 challenge post, totally missed the mark for us. We were as unenthused about that one as we were thrilled with this one. But overall, we are just so happy with this challenge because of this awesome tofu dish!

Slow Cooker Love

We made this recipe back on Halloween and I finished writing this post on November 6 of last year. I'm not sure why we never posted it (especially since I've already posted another recipe using our slow cooker). Week 6 of the 52 week challenge includes a different recipe for rice and peas, so it's about time that I finally put this up on our blog so you know what we're comparing the new recipe with! This is pretty much exactly as written from November 2013.

We got a new slow cooker recently (the Hamilton Beach 6 quart set and forget) and we love it. I originally thought that the first recipe we would make to test out the new slow cooker would be chicken soup, but then A found this awesome-sounding recipe for slow cooker chipotle lime chicken thighs (here) and plans immediately changed. The recipe also included instructions for a side of Jamaican rice and peas that we made alongside it. After trying it, we're instead calling this recipe "chipotle chicken stew with coconut rice and beans." It was delicious.

First, the chipotle chicken stew.

Ingredients:

I remembered the cilantro for the photo but not when it came time to garnish...

- 1/2 yellow onion ($0.30)

- 3 stalks of celery ($0.25)

- 2 carrots ($0.50)

- 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts ($3)

- Salt ($0.05)

- Black pepper ($0.05)

- 1 (15 oz) can of tomato sauce ($1.49)

- Juice of 2 limes ($0.45)

- 2 chipotle chiles in adobo sauce plus ~1 tbsp of sauce ($0.60)

- 4 garlic cloves ($0.10)

The recipe also called for garnishes of avocado and cilantro leaves, but (1) I couldn't find an avocado I liked at the store and didn't really know how to pick a good one back then and (2) I completely forgot about adding the cilantro in my glee over the taste of the stew. Oops. Maybe next time.

The total cost of this part of the recipe was approximately $6.79. Next time, I think I would use a whole onion instead of 1/2 and add in the avocado and cilantro, so that would probably bump the total up to $8-9. Not terrible for a poultry meal that was enough for dinner for two plus two lunches for one (and probably could have lasted longer if we hadn't been such happy gluttons the first night we had the stew).

Process:

1. Prep the ingredients. Chop the mirepoix (onions, celery, carrots). Season the chicken generously with salt and pepper. Whisk together the sauce ingredients - tomato sauce, lime juice, minced chipotle chiles, adobo sauce, minced garlic.

2.  Layer the slow cooker. Mirepoix on the bottom.

Arrange chicken over vegetables. [I think next time I'll turn the chicken so the "flat" sides are facing up and then season with salt and pepper on the other side too.]

Pour sauce mixture over chicken and vegetables.

3.  Cook on low for 6 hours. [It says 6:30 in the photo but we stopped it early. I know you're not really supposed to open the slow cooker to stir it but it was our first time with it so I stirred it a few times. It also wouldn't be a bad idea to open it to flake the chicken with two forks maybe 1/2 hour before the recipe is done.]

And for the side dish, coconut rice and beans.

Ingredients:

Ignore the Chef Boyardee and the fried onions that had nowhere else to go in the pantry...

- 2 cups brown rice (~$1)

- 1 can light coconut milk ($0.99)

- 1 cup water ($0)

- 1 can of red kidney beans ($0.79)

- 1 tsp dried thyme ($0.10)

- Finely grated lime zest ($0.05)

- 1/4 cup chopped scallions ($0.20)

- Salt ($0.05)

- Black pepper ($0.05)

The rice cost came out to approximately $3.50 but that is a real ballpark estimate since I have no idea how much the rice really costs. Not bad considering how much rice this made. It's also quite dense so you can't really eat that much of it at once without feeling it sitting like a rock in your stomach (said in the best way possible).

Process:

1. In a medium saucepan, combine the brown rice, coconut milk, water, beans, thyme and lime zest. Set over high heat and bring to boil. Reduce to low, cover and simmer until liquid is absorbed. 

[Photo of pot ready to boil should go here but I forgot to take one]

All of my liquid absorbed before the rice tasted done, so we kept adding more water and simmering until we felt like it was done and not too chewy. We stopped when it had the consistency of barley. As it sat and waited for the stew, it continued to soften up.

2. Add scallions, salt and pepper to taste.

3. Mix it all up and it's done.

Review:

We were so happy with this dish. The coconut rice and beans were really rich and heavy, but combined with the stew, it cooled down some of the spice and added a nice coconut flavor. That said, it wouldn't be necessary to make this with the stew, and regular rice (or other grains) would work just as well (and would be cheaper). We haven't had any Jamaican rice and peas that tasted like this before, which is why we renamed it to coconut rice and beans.

The chipotle chicken stew was amazing. I surprised A a little bit with how spicy it was, which was completely due to the chipotle chiles in adobo. The recipe called for 1 tbsp minced, but I had been reading a lot of Chowhound threads on chipotle chiles where people kept saying they usually use 2 for everything they make, so I used 2. Of course one of them was gigantic, so I guess it was probably more like 3 chiles. And chipotle chiles are not mild. If you don't know what they are, they're smoked jalapenos, which should give you some idea of their heat. I moved them into this tiny plastic Gladware thing to put in the fridge, and they barely fit. To get the cover on, more and more of the adobo sauce kept squirting out, so I just added the rest of the adobo sauce to the recipe. The result was probably a bit spicier than it needed to be to get the good spicy, smoky flavor. But it was so good that we're not complaining about that at all. Maybe next time I won't use quite so much...

The chicken flaked off like pulled chicken. The carrots, celery and onions were soft like they are in soup. The sauce was zesty and spicy. It was a really great recipe and we were so glad that we made it. Never would have predicted that this would be the first thing to come out of our slow cooker (still haven't made chicken soup, now that I'm thinking about it), but really satisfied.

Caribbean Kitchen

One day around lunch I was coming back from one of my clients and decided I was in the mood for something new. I had walked past Caribbean Kitchen plenty of times on my way to and from this client, and I figured it was time to give it a try. The restaurant space has changed at least 3 times since I started working in NYC back in late 2005. This iteration shared a space with an Indian restaurant that I may try at some point as well. This day, though, belonged Caribbean Kitchen.

One of my favorite Caribbean dishes is stewed oxtail. I use it as a gauge of how good a place could be. Caribbean Kitchen offers their oxtail over rice and peas, stewed cabbages, and plantains.

Stewed Oxtail over Rice and Peas, Cabbage, and Plantains
The oxtails were rich and tender, and the stew tasted of cinnamon and spices. Overall they were quite flavorful, but they weren't the best I've had. The rice and peas were buttery and fluffy and a perfect complement to the rich oxtail. The cabbage was rather bland, but with the heavy flavors of the rice and oxtail it didn't need to be a highlight. What it did add was a bit of extra texture and some vegetables to the dish. The plantains were sweet and soft. I love plantains, and these were tasty. To my understanding it's hard to mess up plantains, though.

Overall this was a very satisfying meal, but it comes at a rather hefty price. Being over $10, it's on the expensive side for Midtown lunches, but it certainly satisfied my craving for stewed oxtail.

Caribbean Disappointment

The Caribbean kiosk was another new kiosk at the festival this year. We like Caribbean food but were really disappointed by our meal here. Maybe next time they can improve on this year's offerings.


Representing the region were ropa vieja (Cuban) and jerk chicken (Jamaican):



First, the ropa vieja (Cuban-style braised beef) with white rice ($3.50):


M's take: This was just OK. The meat had some flavor but mostly it was really salty. The dish definitely needed the white rice to balance out the salt. I wouldn't get this again unless I had heard that they improved it.

A's take: Braised and pulled/shredded meat normally has a nice soft texture to it. This beef was kind of tough. It also ended up being salty. The rice was, well, rice. Plain old white rice.

Second, the jerk spiced chicken drumstick with mango salsa ($3.25):


M's take: I prefer chicken without the bones, but am usually fine with drumsticks because they're easy to eat. This one however was not. It was a big sticky mess and I gave up on it and gave it to A rather quickly. The mango salsa was pretty good though.

A's take: Jerk spice is a beautiful thing. It's spicy and flavorful, and normally a delicious meal. This chicken was dry, sticky, and fairly bland. The mango salsa was a nice touch, but in the end it didn't do enough to save the dish.

Favorite dishes at the Caribbean kiosk:
A: Jerk chicken (only because of the mango salsa)

M: Mango salsa, but since that's not a dish, I guess the ropa vieja?