BY INGRID BROWN

Associate editor – special assignment

browni@jamaicaobserver.com

BANANA production’s slow return to St Thomas has brought delight to many residents of this eastern parish who are going back to the days of using the locally grown staple to replace some processed food items in their diet.

But they have gone beyond using both green and ripe bananas for meals, and are also using the trunk and leaves to manufacture furnishings and make clothes.

They contend that many Jamaicans are not aware of the versatility of banana and the variety of value-added products that it can make. Members of the Greater Port Morant Jamaica Agricultural Society Group demonstrated this at a recent banana festival by creating more than a dozen dishes from both the green and ripe fruit, as well as the skin.

Some of their more unique creations were vinegar, tarts and syrups and a wine.

Sherine Thompson said the banana vinegar was being made for the first time and explained that it was produced from ripe bananas.

“We wash the ripe bananas then we leave them in the skin to ferment over a period of time,” Thompson told the Jamaica Observer North East.

This vinegar, she said, can be used for the same purposes as cane vinegar.

Some of the less unusual products the agricultural group made included banana bread pudding, banana duckunoo, banana bread, and banana fritters.

Another member of the group, Racquel Brooks, explained that except for the pudding and the duckunoo, the group used banana as the binding agent instead of flour.

“You don’t even need flour to make some of these things because of the versatility of the banana,” said Brooks.

Nodene Clarke said there were a lot more value-added dishes which they could have prepared from the banana as they had wanted to include banana chutney, green banana and saltfish fritters, and roasted banana among the items on display.

“We could have also done banana jam or fufu, which is banana flour,” said Clarke.

One particular dish that was not left out of the mix, however, was one which the group says is authentic St Thomas fare — paka.

It’s a one-pot meal of dumplings made from grated bananas in coconut milk and is inexpensive, yet tasty.

Explaining the process, Fitz Albert Betty said the banana dumplings are boiled in well-seasoned coconut milk.

“This is a well-known dish throughout St Thomas and one which people are always cooking,” he said.

Banana, he said, is a nutritious food and argued that it should be better utilised by Jamaicans who have often opted for imported and processed foods over the locally grown produce.

“Mi love banana bad because when mi ah eat (green) bananas all two dozen me one eat,” he told the Observer North East.

The group, which consists of some 30 male and female farmers, copped the banana festival trophy for their creativity in utilising the staple.

The group is known for its creativity, having won a similar competition in June for its wide array of value-added products from locally grown foods. The highlight then was a guava pumpkin cheese, which creator Marcia Baker said was a big hit with the many persons who sampled it.

“It was very good,” she emphasised, adding that Jamaicans need to be more creative in the preparation of some of our locally grown produce.

And apart from the tasty meals, the group also used various sections of the banana tree; the trunk was dried and used to make floor and table mats, window blinds, belts, rope, and even hair extensions, among others.

“Down to the root of the banana can be used for medicinal purposes,” said Brooks, adding that the green banana can also be used with kerosene oil to pull poison from the body, while the skin can be used to treat burns.

“Even when you have a fever you can use the banana leave to wrap up in and sweat the fever out you body. So, you see that every part of the banana and the tree can be used,” she said.

The group said they have been contemplating finding a market for the banana given the interest being shown in some of the more unique products.