Festivals

My other half's parents are from Jamaica. I love to combine Seychelles food with Jamaican food ,a sort of fusion I love a curry from the Seychelles deeply flavoured with seychellois masala and I serve it with the traditional rice n peas from Jamaica.

With winter firmly upon us its lovely to have comfort food, thick substantial rib sticking foods. I love dumplings especially fried dumplings .The following recipe is for a dumpling that is fried but it has sugar added. Its almost a doughnut not as sweet and is doesn't use yeast. It has a leavening agent of baking powder. It is wonderful with salt fish, and spicy food as is seems to counteract the heat. Try with any curry, and is especially nice with chicken or fish coating in the fiery jerk seasoning .Its readily available in most major supermarkets. I love to support local shopkeepers and I recommend that you shop out of the box and pop into the local Caribbean /west Indian shop they will have the best , most authentic seasonings and can help you a little more. Just add to chicken and fish ,either barbecue or oven bake.

Serve with these delicious hot crisp fluffy sweet festivals.Or try with the saltfish recipes or the poisson grille.(See earlier recipes)

Festival

!50g yellow cornmeal (polenta)

100g plain flour

60g light brown sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1 egg lightly beaten

250ml water

grating of nutmeg

flavourless oil for frying.

Method

Mix the dry stuff.Stir in the egg add water to make a soft dough. Tear off small handfuls and roll into small or large ovals.Fry in very hot oil until crispy on the outside and soft and fluffy inside. do this in hot oil but lower the flame as you have to ensure the batter it cooked on the inside approx 6 minutes.Drain on absorbent kitchen paper. Eat whilst hot these can be kept warm in an oven quite happily for a while ,but the longer they stay they lose the crispiness but are still delicious.