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Canada to ban export of saltfish to Jamaica. Yes Jamaicans lets see how well you can run
without saltfish in your ackee.

In reply to CWWeekes

Dont worry - Norway will fill the breach

In reply to FanAttick
Jameek err he whose name starts with B says it’s the Yam and the Trelawny soil is spiked with drugs

In reply to FanAttick

Norway might do the same but we could fill the breach with some salted doctor or
parrot fish. Dem caan stop wi.

In reply to CWWeekes

Maybe this is payback for how the Yardies used to shortchange the Newfies in the Rum for Saltfish exchange in the old days.

In reply to CWWeekes

Is not de saltfish is de YELLOW YAM!!!!!

In reply to Dukes

Don't forget the dumplings.

In reply to CWWeekes

In my part of the Yankee northeast, pollock has long been an acceptable substitute, I guess due to being a bit less expensive. I have tried ackee with salted shark while in GT-- taste is OK but it 'eats' a bit different-- enough to put you off.

--Æ.

In reply to JayMor
Guyanese salt all kinda fish. Snook is pretty good.

In reply to CWWeekes
Guyana can fill the void.

In reply to Chrissy

Cool. Thinking of going there for Crismus; may get to try it.

--Æ.

In reply to JayMor
Some of the older Jamaican Chinese also salt their own fish.

I like it like him

In reply to googley

In reply to Dukes

Make that YALLAH YAM!!

All Saltfish sweet. Big money does run behind it. True thing.

In reply to CWWeekes

I remember my boy days especially ore teen . As we lived on a self contained farm in St. Mary ,when we eat salt fish which we seldom did,
it was used in fritters which numbered in the dozens as the home had at least 12 people all the time.

The preferred thing with ackee was pork.

Man, we had the pork in barrells and corned and seasoned with all spice pimento leaves,salt and the pimento itself and that would be placed
in barrells in a little house called a butchery.

They would then boil the choice pieces of the corned pork,sometimes in a pot of bananas. Extract it and fried it,
then layer it over with the oil over the hot already cooked ackee which is already mouthy watering with its onion and bits of scot bonnet pepper giving the
off the sweet aroma. Yes Scots bonnet we called it back then not scotch.
As we were told it was named for the bonnet the Scots wore as a look a like item ....

Nice roasted breadfruit or the cous-cous, breadfruit's cousin with the very soft texture ,along with a pear or two (avocados)
and we licked our finger and hunger for more. That was the usual breakfast and when breadfruit is out of season, nice fried dumplings were
the fare.
What a life ???
Then as a young man I stopped eating pork except for Jerked one in Boston when I lived in Portland for two years.
After that nada.
If you haven't tried the fried pork with ackee ,you have missed out. There was no better company with ackee.
Hallmark of a boy's life along with cricket back in the day.

In reply to hubert

Mouthwatering Maas Hubie; considering I only had a bagel and a cup of hot chocolate this
morning. Old enough to remember seeing my grandparents' generation "corning" all types
of meat and fish because refrigeration or was not available.

In reply to hubert
I have never liked salt fish fritters - way too much oil.
My love salt fish cakes, with potato, breadfruit or yam.

In reply to hubert

What a mouth-watering reminder of bwoy days! We didn't have a whole 'butchery' but just a barrel instead. And yes, ackee wid corn pork over roast breadfruit was a hit... most especially on days when men came to dig yam hill. Noteworthy also is that in my neck of the woods, ackee and salt mackerel was more of a staple than ackee and salted codfish.

I'm finding your comment on cous-cous breadfruit interesting; never heard of it. But I wonder if it's a fruit I saw in GT-- smaller than a breadfruit with its outside being more 'jooky-jooky'. I don't remember what they call it.

--Æ.

In reply to JayMor

It is a type of breadfruit..looks more like a longish jackfruit but smaller.They are never round like breadfruit. Only
good for roasting and when full have a nice more softer yellow tint than regular breadfruit.
The flesh after roasting is very soft and so it absorbs liquid easily .. it sucks up all the oil on the dish easily.

Boiling it was never done. Unless it is not fully fit and young. Even then the flesh will break up easily.
We had quite a few tress and it was common in many parts of western St.Mary, but I never saw much of it elsewhere.
The tree never reached great heights like the Breadfruits and tended to spread horizontally rather than vertically. Probably known by
other names but cous cous what we knew it as.

BTW, Ackee and saltfish became national dish because folks were looking for a word to rhyme with dish..so codfish
was it. It was also an item of convenience and was and still polular with Jamaican people. In fact Bustamante at one time
once said the people need more than education.And it was relatively cheap and affordable to the poorer class.
We have come a long way my friend.
The national dish should really have been rice and peas as every family whether rich or poor had that for Sunday dinner
religiously either with chicken brown stewed,curried or beef brown stewed. Back in the day a lot of folks only ate
beef once a week and that was at Sunday dinner.
Never agreed that an imported item should constitute A National Dish. But who were we to disagree with the Pols of the time.

We never liked codfish much as one had to be careful of extracting bones..before and after boiling before placed with the ackee.

In reply to hubert

I see. Unfortunately, although I'm a Morris, descended from the St Mary ones, I have only driven through that parish, via the Fern Gully road, a few times. Don't know the place at all! (Ditto for Portland and St Thomas.) I'll make an effort to check out cous-cous.

While I have no beef with anything involving ackee, I could agree with you if you say "rice and gungu peas". My preference by far.

Yuh got dat right! Possibility of beef soup during the week, but beef stew dung? No sah. Sunday morning Mama get up early and prepare it before church. Merely needed warming up on return. One thing to add, in the case of my home... a fancy drink is always on tap: soursop, beet root or carrot juice blended with port wine, ginger wine or Dragon stout. And served to everybody, including me at six-seven.

Ah, the times!

--Æ.

In reply to hubert

In St. Ann, we called it Finey Breadfruit.

In reply to hubert

Jamaica imports rice - yam, banana, and chicken more fit the bill

In reply to CWWeekes

Wait dem don’t make saltfish?

In reply to XDFIX

They even import water

In reply to JayMor

Nice memories ..Gungu peas ,yes. Gungu soup with yellow yam too ,,please stop.I hungry

In reply to Fredo

Yes. I hear that name Finey Breadfruit. I wonder if this plant is plentiful
anymore. Hope it is not going the way of Gros Michel bananas .

In reply to hubert

Not so plentiful. Some trees in Chalky Hill.

There is a tree at the Bar i operate in Runaaway Bay.

Do you know the Old Ambiance Hotel?

Very close to it, going towards Runaway bay Square from Discovery Bay direction. The tree almost hangs in the road.

In reply to Fredo

Sure knew the Ambiance Hotel. Know the area well.
Sorry to hear that they are not plentiful. Chalky Hill folks are blessed.
Hope they increase the numbers too.

In reply to hubert
I have not eaten pork since age 17 (Long time) but maan yuh remind me of both maternal and paternal grandma's Ackee n Powk, Jeezam Peace!!!
My Dad's mother could just stretch outside the kitchen window and rope een some cherry tomatoes that was sauteed with the onion, scotchy and the
same pork except hers was cured dry via a KRENG-KRENG!!! There's no better breakfast in the world!!! Especially if the breadfruit was yellow heart
scraped and not peeled. Mamma Mia!

In reply to hubert

Do you know aunt may's Bar?

In reply to hubert

Do you know aunt may's Bar?

Saltfish yuck