When I cook, I always do my best to feature local ingredients – at home or on the road. When my windsurfing buddies and I head off around the world in search of waves, we each take on one logistical task. That makes me the team cook - a culinary tourist!
Half the fun of being a traveling cook is searching for the local ingredients. The other half is making something memorable with them. The best part is renting a place with a full kitchen. We generally save about $1000 over restaurant prices and we eat a whole lot better too! I’ve been cooking and traveling my whole life, but never in the back woods of the Caribbean.
A couple of winters ago, we were shacked up in the Dominican Republic waiting for the reliable daily trade winds and waves to build. Our resort was perched with a small local village on a remote stretch of coastline. You didn’t have to go far to find relative wilderness - or get lost. Most days we’d sail all afternoon so that left evenings for dining and extra curricular activities, and mornings for sleeping in. But not for the cook!
The day after we flew in from Canada, I got up early and set off on morning kitchen patrol. The village’s main street was easy to find – just inland from the beach hotel strip. I strolled past the normal tourist trinkets to visit a few produce stands here and there. With my knapsack filled with locally grown onions, carrots and herbs, dinner was shaping up nicely. But I couldn’t find any meat. I had a battered old pot and a worn out hot plate waiting, and meat had to be on the menu so my fellow carnivores and I could face the waves each day.
I fumbled with a bit of my kitchen Spanish and asked around for “carneros.” I got a few odd looks and a lot of pointed directions. It seemed that the meat lay somewhere beyond the bounds of the small town. The road looked dubious, but I figured it must go somewhere as the power lines marched out of town along with it. I continued along as the colorful main street turned into a worn dirt road through a thick forest leading to the next town along the coast. It was a nice day and I didn’t mind a brief stroll figuring there’d be a sign or a house or something nearby! I could hear the nearby beach but couldn’t smell any meat.
After a 20-minute walk, I figured there wasn’t going to be meat any time soon and was getting ready to turn around when I noticed an orange extension cord spliced into the cables above me. It seemed to lead off along a well-worn trail into the woods. I followed it out of sheer curiosity and laughed as I realized it was actually a series of cords plugged into each other. They led to a clearing surrounded by several carefully assembled shanties. There were kids playing and people sitting around one of whom jumped up when he saw me and came running over. As he did, my eyes followed the extension cord at my feet as it dead-ended in a familiar looking chest freezer sitting in the middle of the clearing.
The freezer held about half a pig. Turned out my new friend was the village butcher. Out came the hindquarters, a machete materialized and he whacked off a huge chunk handing me dinner for days. My buddies and I sailed all week fueled by local pork vegetable broth.
Best pig we ever ate!