Barbados and Don’ts

Fish Cakes

We had some momentum at this point, and had our entrees come out directly following the roti, I might have fared better than I did.  Unfortunately, there was a twenty or so minute gap that gave the roti more than enough time to settle and the fullness of my belly more than enough time to register with my brain.  My entree ended up coming out a good bit after the other two, so I was able to nibble from the Nomad’s fried flying fish and coo-coo (the Barbadian national dish), and Noquar’s oxtail and coo-coo.  The plan at that point was that they would in turn help me with mine when it finally got there.  Coo-coo, by the way, is Barbados’ national staple made from cornmeal and okra and with a polenta-like texture.  Both coo-coo dishes were excellent, and neither the Nomad nor Noquar were about to hold off or even slow down to wait for my dish. By the time it finally arrived, they were both stuffed and still had a fair amount of their own dishes to take care of.

Chicken Roti

Now I should explain the logic behind my ordering pudding and souse.  It wasn’t that, having lived for a time in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, I had any prior affinity for souse, nor was it that our server’s description made it sound particularly appealing.  I ordered it because a) it’s only served on Saturdays, and b) it was Saturday.  Pudding and souse, as it was served to me, was a pile of pig’s ears, pig’s feet, and pork shoulder topped with a spicy chopped celery salad (the souse), accompanied by a mashed sweet potato mix cased in pig’s intestine (not exactly your run-of-the-mill Bill Cosby pudding).  I dove into that plate with everything I had left in me.  I ate at least one pig’s ear, gnawed for a few seconds on a pig’s foot, took care of most of the shoulder, and put a serious dent in the pudding, which I probably would have finished and enjoyed had it not been for that beast of a roti.  In the end, though, there was just too much.  The Nomad did her part and bravely tried to help me, but Noquar, who has inspired me countless times to put crazy things into my mouth, was still visibly shaken by his run in with the Argentinian tripe and blood sausage.  He was a sad, broken shell of the fearless eater I’d seen travel through Asia.

Oxtail and Coo-coo

Once I’d resigned myself to the reality that there was no way I was putting any more pig parts in my mouth, I put the still fairly large pile of souse and the rest of the pudding into a take-home container knowing full well that there was little to no chance of me pulling it out of the fridge the next day for Sunday brunch.  It weighed heavily on my mind as well as in my hand as I carried it home home clinging to some delusion that maybe, if I was just hungry enough, I would give it another look.  In all honesty though, letting go of that bag and hearing it hit the bottom of the trash can might have been the best feeling I had all day.

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