Why are there so many recipes with banana in them?  Bananas (and coconuts) are often the only crops that are actually grown on many Caribbean islands.  Thus they are cheap and plentiful and feature strongly in Caribbean cuisine.  What's more they have some ripsnorter recipes as you will find out if you make any of the recipes below......and also because I love bananas!

Below are two great recipes from the fantastic evening of cooking at Mondu Taitu Hostal in Bocas del Toro Archipelago, Panama.  If you want to read more about that great evening visit my blog  The first recipe is a savory one from Daniel and followed by two sweet ones from Joey (because he’s so sweet).



All I know about Chimichuri sauce is that tit is a parsley and garlic based Argentinean dipping sauce that is used to accompany meats.  It is really good and I recon it would also go really well on toast or with roast vegetables.  Unfortunately I didn't take a picture of it so if you want to see what Chimichuri looks like, you will have to watch "Daniel and Joey's Brazilian Cookup", the cookumentary I made about the fantastic night of cooking at Mondu Taitu in which Daniel prepared this recipe.

What you need

• 2 cups of finely chopped parsley
• 8 cloves of garlic chopped finely
• ½ cup of olive oil
• ¾ cup of red wine vinegar
• Juice of half a lime
• A pinch of crushed red pepper flakes
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method

This is a really simple one!  Simply mix everything together in bowl and leave it to sit for an hour or so the flavors can mature.








Joey’s banana bread turned out to be one of the highlights of the Brazilian Cookup evening and was something he pretty much invented on the spot with the help of a quick search of the Internet for inspiration and proportions of ingredients.  Just when everyone thought they were full, the sight of this desert made everyone realize they actually still had a little room! (that’s one of the reasons why I advocate for eating desert before the main course – you are never faced with the dilemma of “will I stay comfortably full and say no to a yummy desert I would really like to eat”, or, “will I stuff it in anyway and gorge myself to the point of almost hemorrhaging”). 

Both the banana bread and the custard are simple to prepare and are made from ingredients, the majority of which you probably already have in your pantry.  The Banana Bread is great served warm with either hot or chilled custard.

Banana Cake

What you need

• 1 cup of sugar
• ½ cup of butter
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 3 tablespoons of hot water
• 2 cups of flour
• ¼ teaspoon of salt
• 5 large and very ripe bananas
• Optional - 1 teaspoon of ground cardamom (this is my suggestion if you want to spice things up a little.  Banana, coconut and cardamom go great together)

Method

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Place the sugar, butter and eggs in a bowl and mix thoroughly until the sugar almost dissolves  (a food processor or electric mixer is ideal for this).  Next, dissolve the baking soda in the water and mix this in as well.  Now, while the mixture is mixing, sift in the flour, salt and cardamom (if you are using it). Finally, peel and smash up the bananas, add them to the batter and mix well until everything forms a nice smooth consistency.  NOTE:  If you like your banana bread with big chunks of banana in it, set aside two of the mashed up bananas and add them in at the last moment, barely stirring them in.

Using a little butter, grease a loaf of bread sized baking tin and then pour in the batter.  Bake for 1 hour at 350 by which time the bread should have turned golden brown.

Coconut Pudding

What you need

• I can of sweetened condensed milk
• 1 can of coconut milk
• 2 cans of regular milk
• 3 teaspoons of cornstarch

Method

Mix the cornstarch with a little of the milk until all the lumps are dissolved.  Next, add all the ingredients to a saucepan and gentle boil over medium heat, stirring constantly until the mixture thickens.  You can either serve custard hot or chilled.

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While the banana cake (which you will read about shortly) is really good and distinctive in its own right, in the end it is cake and similar to other cakes you have had before.  The banana puddin’, on the other hand, stands out as something different.  It is a thick, heavy slab of banana mush and until I learnt the recipe I had no idea what was in it (except for the fact in had banana in it of course).  Eat two slices of banana cake before your dinner and not only are you likely to no longer have any room for dinner, you are also like to feel full until the next day.  A slice of banana puddin on Bocas Island will set you back 20 cents.  All I can say is that I ate way too many slices of banana pudding!

This recipe will make 2 large trays of puddin (enough to kill a large ox, if eaten all at once)

What you need

• 9 lbs of very ripe bananas
• 1 ½ bars of margarine or butter (a bar is about 120grams)
• Milk of 2 coconuts (add 2 litres of water to the grated flesh of the coconuts to get the right amount of liquid for the recipe) or 3 cans of coconut cream and one can of water (this is my rough estimate)
• 4 large serving spoons of vanilla essence or extract (Irma and Martin use nasty imitation vanilla essence and the puddin still tastes great).
  
• 4 lbs of flour
• 2 lbs of finely ground sugar (white or raw should work fine)
• 2 ground nutmegs
• 2 desert spoons of ground cinnamon

  
Method

In a large mixing bowl, blend together the bananas, butter, coconut milk and vanilla.  In a separate container, add all dry ingredients (flour, sugar, ground nutmegs and cinnamon) and mix well.  Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients (I would do it that way, rather than the other way round) stirring all the time.

Vigorously mix the puddin slurry and then spread the mixture into two large greased baking trays.  The height of the mixture in the trays should be about 3cms.  Bake at 250 degree Celsius for roughly one hour or until the top of the puddin turns golden brown.

Martin James Binns suggests that you could add raisins or grated coconut to the recipe too.  Martin James Morris (me!) suggests that a 3 healthy desert spoons of roughly ground cardamom would also be a winner.

Note: a yucca puddin can be made quite easy with this very similar recipe.

• 10 lbs of raw, grated yucca (peal the yucca first).
• Coconut milk of 3 coconuts (make it with 3 liters of water)
• 1 bar of margarine (roughly 125grams)
• 6 ounces of fresh grated ginger
• 1 ½ lbs of flour
• 5 lbs of sugar
• 2 ground nutmegs (this quantity is a guess)
• 2 desert spoons of ground cinnamon (this quantity is a guess)

Bake at 250 degree Celsius for 1½ hours.

This Banana Cake tastes easily as good as it looks.  It is similar to other banana cakes you have probably tried however the coconut milk, spices, rum and dried fruit give it a special Caribbean flavor.  Best eaten while listening to reggae music.

What you need
 

• 1/2 lb of dried mixed fruit (the Christmas cake variety)
• 4 - 6 ounces of liquor (whisky or rum). This acts as a preservative and will keep the cake fresh for     about 3 days in a hot climate without refrigeration.
• 4 large serving spoons of vanilla essence/extract (Irma and Martin use nasty imitation essence and it works fine)
• 7 lbs of peeled very ripe bananas
• 1 lb (453 grams) of butter
• Coconut milk of 4 medium sized coconuts. Add 1½ to 2 liters of water to the grated coconut. (see the recipe for ‘Rice and Bins’ to find out how to make fresh coconut milk) or 4 cans of unsweetened coconut cream.

• 6 lbs of flour
• 4 lbs of sugar
• 4 nutmegs, finely grated.
• 4 ounces (1 ounce = 28grams) of Bicarb of Soda (Irma says this helps retain the flavor of the bananas and stops the ‘acid in the stomach’ feeling that some people get from eating coconut milk combined with bananas)
• 6 ounces of baking powder
• 2 ounces of ground cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon of salt (Actually I can't read my writing. It may actually be 1 teaspoon!  I suggest being conservative and going for a teaspoon first and then adding more if necessary!)
• 1 cup of grated (or desiccated coconut). If you make fresh coconut milk, you can use the left over     gratings.

Method
 
First blend together the mixed fruit, liquor and vanilla and set it aside. Next, blend together the bananas, coconut milk and butter (either use a Barmix or do it in batches in a food processor or blender). Now, in a separate bowl, mix all the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, nutmeg, bicarb, baking powder, cinnamon and salt) and then slowly add it to the banana slurry, stirring all the time. Add in the mixed fruit mixture and the grated coconut and mix well until the mixture takes on the consistency of thick batter or double cream (if you are doing this by hand using a wooden spoon it may take about 10 minutes to reach this consistency, less if you use an electric mixer).

Now grease enough baking trays for all the mixture and fill the trays to a height of 3cms. Note: when the mixture is cooked it will double in size. Bake for about 1½ hours at 220 degrees Celsius.

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Guisadas, a traditional sweet on Bocas Island, are scrumptous little pastry tarts that are filled with a yummy spiced coconut mush.  I was introduced to guisadas at Don Chicos restaurant in Bocas Town, Panama.  This recipe comes from Mayelas, a long standing guisada maker on Bocas Island.  Mayelas’ guisadas look easy to make but my guess is that they will be even easier to eat!  The recipe looks quite big so you may wish to half it or quarter it.

What you need

The base

• 2lbs of flour
• 1 bar (118grams) of butter or margarine
• 1 teaspoon of salt (or less)
• 2 teaspoons of sugar

The topping

• 2 coconuts (grated)
• 3 blocks of unrefined sugar (on brown sugar).  I estimate a block to be equivalent to a rounded large serving spoon.
• Vanilla essence or extract
• Cinnamon
• Clove

Method

The base

Combine all the dry ingredients and mix well.  Add the butter (or margarine) and crumble it through your fingers until a stiffish dough is formed (you may need to add a little water as well).  After kneading the dough a little, form it into little “cups” and place them on a greased baking tray.  Mayela didn’t explain much about how to bake the cups other than to say that they are ready when they turn golden.  How long this will take and how hot the oven should be is thus a mystery.  My guess is 180 degrees Celsius for about 40 minutes but that is a pure guess.

The topping

Melt the sugar in a saucepan with a bit of water and then add the coconut and spices.  I don’t know how much cinnamon, clove or vanilla to add however this recipe is very similar to the one for “Dulce de Coco”, which appeared in an earlier letter of mine so you could use that recipe as a guide.  Cook the mixture until it thickens (about 30 minutes).

Spoon the topping on the cooked bases.  Serve the Guisadas on their own or with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

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This recipe comes from Victor Jonah Eleutario, better know as Jonas, who I met one day while out walking in the island of Bocas del Toro which forms part of an archipelago by the same name on Northern Caribbean coast of Panama.  Jonas was on his bike selling Johnnycakes, which is something he does each Wednesday and Friday to make his living (his 88 years of age but still not retired).  Jonas is a real character, especially in his baking outfit complete with a white baker’s hat, who generously allowed me watch him make Johnnycakes in the kitchen of his run down house in the back streets of Bocas Town.  At first Jonas was suspicious that I was a spy from another bakery who had come to steal his Johnny Cake recipe but in the end shared it with me anyway (and allowed me to make a small documentary).

Johnnycakes are small coconut milk breads that are a specialty of the Caribbean Africans and are made throughout the Caribbean.   Most of Caribbean coast of Central America (including the islands that dot it) has small settlements of ex African slaves who were brought to the region by British Colonials and then migrated along the coast in small fishing boats.  Before this time there were no coconut trees along this coastline coast.  Coconuts (and bread fruit, mangos and other plants) were brought with the Africans who used them, along wish fish and rice, as a central part of their diet.


Ingredients

• 20 lbs of flour
• 4 dessertspoons of salt
• 2 dessertspoons of baking powder
• 2 dessertspoons of dry yeast
• 2 dessertspoons of sugar
• 1 lb of butter
• ¼ lb of vegetable shortening
• Coconut milk made from 7 coconuts – let it sit until the cream floats on top of the milk and then separate off the cream and set it aside (I estimate this to be about 7 to 10 cans of coconut cream).

Method

Step one, in a large bowl, mix the flour, salt, baking powder, yeast and sugar.  Next add the butter, vegetable shortening and coconut cream (or cans of coconut cream) and work it through the flour using your fingers as if you were making a pastry crust.   Now, while working the mixture with your hands or a wooden spoon, gradually add the coconut milk (or water if you used cans) until a bread dough like consistency is reached.  Knead the dough for about 10 minutes and then set it aside in a warm place to rise for about 30 minutes.  Next divide the dough balls just a little smaller than a tennis ball, poke them with a fork and leave them to rest a further 15 minutes or so.

There are two ways that Jonas bakes his Johnnycakes.  The first way is in a greased cast aluminum pot that has a few coals underneath and a lot of coals heaped on top of the lid (using this method it takes about 15 minutes for the Johnnycakes to cook).  The second way is to arranged them on a greased baking tray and bake them in a regular oven at 300 degrees Fahrenheit (this is a rough estimate as Jonas oven did not have any indications of temperature on it) for about 3 hours, or until they are golden (3 hours seems a very long time however that how long they took.  There is probably a way to make them cook faster however by increasing the temperature of the oven – just make sure they don’t end up raw in the middle).

PS. This recipe could be used as a good base for experimentation (ie substituting some vegetable shortening for butter or more coconut cream or perhaps adding dried coconut flakes etc). If you make this recipe please write to me.  I would love to know how it turns out.

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Francisco and Joska's pizza sauce was an essential element of the pizza night that I organised at Mondu Taitu on Bocas del Toro, Panama.  They are both from Italy so this recipe comes straight from the horse's mouth!  Unfortunately Francisco and Joska both left Mondu before I could ask them for the recipe so I sent them an email and below is their reply.  By the way, you can keep up with their travel adventures via their website.

Dear Martin!
Great to hear from you!
we've just been in your blog and it's amazing!

You were asking about the sauce recipe: actually we didn't have any: we
just created. Anyhow, it's quite easy. Here the main ideas go:

PIZZA SAUCE
onion (very little)
3 kg tomatos (without skin. Hint: in order to peel them better, put
them in boiling water for a minute)
salt
extra vergin olive oil (we know, it's very expensive, but good oil
definitely makes the difference)
1 spoon of sugar

Cut the onion very thinly and put it into hot oil. Leave for a few
minutes till it gets brownish (not black!). The oil must not be too hot,
otherwise you'll burn the onion.
Incorporate the tomatoes cut in small pieces, sugar and salt and stir
them untill they become sauce.
Taste it in order to see if salt is ok.

that's it.. Hope you'll try it again and succeed!

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