Jamaican cooking amenities have evolved from open wood fuelled fires to high-end modern gas and electric ranges with ovens. However, some households are still using the traditional coal stove to prepare daily family meals.

Barbacoa – The Barbecue

The original Jamaican barbecue is a Taino invention. The now widely used word “barbecue” is derived from the French word, babrecot, which is itself a corruption of the Arawak1

word, barbacoa, meaning “heated sticks”. The barbacoa was made of heated pimento wood on a raised platform and was used to “jerk” wild pigs. The barbacoa is no longer used for jerking meat in Jamaica and has been replaced by metal drums customised for slow-cooking meats.

The Coal Stove

The coal stove is a small charcoal fuelled cooker with a basin-like top covered by a flat metal grill

attached to a long hollowed cylindrical foot. Similar

to a single cooktop, the coal stove was used to

cook a wide range of foods. Meats could be placed

directly on the grill of the coal stove or on sticks laid

across the top of the stove to be grilled or smoked.

Pots that were usually round and blackened were

positioned on coals for cooking. The coal stove is

still a primary cooking device for some Jamaican

families, especially when roasting breadfruit. Over

time, the coal stove has lost its prominence to

kerosene, gas and electrical cooking appliances.

The cooker was introduced to Jamaica by Dutch

traders during the period of slavery. These traders also sold and transported essential tools used on

the plantations throughout the Americas.

Source :jis.gov.jm/features/traditional-food-preparation-jamaica-tools-methods/

COOKING cont’d on >>> Page 20