Restaurants and food of Jamaica

Restaurants scene in Jamaica is exceptional and the seafood is especially great. But you've got many more options than just seafood on Jamaica. There are great restaurants serving up Caribbean, American, and many other types of cuisine. The restaurants from Jamaica have all of the variety you desire...
During your vacation in Jamaica plan at least one dinner so that you can catch the sunset while looking over the ocean and be sure that you are hungry. Jamaica's cuisine shows a multitude of influences from all around the world.
The first cooks of the island were the Arawaks Indians who made use of native produce and meats. Fish, corn, cassava and callaloo - a green similar to spinach - were mainstays of the diet. With European settlement and the introduction of slavery, English puddings and pasties and African yams, okra and ackee - a tree fruit used as a vegetable - entered into the repertoire. After the abolition of slavery the British brought over indentured servants from India and various curries became popular. Chinese immigration expresses itself in the popularity of sweet-sour dishes.
Other ingredients in wide use on Jamaica include bananas, breadfruit, chocho (or chayote, a type of squash), bok choy, butterbeans, pawpaw (papaya), lime and avocados (known only in Jamaica as pears). Pork, chicken, fish and shellfish find their way into various dishes. Allspice and thyme are typical seasonings in Jamaican cooking and the super-hot bonnet pepper adds fiery punch to almost everything. The Jamaican rum lends itself to a variety of tropical drinks. And the coffee from Blue Mountains, grown in the interior, is a world famous product.
Ackee and salt fish is a mixture of salt cod and it's considered the national dish. Perhaps the most widely known and beloved of Jamaican food is jerk. This method of grilling meats originated with the Arawaks and involved cooking marinated meat over a fire of pimento wood. The pimento tree is the source of allspice, a beloved Jamaican flavoring, and allspice finds its way into every jerk recipe. The vegetarian cooking of the Rastafarians, called Ital cuisine, is an important subcomponent of Jamaica's food culture. Ital focuses on not only the nutritive value of food but also on its medicinal effects.

Typical Jamaican dishes

The typical Jamaican dishes are:

Appetizers
- akkra (black-eyed pea fritters)
- plantain fritters (deep-fried plantain balls)
- stamp and go (salt cod fritters)

Soups and Stews
- blaff (lime-scented fish soup)
- oxtail soup
- pepper pot (spicy stew)
- red pea soup (red bean soup with coconut milk)

Salads
- coleslaw

Poultry
- jerk chicken (spicy grilled chicken)

Meats
- beef and okra (African-style stir fry)
- beef patties (spiced ground beef in pastry crust)
- goat curry
- roast pork

Fish and Seafood
- ackee and salt fish (national dish)
- coconut shrimp (crispy deep-fried shrimp)
- escovitch (pickled fried mackerel)
- fish pie (baked fish and eggs)
- pepper shrimp (spicy simmered shrimp)
- rundown (mackerel or salmon simmered in coconut milk)

Vegetables
- baked sweet potatoes
- green bananas (steamed bananas)
- greens (kale, collard, mustard, turnip, beet, chard)
- rice and peas (rice with beans and coconut milk)

Breads
- bammie (cassava flatbread)
- rice and peas (rice with beans and coconut milk)

Sauces and Condiments
- jerk marinade
- pawpaw chutney (papaya relish)

Desserts
- banana cake
- black cake (rum-soaked fruitcake)
- plantain fritters (deep-fried plantain balls)
- totoes (coconut cake)

Beverages
- carrot juice
- ginger beer (ginger beverage)
- limeade (lime beverage)
- planter's punch (dark rum with fruit juice)
- sorrel punch (hibiscus flower beverage)