Bake and shark is a traditional fast food dish of Trinidadian cuisine prepared using fried flatbread, shark meat and additional ingredients. It is a classic street food dish that is sold at a multitude of food stalls and cookshops all over Trinidad and Tobago.
It consists of a fried flatbread ("bake") filled with fried pieces of shark meat and various other ingredients and sauces. Before frying, the shark meat is either seasoned with a herb blend and breaded, [1] or marinated in a mix of lemon juice, onion, garlic, thyme and capsicum chinense. [2] Popular additional ingredients are lettuce, coleslaw, tomatoes or pineapple; liquid condiments commonly used are mustard, ketchup, garlic sauce, chili sauce or a sauce made from culantro. [1] In Trinidad, bake and shark is widely associated with Maracas beach on the Northern coast as it features a multitude of bake and shark stands, and the needed shark is caught in the offshore surf. [3]
As apex predators, sharks are of high importance for the ocean as an ecosystem. Through overfishing, many shark species are endangered. Apart from ethical problems this also causes economic problems as the demand for shark meat in Trinidad cannot be covered any more. [4] Often catfish and ray are used as substitutes and are declared incorrectly. [5] In return, bake and shark stalls sometimes advertise for using shark meat instead of cheaper alternatives. [6]
A blood sausage is a sausage filled with blood that is cooked or dried and mixed with a filler until it is thick enough to solidify when cooled. Most commonly, the blood of pigs, sheep, lamb, cow, chicken, or goose is used.
Roti is a round flatbread native to the Indian subcontinent. It is commonly consumed in many South Asian, Southeast Asian, Caribbean, and Southeast African countries.
Trinidad and Tobago has a unique history and its food is influenced by Indian-South Asian, West African, Creole, European, American, Chinese, Amerindian, and Latin American culinary styles. Trinidadian and Tobagonian food is dominated by a wide selection of dishes, most notably, doubles, roti, pelau, callaloo and curried crab and dumplings. Trinidad and Tobago is also known for its prepared provisions, such as dasheen, sweet potato, eddoes, cassava, yam, soups and stews, also known as blue food across the country. Corresponding to the Blue Food Day event held annually in Trinidad and Tobago.
Callaloo is a plant used in popular dishes in many Caribbean countries, while for other Caribbean countries, a stew made with the plant is called callaloo. Cuisines including the plant Callaloo or dishes called callaloo varies throughout the Caribbean. In countries such as Trinidad and Tobago or Grenada, the dish itself is called callaloo, and uses taro leaves or Xanthosoma leaves.
An aloo pie is a Caribbean fast food dish of Indian origin from and common in Trinidad and Tobago.
Levantine cuisine is the traditional cuisine of the Levant, in the sense of the rough area of former Ottoman Syria. The cuisine has similarities with Egyptian cuisine, North African cuisine and Ottoman cuisine. It is particularly known for its meze spreads of hot and cold dishes, most notably among them ful medames, hummus, tabbouleh and baba ghanoush, accompanied by bread.
Uzbek cuisine shares the culinary traditions of peoples across Central Asia. There is a great deal of grain farming in Uzbekistan, so breads and noodles are of importance, and Uzbek cuisine has been characterized as "noodle-rich". Mutton is a popular variety of meat due to the abundance of sheep in the country and it is a part of various Uzbek dishes.
Chicken curry or curry/curriedchicken is a South Asian dish originating from India. It is common in the Indian subcontinent, Caribbean, Arabian Peninsula, Southeast Asia, Great Britain, and Japan. A typical curry from the Indian subcontinent consists of chicken stewed in an onion- and tomato-based sauce, flavoured with ginger, garlic, tomato puree, chilli peppers and a variety of spices, often including turmeric, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, and cardamom. Outside of South Asia, chicken curry is often made with a pre-made spice mixture known as curry powder.
Belizean cuisine is an amalgamation of all ethnicities in the nation of Belize and their respectively wide variety of foods. Breakfast often consists of sides of bread, flour tortillas, or fry jacks that are often homemade and eaten with various cheeses. All are often accompanied with refried beans, cheeses, and various forms of eggs, etc. Inclusive is also cereal along with milk, coffee, or tea.
Regional street food is street food that has commonalities within a region or culture.
Malaysian Indian cuisine, or the cooking of the ethnic Indian communities in Malaysia, consists of adaptations of authentic dishes from India, as well as original creations inspired by the diverse food culture of Malaysia. Because the vast majority of Malaysia's Indian community are of South Indian descent, and are mostly ethnic Tamils who are descendants of immigrants from a historical region which consists of the modern Indian state of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka's Northern Province, much of Malaysian Indian cuisine is predominantly South Indian inspired in character and taste. A typical Malaysian Indian dish is likely to be redolent with curry leaves, whole and powdered spice, and contains fresh coconut in various forms. Ghee is still widely used for cooking, although vegetable oils and refined palm oils are now commonplace in home kitchens. Before a meal it is customary to wash hands as cutlery is often not used while eating, with the exception of a serving spoon for each respective dish.
Buljol is a salad dish of the cuisine of Trinidad and Tobago. It consists of chopped salted cod, tomatoes and chilies. The name is of French origin. 18th-century colonial power Spain launched the cédula de población in 1783, an edict that successfully promoted the settling of French planters in Trinidad who quickly set the population majority. The name is a combination of the French words brulé ('burnt') and gueule ('muzzle'), which was changed into bu'n jaw in Trinidad's 19th century patois and finally morphed into buljol. The name does not relate to the temperature of the dish but to its spiciness, caused by the added hot pepper.
Kuchela, also spelled kucheela, occasionally also kuchila, is a hot relish of the Trinidadian cuisine.
Pelau is a traditional rice dish from the West Indies. Its main ingredients typically include meat, rice, pigeon peas or cowpeas, coconut milk and sugar. Various vegetables and optional spices can be added. Common spices used in the dish are cardamom, cloves, cumin, and coriander. The meat is caramelised in brown sugar along with onion and garlic and the other ingredients are then added one by one, resulting in a dark brown stew.
Arab Indonesian cuisine is characterized by the mixture of Middle Eastern cuisine with local Indonesian-style. Arab Indonesians brought their legacy of Arab cuisine—originally from Hadhramaut, Hejaz and Egypt—and modified some of the dishes with the addition of Indonesian ingredients. The Arabs arrived in the Nusantara archipelago to trade and spread Islam. In Java, since the 18th century AD, most of Arab traders settled on the north coast and diffuse with indigenous, thus affecting the local cuisine culture, especially in the use of mutton meat and ghee in cooking.
Saheena are a street-food and snack of Indian origin in Trinidadian cuisine.
