Banann ak Yam nan Sos Pwason Recipe

Banann ak Yam nan Sos Pwason / Boiled Plantains and Ñame with Fish Sauce

Syndia Leonce ak Amazan Esperanta, 2 memb Atis Rezistan, te vin bay yon reset pou Bannan ak Yam nan Sos Pwason nan Radyo Shak lan.

Syndia Leonce and Amazan Esperanta, both members of the Atis Rezistans arts cooperative, host of the Ghetto Biennale, delivered this double-header recipe for the Radyo Shak audience.

Ingredients for Syndia Leonce’s Banann ak Yam:
Plantains
Ñame [nyaah-meh] or yautia*
Bitter Orange*
Salt

So, first, you have to go to the market and buy plantains and yams.

That’s the only two ingredients in there? OK, so, how do you make it?

First thing is you boil water, because you can’t put the plantains in cold water. While my water is heating up, I peel the plantains, and take the skin off the ñyame. Then I wash them with bitter orange, to give them a really nice color. Then I put them on to boil, and I put a little salt.

How long are they going to boil for?

Maybe thirty minutes.

And then?

They’re cooked. They are ready. You have some people, they eat ñyame without sauce, and then some people eat it with a fish sauce, like Esperanta is going to tell you how to make.

* A hairy tuber sold in Caribbean or Latin American markets. Neither “Yam” nor “Sweet Potato”
* (Failing fresh, bottled juice is sold as Naranja Agria in Latin American markets)

Ingredients for Amazan Esperanta’s Sos Pwason, Fish Sauce:
Fish
Garlic
Leek or Scallion
Maggi® Seasoning Cubes
Scotch Bonnet Pepper
Lemon
Coconut Water
Tomato Paste (optional)

So to prepare your fish, you know, fish is a fruit de mer, get your fish, before you clean it, you need to get your seasonings ready. You put some garlic, you put some leek, and then you are going to crush those [in a wooden mortar]. When you’re done crushing them (you want them crushed up before you put salt in there so you don’t get too much water out of them), then you add a little salt. You crush up some Maggi, you’re going to put a teeny bit of hot pepper, just a bit, because you don’t eat fish without hot pepper, it would be a bit cold, we need to heat it up.

So then, once you have done a really good job of getting the scales off of your fish and cleaning it, you give it a little lemon juice, then you are going to season it, and then you’re going to make your sauce with a little bit of coconut water, if you are going to use coconut water. Or, you have to buy tomato paste if you’re going to make it with tomato paste, that’s going to depend, you have some people eat their fish sauce with straight up coconut water, and you have others eat it and it has to have a little tomato paste in there.

When you’ve cleaned your fish, you have to slice it open so you can get your seasonings in there. If you had time to make a fire, you put your pot on there and put some oil in it, and fry up your tomato paste, and put in little bit of water, just a little bit, and your coconut water and your fish. But don’t stir it up, you don’t want your fish to break apart: you’re not supposed to boil your fish for thirty minutes or something like that, it will break.

And then you put a bit of onion with it, or shallots.

And then you put that on your ñyame and plantains?

Yes, good food! You’ll “cut your fingers off” eating that! [Koupe dwet, the kreyol equivalent of “finger-licking good"].

After that, you drink a passionfruit juice and you are OK!

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