Goat water, saltfish and what St. Kitts eats

Ask someone in St. Kitts what the national dish is and you may get two answers. The official one is stewed saltfish with spicy plantains, coconut dumplings and seasoned breadfruit. The one many people will cook for you on a Saturday is goat water.

The official national dish

The saltfish plate was chosen in 2003, through a national competition held as St. Kitts and Nevis marked 20 years of independence. The winning recipe, by Jacqueline Ryan, brings four things together on one plate:

• Stewed saltfish: salted cod, soaked and simmered with tomatoes, onions and sweet peppers
• Spicy plantains: ripe plantains, seasoned and fried
• Coconut dumplings: dumplings made with coconut
• Seasoned breadfruit: boiled breadfruit, the starch that runs through a lot of island cooking

It's the kind of plate you'll find at home and at lunch counters rather than on a restaurant tasting menu.

Goat water

Goat water is a goat stew, cooked with water rather than stock, which is where the name comes from. Recipes vary from pot to pot, but most have bone-in goat meat, breadfruit, green papaya and dumplings, warmed with cloves, thyme and hot pepper, usually over a tomato base.

On St. Kitts it's a weekend dish. Roadside cooks and small eateries sell it on Friday and Saturday nights, and it turns up at fêtes and festivals. Montserrat, a nearby island, claims goat water as its own national dish, and versions are cooked across the Leeward Islands.

Also on the table

• Johnny cakes: fried dough, often eaten at breakfast with saltfish
• Cook-up: a one-pot rice dish with pigeon peas, coconut milk and meat or saltfish
• Conkies: cornmeal, coconut, pumpkin and spice, steamed in a banana leaf, traditionally around Independence Day on 19 September
• Sugar cake: a simple coconut and sugar sweet

And to drink

CSR, Cane Spirit Rothschild, is a clear spirit distilled from fresh sugar cane. It was created on St. Kitts in the 1980s under Baron Edmond de Rothschild, and Demerara Distillers took over the distillery and brand in 1996. St. Kitts also has smaller rum makers, among them Brinley Gold.

Photo: Basseterre - Market by roger4336, CC BY-SA 2.0.