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Complete Caribbean Cookbook : Totally Tropical Recipes from the Paradise Islands

Caribbean Light brings you vibrant, good-time, home-style island food that’s not only exciting, but healthful and nutritious as well.

Caribbean food is a medley of brilliant colors, bold flavors, and lush presentations. The cooking techniques combine European, African, Indian, and Chinese influences, and the result is a cuisine with a big, assertive personality.

The more than 125 recipes—for such exotically named but easy-to-cook dishes as Coo-Coo (the Caribbean answer to polenta), Suds ‘n’ Snapper (a tasty poached fish that lets you have your beer and eat it too), Stuffed Banana Lime Voodoo Chicken (the only magic is in the taste), and Pi±a Colada Custard Pie (featuring pineapple and coconut, just like the drink)—are accompanied by notes on their origins, descriptions of tropical ingredients, and short essays on island customs and festivals. Each of the recipes includes a nutritional breakdown of calories, fat, cholesterol, and sodium.

Home cooking from the Caribbean. Harris is a native of Jamaica, but recipes come from all parts of the region. The influence of the European and Asian settlers is evident in what has become the native food, with Gouda Cheese Soup, Poisson en Blaff, and Arroz con Pollo all part of the mix. Caribbean food is popular now; Elizabeth Lambert Ortiz’s Complete Book of Caribbean Cooking (M. Evans, 1983. pap.) is a good standard guide, but larger collections could add this too. JS

Caribbean cuisine blends West African, French, Portuguese, East Indian, Spanish, English, Dutch and Chinese heritages. In serving portions from this melting pot, Harrisa native Jamaican and an importer of Caribbean foods to the U.S.offers “everyday fare and tasty bits and pieces” ranging from party beverages (e.g., tamarind drink) to main courses (pot roast calypso). In addition, Harris traces a brief history of Caribbean cookery. His book is a good place to test your mettle on highly spiced foods and flavors.

However, some recipesrequiring the entrails, head and feet of lambs, and pigs’ tailswill appeal only to devoted followers. And if you live in an area where fresh shark, conch, chayote and callaloo are hard to come by, you may have to do some nimble improvising, though the author does suggest alternative ingredients and lists Caribbean food distributors in this country.

Rivera, a novelist and a Nuyorican (the term refers to a Puerto Rican raised or born in New York City), has compiled a wide-ranging collection of homestyle Puerto Rican recipes, both traditional dishes and those adapted or inspired by mainland cuisine. Many of them come from Rivera’s extended family, and his readable headnotes and introductions include lots of family anecdotes as well as background on Puerto Rican culture and cuisines. Thoughtful wine suggestions accompany most dishes. Recipes from Puerto Rico appear in general Caribbean cookbooks, but there are few titles on its cuisine alone. Recommended.

“The Food of Jamaica” offers the best food that the traditional Jamaican kitchen and the island’s best-known chefs have to offer. Beautifully illustrated, the title includes over 70 recipes from well-known restaurants like Grand Lido Negril, Norma’s, and Good Hope, as well as the curries, jerk sauces, and luscious fruit drinks and desserts for which Jamaica is famous.

We’re talking Jerk Chicken, Fried Fish and Bammy, Rice and Peas and Johnny Cakes. Follow the road signs through the island of Jamaica to discover authentic jerk and other Jamaican food, traditionally cooked in hollowed-out oil drums and served to you by a friendly proprietor. Celebrate the Jamaican culture by sharing the great spirit of the people through their delicious recipes. The black and white photos allow you to be a part of the richly visual experience of creating authentic Jamaican food. Real Jamaican food, when cooked with understanding, is a soul-satisfying experience. So pour yourself a Rum Punch, nibble on some Plantain Fritters and bask in the warm glow of Jamaica.

Body nourishing and soul satisfying food legacies from our ancestors are collected in this New England Cookbook. Recipes include Crab Meat Canapes, New England Clam Chowder, Boiled Main Lobster, Bouillabaisse, Yankee Pot Roast, Steamed Brown Bread, and Boston Cream Pie.

New England cuisine is truly native American, founded as it was on the first discovered fruits and game of the New World. Seafood was plentiful. At one time, storms on Cape Cod left 2-foot high windrows of lobsters for the taking and tide pools filled with crabs. Easily gathered clams, sweet small scallops, and oysters so numerous that a hundred might be used to enrich a dish for unexpected company, the ubiquitous cod – all were important in typical New England dishes.

Native American Indians shared crops with early settlers – pumpkin, squash, shell beans, cranberries, blueberries, and wild strawberries. Of the latter, Roger Williams wrote in 1636, ”I have seen as many as would fill a good ship.” Corn, above all, was a staple food, yielding cornmeal for bread and porridge. Apple was, and still is, the favorite fruit for pies, with more than a dozen versions of how it should be made. The New England flavor is sometimes salty, sometimes sweet and spicy – salt pork and bacon for frying and maple syrup, honey, and molasses for sweetening. Spices, dried fruits, and rum from the cargoes of New England sea captains added variety and flavor to the local cuisine.

The Caribbean is a rich culinary melting pot, where influences from Europe, East Asia, and especially Africa meet a stunning array of native produce and seafood. Now, the author of A Taste of Africa captures the sizzling, seductive flavors of the Caribbean palate with this cookbook based on her PBS-TV cooking show, A Taste of the Caribbean. Over 100 recipes. Color photos

This best selling regional book features Fritters and more fritters, Island Jerk Seasoning, Boil Fish, Johnny Cake, Shrimp and Spinach Potlicker, Benny Cakes and Goombay Smash, and many more favorites ”from the islands of ocean blue where Columbus landed in 1492.”

The light, luscious, tropical, and healthy Caribbean cuisine derives from seafood, which is a principal industry as well as a local food staple. Nourished and supported by the local catch for centuries, the Bahamians have perfected a spicy cuisine using their traditional conch, grouper, crawfish, pigeon peas, breadfruit, guava, mango, and a variety of hot pepper sauces. The conch, pronounced konk, is served, cooked or uncooked, in chowders or fritters, or added to soups, salads, and stews.

Other delicacies include land crabs and local spiny lobsters, which are boiled, baked or steamed and served with pigeon peas, rice or grits, or minced into salads and soups. Popular dishes also include boil fish served with grits and stew fish served with vegetables.

Old Havana Cookbook: Cuban Recipes in Spanish and English