Ackee and Saltfish is Jamaica’s national dish; Many Jamaicans and lovers of Jamaican dishes enjoy Ackee and Saltfish as a favorite breakfast, lunch or dinner meal. Ackee is a fruit with a thick red skin; when unripe, the skin forms a sealed pod, but when the fruit ripens, the skin opens up to reveal three or four yellow pegs topped with a single black seed. Native to West Africa, Ackee came to Jamaica along with enslaved Africans, who used to use its seed as a form of protection.
Ackee can potentially be poisonous if not properly prepared, however it is perfectly safe to eat when harvested when ripened and when prepared correctly. To know if the Ackee is ready, the skin must be naturally and fully opened before picking; the yellow pegs, must extracted from the red pod and thoroughly cleaned. Cleaning the Ackee involves the removal of the black seed and the thin red membrane in the flesh of the yellow peg; the Ackee must then be boiled in lightly salted water. Most Ackee consumed outside of Jamaica, is available in cans and can be found in supermarkets throughout the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
Dried and salted cod, sometimes referred to as salt cod or Saltfish, is cod, which has been preserved by drying after salting. Salted cod was long a major export of the North Atlantic region, and has become an ingredient of many cuisines around the Atlantic and in the Mediterranean. Salted cod, known as Saltfish in the Caribbean islands, is a staple in the cuisine of almost all of the Caribbean islands as it formed part of the Triangular Trade between Europe, Africa and the Americas, tying its history to that of the African slave trade, slavery on Caribbean plantations, and the production and trade of West Indian sugar and rum. While high-quality North American salted cod was being exported to Europe, a lower quality product of poorly cured fish—called “West India Cure”—was being sold to plantation owners in the Caribbean. The West Indian slave owner relied on imported salt cod as a cheap form of nourishment for slaves.
As is often said in Jamaica "Tun yuh han an mek fashon" Jamaica made Ackee and Saltfish the national dish even though the history behind the ingredients were from a dark time in Jamaican history. Michelle and Susanne Rousseau writes that "The combination of these two very different ingredients combine to create a meal that is both subtle and bold. Ackee has a soft texture and delicate nutty taste, it absorbs the flavor of whatever it’s cooked with; this tempers the sharp, bright, saltiness and firm, dry texture of Saltfish. The addition of Scotch bonnet pepper, garlic, thyme, green peppers, onions, and scallion, along with boiled dumplings, fried dumplings, green bananas, breadfruit roasted or boiled and other ground provisions makes for an incredible meal."
Let's learn how this dish is prepared in our next post.
Sources WikiPedia & Serious Eats