Antigua and Barbuda

Antigua and Barbuda, contrary to their name, is a country made up of three islands, not of two – Antigua, Barbuda and Redonda. The islands are located between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Antigua is said to be the island with 365 beaches. One for each day of the year. They were discovered on the second voyage of Christopher Columbus. He gives them name and continues his journey. Only thirty years later the first settlers appeared on the islands. Due to the lack of rivers and the frequent raids of the cannibals, the Spaniards fail to stay in these lands and return to their homeland. For more than 100 years, the islands have been forgotten by the world powers while the English do not claim to these territories. For three years, Europeans have managed to settle. The local population periodically organized raids on settlers. Even once they manage to capture the governor. They even join alliance with France to evict hateful Englishmen. For a year, the French change the English as the ruler of the island state, but then the English regain territory.
To feed the English, they cut off the tropical forests, but did not assume that they were taking away moisture and they created a dry period. They had to plant sugar cane, and this was the culture on which the economy was based for many years. In fact, there are no rivers on the islands, but there are groundwater and they provide drinking water to this day. To process the plantations, the British brought slaves from Africa. After the abolition of slavery, the descendants of the slaves make up the majority of the local population. In 1940, on the island of Antigua, the United States made a military base. In 1981 the state gained independence, but to this day it is part of the British community. The government is headed by a governor appointed by the queen. Now there is no sugar cane production. The state now relies on tourism, and tourists enjoy white sandy stripes, coral reefs, and exotic diving around sunken ships.

Antigua and Barbuda’s kitchen is a mix of African, French, Italian, Indonesian and Thai traditions. The main products are corn and sweet potatoes. The national dish can be considered dukun – dumplings of sweet potatoes, flour and spices. Also the ku-ku, fangzi, and pepepot dishes. Ku-ku is reminiscent of polenta and is made of corn flour and okra. Affordable and cheap products. It was simply a food dish for sugar plantation workers. It is also a national dish for Barbados. Add to it baked fish or veal. When the okra is absent from the recipe, the dish is called the fangzi. The name “Ku-Ku” comes from the original kitchen appliance made of wood, flat and rectangular. Ku-ku-stick is important for determining the density of the meal. Another popular food is Pepot – a spicy dish of meat and vegetables or fish with vegetables. Other local dishes are marinated rice, lobsters and ducks. Local people mostly drink tea and chilled fruit juices.
Choosing a cake was not easy. Again. It was hard to find a cake for this country at all. These beautiful islands in the Caribbean have tormented me. They do not have cakes and that’s it. I can not be angry – it is logical when you have wonderful fruits all year round not to do any complicated actions to sweeten your life. After a lot of research, there was something to find – a pie with papaya. In the original recipe, the base of the pie was from macadamia. I do not like this nut and that’s why I’ve modified the recipe for my taste. I made a traditional base of butter dough for pie and I do not think I was wrong. If you want to make it according to the original recipe, then the base is made from 1 1/2 cup of macadamia, 1 cup of coconut and 1 tablespoon of agave or honey. All the ingredients are blended in a blender to homogeneity and then the base of the pie is formed in a suitable vessel. The papacy was worrying me as the main ingredient of the stuffing, because I had eaten this fruit in many places and always looked like a tasteless pumpkin. And now, among other things, I had to buy it in Bulgaria, where it does not grow, and it seemed quite unlikely. In fact, exactly in this recipe the presence of papaya was a very tasty shot. But I’ve explained enough. Here’s the recipe.

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About cake:
175 grams of flour
2 grams of salt
7 grams of sugar
110 grams of cold oil
60 ml of ice water

For filling:
1 1/2 tea cups of papaya cut into cubes
1/2 tea cup of raw cashew
1 tea cup of coconut oil
1 tea cup of pineapple cubed
1/2 tea cup of mango cut into cubes
1/4 tea cup orange juice
1/2 tablespoon of grated orange peel

Steps of preparation:
Flour, salt, sugar and chopped butter are chopped with a blender for 15 seconds until the mixture becomes small crumbs. Add ice water and run the blender for another 30 seconds. The softened dough is wrapped in a foil for fresh storage and left in the refrigerator for at least an hour to cool. Once the time has elapsed, a crust is rolled out to cover the bottom and sides of a 20 cm diameter mold. Punch the bottom of the bark with a fork and return to the fridge for 15 minutes. Before baking, cover the baking sheet with baking paper and put beans on it to prevent the dough from rising. Bake 200 degrees in 20 minutes, then remove the beans and bake until golden for another 10 minutes. Gently pull out the base of the pie and, while cooling, prepare the filler.

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In the blender, smash up to smooth compound cashew nut, coconut oil, pineapple, mango, orange juice and orange peel. In the cooled base of the pie we pour the cobweb papaya (I secretly put cubes and mango because I love it very much;)) and pour the mixture from the blender. Smooth and refrigerate in the refrigerator for an hour.
It only remains to decorate the cake. There was no fruit in the original recipe, but I put mango, pineapple, kiwi, and something unusual for in the Caribbean – strawberries. I could not resist the temptation when I saw the other ingredients in the store and I mostly felt the aroma of these great strawberries.
So it happened that the people who visited me for the feast and tried the sweets turned out to visit Antigua and Barbuda. What they have told me greatly delighted me – that I have definitely achieved a Caribbean taste.
The cake is light and very fresh. It’s harder to find the fruit for it than to do it. So try.

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Next destination – Argentina.