A slice of heaven on a lush mountain in Jamaica

A goat herder on Canaan Mountain in Jamaica, where he lives among other subsistence farmers. Our stay at the nearby Zimbali Retreats showed us a side of the Caribbean island few tourists ever see.

One evening, Obrian Herron, the chef at Zimbali Retreats, prepared a deliciously thick soup, using coconut milk that he made himself and filling it with unusually tender whelk, a marine mollusk; banana, yam and other ingredients.

 

Another evening, Obrian served us butter-fish fillet with rice and peas; eggplant and other vegetables. His fruit-based sauces and salad dressings made every meal special. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Zimbali Retreats -- a cluster of rustic cottages on lush, green Canaan Mountian in western Jamaica -- redefines the meaning of getting away from it all.

The complex is not only off the beaten path, it relies almost completely on solar power, storage batteries, rain water and a natural spring.

We enjoyed three meals a day prepared by Chef Obrian Herron, using ingredients from a 7-and-a-half-acre organic farm the owners started several years before they began accepting guests.

What did we do? 

We ate, rested, ate some more and rested some more. I read "East of the Sun," a novel set in the 1920s in England and India that I found in our room.

Life is a beach

You can be as active or inactive as you want. 

There are spa services available at extra cost, including massages, facials and nail treatments. 

Or you could go on one of several day trips, including a jaunt to the white-sand beach Negril is famous for -- about 12 miles away.


Nature's soundtrack

And you can commune with nature, listening during the day to the sounds of birds, crickets and goats swell at night to a discordant symphony of noisy tree frogs and other critters. 

We watched powerful thunderstorms from the safety of a covered veranda in the main villa.

My morning routine was making coffee in our cottage and drinking it on the porch.

I watched in fascination as -- only a few feet away -- iridescent green hummingbirds took nectar from flowers while their wings beat furiously to hold them suspended in the air.

A tasty vegetarian meal of, from upper left, lentils, lentil flat bread, salad with mango vinaigrette and green plantains.

A breakfast of ackee and salt fish, the Jamaican national dish, included roasted breadfruit, rear, boiled green banana, avocado and sweet plantains.

Fresh fruit started off breakfast. Sweet bananas had green and red skins, and the latter was the sweetest such fruit I have ever tasted. A soft Jamaican apple was unlike any I've eaten before.

The freshly made juices served with most meals, including pineapple, above, were heavily spiked with ginger.

  

Cooling off

Just before breakfast on Sunday, GG, the farmer at Zimbali Retreats, led me and my wife on a 10-minute walk down a rocky dirt road to a spot where I could take a dip in the cool Canaan River, under a thick canopy of leaves and bamboo.

We encountered a farmer who lives nearby and was out cutting fresh sugar cane for a morning energy boost.

Fruit rots on trees

GG spoke of the abundance of fruit and nuts grown in the lush setting, including breadfruit, mango, avocado, which is called "pear" in Jamaica; cashews, almonds and lychee.

In fact, he said, there is so much blooming on the mountain that farmers and their families can't possibly eat it all and lots of it goes to waste.

Coffee on the porch of our cottage, only a few feet away from a tree whose flowers are called shrimp, below.

Hummingbirds find this flowering shrimp simply irresistible.

A young hummingbird in an unusual pose -- resting on a branch. When in motion, you can hear the thrumming of the hummingbird's wings, but it's a blur when flying.

 

A hammock is placed strategically at each corner of the main villa's breezy covered veranda, which guests have the run of. 

Zimbali Retreats' main villa as seen from the farm.

Thursday, Friday and Saturday brought intense thunderstorms, all of them starting at 3 in the afternoon. On Sunday, the sun rose through a cloudy sky.

A welcoming home

Since we hung around Zimbali Retreats most of the time, we got to hear the owners, Mark and Alecia, bantering with their staff and their children in the colorful hybrid language Jamaicans call "patois."

Mark apologized for workmen sawing and hammering wood to add a sixth guest room on the other end of the property from our cottage, explaining the off-season is the only time he can expand.

You'll find most of the creature comforts at Zimbali Retreats, but no air-conditioning. 

Near silent ceiling fans do a good job of keeping guests cool in the hot, humid weather, especially on the breezy veranda. Nights are cool, and even fans aren't needed.

One of the revelations at Zimbali Retreats was fresh collaloo, above left and below, a spinach-like green that is chopped, canned in brine and sent to the United States.

Collaloo with sweet and green plantains, avocado and scrambled eggs.

Ackee, the Jamaican fruit, is said to be poisonous until it opens, and then requires labor-intensive cleaning of the black seeds and other non-edible waste.

Chef Obrian at the stove in the kitchen-dining room. He is a skilled vegetarian cook, but will prepare seafood or chicken for guests who want them. No pork is served. Many of the nearby farmers are Rastafarian and eat only fruit, vegetables and fish.

Going organic

The mostly organic food was a big draw for us, and eating fresh collaloo and ackee -- not the canned stuff we have in the U.S. -- were revelations.

We were served wonderful homemade juices, heavily spiked with ginger, including mango, pineapple, sour sop and beet.

I also liked the strong, muddy black coffee from a French press.

After my swim on Sunday, I asked GG if there was any coconut water around, and he went to hack open two of the fruit for us.

The owners, Mark and Alecia; GG, Chef Obrian, Miss D and other members of the staff made us feel completely at home.

Coconut water straight from the source, above and below.

Chef Obrian estimates that 75% of the ingredients he uses come from the farm at Zimbali Retreats.

GG fashioned a spoon so we could eat the "jelly" from inside the coconut.

 

A farmer of Jamaican and Chinese descent enjoying a snack of fresh sugar cane, above and below.

   

Zimbali Retreats, Canaan Mountain, Little London District, Westmoreland Parish, Jamaica; 1-876-485-2789. 

Web site: Healing mind and body

We learned about Zimbali Retreats from Amazon Local, purchasing a voucher for 4 nights, including meals, for $799 for 2 people.  A 16.5% tax is additional.

Transfers from the airport in Montego Bay were $99 each way, and are well worth it considering Jamaica has some of the worst roads -- and worst drivers -- in the Western Hemisphere, including a long, rocky dirt track that runs through a sugar-cane estate leading up to Zimbali Retreats.

Jamaicans also drive on the left. Enough said.

If you go, don't forget to pack insect repellant. 

Coming soon:

In Jamaica, nature's splendor

 is everywhere

Costco Wholesale's accent is becoming much more pronounced

A quiet day at Costco Wholesale in Hackensack. (February 2013)

Editor's note: A lot has changed since I wrote this post in 2011. Pine Hill, the Korean restaurant in Paramus I mentioned, has closed. And I no longer buy the farmed shrimp from Costco; I pay more for wild-caught, usually from the Gulf of Mexico (January 2016).

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

On my first visit to Costco Wholesale since Sept. 9, I was surprised at two of the items I saw on the shelves.

Imported items from Korea are nothing new. After all, there are eight Costco warehouse stores in Korea, and thousands of Korean-Americans living in North Jersey.

But the 3-kilo tub of spicy red-pepper paste stopped me in my tracks. Koreans call it gochujang, and use it in many dishes or like ketchup. The other day, I used leftover Chinese takeout brown rice, kimchi and gochujang to make kimchi fried rice.

Unfortunately, this imported brand lists corn syrup as the first ingredient, and it's rated only medium spicy. I buy smaller containers of the vinegared red-pepper paste made with sugar at H Mart in Little Ferry.

Costco gets an "A" for effort, but this brand isn't the best available. I recall when refrigerated jars of cabbage kimchi showed up at the Hackensack Costco, and MSG was listed as an ingredient.

I continued to buy my artisanal, all-natural Arirang-brand kimchi in Englewood. 

I did pick up a box of Korean roasted, seasoned seaweed at Costco. Twenty-seven packages -- each .18 ounces -- were $9.99 or 37 cents each. They make great snacks.

The other item that stopped me in the aisle today was a jar of tahina or tahini from Lebanon, and this popular sesame paste is possibly the first imported Middle Eastern item I've seen at the Hackensack warehouse store. 

Tahini is an essential component of hummus, and can be used as a salad dressing with the addition of lemon juice and garlic.

Around the world

The gochujang and tahini extend Costco's already impressive global reach.

In my basket at checkout today were:

A wedge of Grana Padano cheese from Italy, $9.99 a pound; two 2-pound jars of Kalamata olives from Greece, $2.24 a pound. 

Wealthy Greeks have said "no" to taxes for so long, the country is on the verge of collapse, but the olives keep on coming.

The refrigerated soups are back in the cold case, and I picked up Alaskan King Crab and Sweet Corn Chowder from Legal Sea Foods, $9.79 for two 20-ounce containers; and CedarLane brand Chopped Vegetable and Barley Soup, $8.99 for two 2-pound containers.

I also picked up a new item from Kirkland Signature, the Costco store brand: three, generous 32-ounce jars of Marinara sauce at $2.09 each. The ingredient list is short, and no sugar or corn syrup is used.

I usually add a can of anchovies with their oil to bottled pasta sauce, along with dried herbs. The anchovies cook away, but leave behind a robustness.

My last two items were U-15 farmed shrimp from Vietnam for dinner tonight, $10.99 a pound; and Oliveri brand 7-Cheese Tortellini, $9.39 for 3 pounds, not 4 pounds, as I wrote originally.

The shrimp, tortellini and Marinara made a great dinner, with a salad of organic spring mix and a glass of wine.

Exploring our options

If you avoid beef, Korean restaurants offer a wide variety of healthy food, including tofu, vegetables, seafood and bracing stews that can be prepared from mild to spicy.

One of our favorite dinners is a stew of soft tofu, accompanied by a fresh egg that you cook in the bubbling broth, side dishes and steamed rice. 

Breaking the  softly boiled yolk over rice and eating them together is a highlight of the meal, which is available for under $10.

For many years, our go-to place has been So Gong Dong, a second-floor soft-tofu house on Broad Avenue in Palisades Park, where about 10 varieties of soft tofu (pork, beef, oyster and so forth) are available, in addition to dumplings, seafood pancakes and barbecue. 

But as I've done periodically in recent years, I am trying soft tofu at other restaurants just to make sure So Gong Dong is still the best for Korea's beloved comfort food.

Soft-tofu stew at So Gong Dong in Palisades Park.

Two Korean restaurants

On Tuesday night, I stopped at Pine Hill, a Korean restaurant in Paramus to try its soft-tofu stew or soondooboo jigae.

It's listed on the full Korean menu for $10.95, compared to So Gong Dong's $9.99, which includes four side dishes, rice and tax.

After I ordered, a waitress brought me seven side dishes, but I sent back cabbage with slices of boiled ham, because I am not eating meat, though I acknowledge the broth used in most soft-tofu stew is beef based.

There were a couple of problems at Pine Hill. 

The side dishes were terrific, including cabbage kimchi, bean sprouts, seaweed, chunks of yam in a maple syrup-like sauce and stewed tofu, but the waitress didn't bring me a fresh egg with the soft-tofu stew.

When I asked for one, she went away and didn't return until long after my stew had stopped bubbling, and then she brought me an egg souffle, not a fresh egg. 

The broth of the tofu stew was nothing special, certainly no match for So Gong Dong's spicy version, which I enjoyed last weekend.

The search continues.

Pine Hill Restaurant, 123 Paramus Road, Paramus; 201-843-0170. Parking lot, liquor license.

So Gong Dong, 118 Broad Ave., Second Floor, Palisades Park; 201-313-5550. Valet or street parking, BYO.

Another great (meatless) meal at Wondee's

Image via Wikipedia

We didn't get to Wondee's until 8:45 or so Saturday night, but we were lucky to get the last vacant table. My wife and I ate only seafood or vegetarian dishes at the Thai restaurant in Hackensack, where we pledged to go meatless on Feb. 28. But our 13-year-old son, celebrating his birthday, ordered wonton soup with sliced pork (he says it's the best he's ever had).

It was another great meal at one of our all-time favorites and we didn't miss meat. The value is outstanding. Wondee's is one of the few restaurants in North Jersey where a whole fish is priced at $16.95 (up recently from $14.95).


We ordered fried shrimp dumplings with a tasty plum sauce, mock duck salad (with crispy tofu instead of crispy duck), soft-shell crabs in Panang curry (a special) and pineapple fried rice with shrimp.


Everything was terrific, but we especially like the two big crabs (cut in four pieces) in the spicy curry, which was flecked with red pepper ($16.95). The dish included some crisp green beans and sweet pepper.


The fried rice dish is so much bolder than Chinese fried rice, which often is made from leftovers. Wondee's version includes big chunks of canned pineapple and three or four crunchy shrimp.


Our son didn't eat all of the sliced pork in his soup -- only the second or third time he has had meat in the two and a half months since we decided to give up meat and eat seafood.

Wondee's has a vegetarian menu and offers vegetarian versions of dishes with meat. For example, another special was a Thai summer roll with or without sweet sausage in tamarind sauce. But we got there too late; the kitchen was out of the meatless version.




Wondee's Fine Thai Food & Noodles, 
296 Main St., 201-883-1700;  parking in rear
http://www.wondeenj.com/ 

Where seafood lovers gather

Image by wallyg via Flickr

The Seabras are an enterprising Portuguese family in Newark with a supermarket and restaurants in the Ironbound section, including Seabra's Marisquiera, where seafood is king. With the word "sea" in their name, how could they miss?

To avoid the Mother's Day rush today, I took my wife and son there Saturday night for a bountiful meal of lobster, shrimp and cod. We watched other families digging into platters of octopus salad, fried squid and whole fish.

 My wife and son started with a briny, pureed seafood soup that had shrimp, pieces of lobster in the shell and some elbow macaroni floating in it. One portion ($8.50) yielded two bowls of soup. I was very happy with a crisp watercress, tomato and onion salad ($4.50) that came on a large metal platter and was perfectly dressed in just enough oil and vinegar, good for sopping up with soft Portuguese bread.

My wife and son shared an entree -- twin lobsters stuffed with crab and accompanied by those addictive, homemade potato chips ($34). The waiter grabbed two live lobsters from a tank and brought them over. Did we want a single big one or two small ones? When I said two small, the eye of the junior crustacean seemed to swivel in my direction.

The lobster meat was tender, but I ended up eating must of the chips after my wife and son asked for some rice.

The waiter tried to talk me out of my selection -- salted cod boiled with potato and onion  ($21) -- and steer me to grilled fish. But I wanted to try the cod. A long, thick fillet of the snowy fish came on a platter with crisp broccoli and carrot, black olives, potato and onion -- a classic boiled dinner. This was the tenderest salted cod I had ever tasted, but it could have used a simple sauce. It wasn't salty at all, so I sprinkled on fresh lemon juice. It also was a big portion; I took a lot home.

A small bottle of Portuguese green wine (two to two and a half glasses) was $10. I finished with an espresso.

Seating is in a front room and bar and a rear dining room, where tables are lined up family style, so another group might be seated next to you. The two rooms are split by an open kitchen and a display of beautifully iced whole red snapper, sections of larger fish such as grouper and hake, enormous shrimp that looked to be five to six inches long and tanks of live lobsters.

The menu is extensive and offers cold and hot seafood combinations for four ($45). When we left, waiting customers were lined up in the corridor connecting the two seating areas.

The cod dish had a happy ending this morning, when my wife incorporated the leftover fish and potato into her Jamaican ackee and saltfish breakfast. Delicious.

Seabra's Marisquiera, 87 Madison St., Newark; 

973-491-6634. Open seven days. Off-street parking. 

rdison ax: (973) 491-633087 Madison Street, Newark, N
5-1250
Fax: (973) 491-6330

Eating alone

Image via Wikipedia

My wife and son are away, freeing me from having to prepare dinner for three this week.

So I've been eating this and that for breakfast and dinner, and keeping our meatless pledge.

Our last meal together was Sunday night, when I served lobster ravioli with pesto sauce and king crab-and-corn chowder -- all from Costco in Hackensack -- along with toasted Balthazar Bakery bread and a salad of organic greens. (Photo: Basil leaves.)

We went to Lotus Cafe in Hackensack for dinner Saturday night -- tofu and spinach soup, large shrimp in chili sauce, lo mien with vegetables and snow pea tips with fresh garlic.

On my own Monday, I had a sardine sandwich for breakfast and fish and pasta for dinner -- spinach egg noodles with pesto and steamed Pacific flounder (from frozen).

This morning, I grazed for breakfast on leftover dips from Aleppo Restaurant in Paterson, smoked salmon fillet, sardines, cheese, a toasted bagel, sliced tomato with za'atar thyme mixture and kimchi, all washed down with black tea.

Dinner came from H Mart in Englewood, where I found a spicy fish-and-tofu soup ($4.99) and rolls of rice, vegetables, imitation crab and seaweed ($3.49). I ate the soup with steamed yellow rice I prepared.

What are oxymoronic shrimp?

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The latest sales circular from Fairway Market in Paramus offers jumbo shrimp for $6.99 a pound. They are described as U.S.A. caught, 16/20 count, "sweet and succulent," "super-fresh" and "oxymoronic."

Oxymoronic? I Googled the word and came across a discussion on line that it's an oxymoron to describe shrimp as jumbo. But not all shrimp are jumbo, as you quickly learn if you order a shrimp dish from a Chinese takeout restaurant and don't specify "jumbo."

So maybe Fairway is trying to distract us from noticing that these shrimp likely are farm-raised, which also may mean habitat destruction and unwholesome additives. It's always best to buy wild-caught shrimp and other seafood.

'Why is it so red?'

On my weekly trip to Costco in Hackensack today, I was fishing for another fillet of the fresh, wild sockeye salmon I have been enjoying for a couple of months ($8.99 a pound). "This is really good," I said to the woman next to me, referring to the salmon. "Why is it so red?" she replied.

I pointed to the word "wild" on the sign and tried to explain deep orange-red is the natural color. I don't think I got through to her. Not far away were shrink-wrapped packages of farmed Atlantic salmon whose artificial color is pale by comparison. This is the color people have become used to associating with salmon.

I've read that salmon farmers are shown a color palette and that the feed is then tailored with chemicals to produce the desired color. Wild salmon, on the other hand, get their color from a natural diet of shrimp and krill, which contain beta carotene.

I'll cut my wild salmon fillet into five or six portions; season it with salt, Aleppo red pepper and fresh, chopped oregano; and bake it for 10 to 12 minutes at 350 degrees for medium rare. I can't wait for dinner.