Hotel Mocking Bird Hill, Jamaica’s No.1 eco boutique hotel is delighted to be celebrating Terra Madre Day organised by the Slow Food Movement on Thursday 10th December 2010.
Its acclaimed restaurant Mille Fleurs, praised by The Guardian & voted winner of Jamaica’s Best Kept Secret by the Jamaica Observer, will be serving a fine array of 14 scrumptious local Jamaican-style tapas style dishes created by Chef Melvin Laidlaw including:
- Tuna Ceviche with Scotch Bonnet Papaya Salsa
- Goat Chops with Guava and Tamarind sauce
- Green Banana Mussa (cooked mashed Bananas with Coconut Milk and Baccalà)
- Hemp crust pizza with Ackee & Baccalà or Callaloo & Cheese
The tapas will be accompanied by a selection of refreshing liqueurs made from Sorrel, Pimento, Orange & Blue Mountain Coffee.
Dishes will be co-presented by Ma Maybelle, a Jamaica Cultural Development Commission prize-winner for her glorious Sweet Potato desserts and homemade wines. Together we will be illustrating how locally-grown organic ingredients such as Cassava provide a sustainable income to many of the growers and producers in the area.
Unlike many eco-resorts the hotel believes that holiday dining should be more than canteen-style food; rather, a celebration of healthy local dishes sourced from the community that are brought up to date through a fusion of cooking styles which result in unexpected taste sensations. An example of this is the hotel’s widely acclaimed Cassava Pasta served with Dasheen Heart & Roasted Jackfruit Seed Pesto! This is not just wonderful in taste but perfect for those who are gluten intolerant.
Hotel Mocking Bird Hill’s ethos is to help develop a sustainable local economy in Jamaica’s lush North East district of Portland, in which tourism benefits all members of the local community. Rather than creating a kitchen that depends on imported food stuffs with all the extra fossil fuel miles and unnecessary plastic packaging that all these ingredients bring with them, here guests & diners are able to indulge guiltlessly.
Barbara Walker, Co-Owner of Hotel Mocking Bird Hill said:
“Celebrating Terra Madre Day in the week that the Copenhagen Environment Summit commences is the very least we can do to celebrate the fruits of labour and the soil that creates it. It is our special opportunity to highlight, both here in Jamaica and in the outside world that locally sourced ingredients, cooked creatively with care, are the future in helping to grow local sustainable economies.
For Jamaica to continue to be a tourist destination and grow as a nation, it is vital that we compete creatively utilising our own resources, utilising the island’s land type & climate, rather than attempting to copy different lands with very different soils & climates.”