When my husband Steve and I first talked about going cruising, one of the strong appeals for me of traveling on a boat was that I would have my kitchen with me wherever we went.

I love to cook, to try new recipes and experiment, and Steve is a willing guinea pig. And we both love to eat. The name we chose for our sailboat is a dead giveaway: Receta is the Spanish word for recipe; we named Receta’s dinghy Snack.

Still, I didn’t realize this passion would do more than put food on our table. I soon discovered, however, that it could open up routes for us into Caribbean life.

Food launches conversations with strangers

When we moved onto the boat, I left behind not only the conveniences of my land-based kitchen, but North American convenience foods as well. In the Caribbean, fresh produce and fish markets became the new convenience.

This market woman on Dominica is rolling cinnamon bark into sticks. But you wouldn’t hear her call it “cinnamon” — on many Caribbean islands, it’s known simply as “spice. (Photo: Steve Manley)

Many of the items for sale were unfamiliar to us, but our foodie bent meant we were primed to try them.

I’d ask the vendors how they would prepare, say, the christophene (chayote) I was buying; or how I could turn the tamarind pods heaped on their tables into the refreshing tart-sweet drink we had just downed at a nearby food stall; or how I could use an unrecognizable-to-me green herb in my cooking. (One time, in the market in Castries, St. Lucia, the answer was that I should use it to make tea, to get rid of intestinal worms. I wormed out of that purchase and bought the cilantro-like herb chadon beni instead.)

On every trip to market, I make it my mission to buy something new. Tables overflowing with unusual herbs and greens make it easy in Castries, St Lucia (Photo: Steve Manley)	After taking these shots in the Castries, St. Lucia, market, Steve printed them onboard and gave copies to the women on our next trip to town. (Photo: Steve Manley)

Pleased by our interest, the vendors were eager to help. Often, other customers joined the conversation, too, offering their suggestions on how to use a fruit or vegetable. “Would you like me to come home with you and cook them?” the shopper next to me said when I fingered some flat, green, snow-pea-like pods in the market in Port of Spain, Trinidad. With the permission of the vendor, she showed me how to string the seim, as I learned the pods were called, and then mimed cutting them into diagonal strips. “These are very good in curries” she said before heading on her way.

Learning to roll coo-coo on Carriacou (with local cook Leslie Anne Calliste). (Photo: Steve Manley)

Emboldened by the positive reaction (and the information) our questions brought, we began poking our noses into kitchens, too, whenever we tasted wonderful island cooking on shore.

Invariably, we left with a recipe – albeit one of the “pinch of this, handful of that” variety – which formed the basis of my experiments in our galley afterwards.

When the results brought less than four-star reviews from Receta’s official food critic – that would be Steve – we went back to those who helped us, and asked more questions.

Even beyond markets and kitchens, we discovered food was a conversation starter, giving us a way to meet people. From taxi drivers to local boatmen, from customs officials to strangers we greet as we walk paths and roads, food is a subject that gets people talking. Not only does everyone have an opinion of what they like, but also people are proud of their country’s cuisine and pleased when visitors show an interest in it.

We win on all fronts

- Tuna seared rare with a cocoa-chili crust.
- Octopus stewed in a Creole style with fresh tomatoes, peppers, and thyme.
- Thick, creamy callaloo served as a soup or a side dish with rice.
- Provision – yams, sweet potatoes, green plantains, breadfruit – cooked in coconut milk with fresh herbs.
- Mango-pineapple gazpacho.
- Buttery avocado salad.
- Grilled mahi-mahi drizzled with a passion-fruit and ginger sauce.
- Lentils with sweet pumpkin.

By creating dishes based on fresh, local, seasonal ingredients (and adapting old favorite recipes to include them), we eat extremely well on Receta – in terms of both taste and a healthy diet. (These recipes, and many more, are included in my new book, The Spice Necklace: My Adventures in Caribbean Cooking, Eating, and Island Life; see below.)

These greens I’m buying in the Port of Spain, Trinidad, market are called spinach, but they’re from a different plant – and are more strongly flavored – than the Popeye variety we ate back home. Slightly bitter and smoky tasting, they’re wonderful sauteed with garlic and ginger. (Photo: Steve Manley)

“Cooking local” also helps the cruising kitty: Foods that don’t have to be shipped in from elsewhere and that are plentiful because they’re in season are invariably less expensive. A locavore style of eating offers a big helping of environment friendliness, too.

But beyond these benefits, my interest in learning to cook as the locals do also gets us involved in island life. It’s a starting point for adventures that inevitably lead us off the beaten tourist and cruiser path. What better excuse to get off the boat and explore an island than going in search of great food?

Our interest in food turns strangers into friends, and connects the dots between people and their history, culture, and traditions

In Trinidad, “Sweet-Hand Pat” let me look over her shoulder as she cooked in her small restaurant kitchen, and a friendship blossomed.(The crabs are destined for the popular Trinbagonian dish, curry crab and dumplins’.) (Photo: Steve Manley)

With food as our starting point, we tracked wild-oregano-eating goats into the cactus-covered hills at the northwest edge of the Dominican Republic, and tasted for ourselves that their meat comes to the kitchen preseasoned.

We joined a seamoss (seaweed) farmer in St. Lucia as she harvested her crop and turned it into potent “island Viagra.”  We made searing-hot pepper sauce in a Trinidadian kitchen – and got an impromptu dance lesson at the same time.

In the mountains of Dominica, we hunted freshwater crayfish at night (their tails rival those of small lobsters) and sipped moonshine out of hidden back-country stills. And at the University of the West Indies in Trinidad, we crammed for a chocolate-tasting test. (It was hard work. Honest.)

There’s no question that my passion for cooking has added a whole different – and unexpected – dimension to liveaboard life and broadened our cruising experience. And it was no surprise that food played a starring role when I started writing about our travels on Receta, first in An Embarrassment of Mangoes: A Caribbean Interlude.

Reciprocating helps launch a friendship

Our fisherman friends Dwight and Stevie keep RECETA well supplied with seafood when we’re anchored off Grenada’s Hog Island. In return, I try to keep them supplied with fresh baking and other goodies from my galley. (Photo: Steve Manley)

When we were first anchored in Grenada, a stranger gave us a bag of mangoes when she caught us admiring her tree. I baked her a pan of brownies to say thank you – which gave us an excuse to meet again, and started a now decade-long friendship.

If someone gives us a gift from their garden or fish from their catch, we try to say thanks with something homemade from the galley; if someone lets us peek over her shoulder while she cooks or invites us to share a meal, we try to follow-up with an invitation to Receta. Along the way, casual acquaintances turn into something more.

While I was back home in Toronto last fall, I called a friend in Trinidad to catch up – we had first met several years ago when I invaded her small restaurant kitchen to watch her cook – and told her I was preparing a couple of her recipes for a Canadian dinner party. “But, honey,” she said, “I just made two of your recipes for my husband’s birthday.” Food and friendship are a two-way street.

Ann’s 11 Tips
for Shopping in Island Markets

A mid-market refresher: coconut water straight from the shell. I also bring a leakproof bottle with me for the vendor to fill, so we can enjoy cold coconut water back on the boat, too. (Photo: Steve Manley)

1. Each time you go to market, look for at least one new-to-you item to buy.

This gives you a “market mission”, a reason to ask questions – and, of course, it expands your galley repertoire. Since buying locally grown seasonal food is cheaper than trying to replicate the meals you ate back home, it’s an inexpensive experiment if you hit the occasional dish you really don’t like.

2. Substitute island ingredients for North American ones in recipes you already know and enjoy.

Try cooking callaloo instead of spinach, bodi beans instead of string beans, pumpkin instead of squash, West Indian sweet potatoes instead of white potatoes. Make your favorite beef stew with goat, and an apple crisp with mangoes. Season with sive (West Indian chives) instead of green onions, chadon beni (culantro) instead of cilantro, and seasoning peppers instead of bell peppers.

3.  Ask the market vendors questions such as:

• “What do you call this [fruit, vegetable, fish]?” Even if you think you know the name, it’s worth asking the question: You may learn a local/regional variant.
• “How do I know when this [fruit, vegetable] is ready to use?” Asking “How do I know when it’s ripe?” can be tricky, as some produce is used in both ripe and unripe stages.
• “How do I prepare this?” Even better, ask “How do you serve it to your family?”

4. Have a pad and pen along, so you can jot down the details.

5. It’s easier to engage vendors in conversation on quieter days

Though the bustle and profusion of the week’s main market day (usually Friday or Saturday) make it fascinating and fun, it’s easier to engage vendors in conversation on quieter days, when they’re not quite so busy making sales.

6. Include the following in your going-to-market kit:

• sturdy carry bags, especially ones you can sling over your shoulder, leaving your hands free
• an insulated thermal bag (essential if you’re buying fish or other perishables, but even delicate greens and herbs profit from being kept cool)
• a plastic container with a secure locking lid and/or large zipper-type plastic bags (to decrease the odds of leakage when you’re bringing fresh fish, shrimp, or other seafood back to the boat)
• if eggs are on your shopping list, a closed plastic camping-style egg keeper. (Have you ever tried to transport eggs in a plastic bag, as they’re sometimes sold in island markets?)
• I often bring along a leakproof bottle, too, so if I come across someone selling fresh coconut water or fruit juice, I can leap on the opportunity.

7. Carry an assortment of small bills and change
to make doing business in the market easier.

8. Don’t be afraid to try hole-in-the-wall restaurants, small food stalls, and street food. (Size and sophistication are no guarantee of quality, hygiene, or food safety.) Follow your nose – if the cooking smells delicious, it probably is. A lineup of local people waiting for food is also a good sign.

9. Ask residents for recommendations.

But to avoid being sent to an establishment that a local thinks foreigners would like – usually, the typical popular tourist place – try phrasing the question this way: “Where do YOU go for breakfast/lunch/dinner?” If you’re looking for a more elaborate eating place, try asking, “Where would you take your mother for her birthday?”

10. Carry a small bottle of hand sanitizer in your backpack or bag.

You never know when you’re going to stumble on something delicious, and it’s good practice to clean your hands before you “take a taste.”

11. Ask before taking photos.

If you get permission, and if you have a printer onboard, print one or two of the good shots and give copies to your subjects. We’ve found this is a great way to break the ice.

About Ann Vanderhoof

Ann Vanderhoof is currently cruising the Eastern Caribbean with her husband Steve Manley.

Her new book, The Spice Necklace: My Adventures in Caribbean Cooking, Eating, and Island Life, was published in Canada in January and will be released in the USA on June 23, 2010. It recounts the couple’s adventures on Receta, as Ann follows her nose (and her tastebuds) from island to island, and it includes 71 recipes that grow out of the stories she tells.

Ann’s first book, An Embarrassment of Mangoes: A Caribbean Interlude, was an Amazon Top Ten Book of the Year for Travel and a national bestseller in Canada.

You can read Ann’s blog, see Steve’s photos, follow their travels, and find additional tips and recipes on her website: www.spicenecklace.com

Related articles (on this website)

• Ann Vanderhoof’s advice on setting up your galley and cooking onboard
• Taking Passions Cruising (Admiral’s Angle column #41)
• Other Take Your Passion Cruising articles (complete list)

More info (external links)

• Ann Vanderhoof’s website: www.spicenecklace.com
• “The Spice Necklace” Facebook page
• Ann Vanderhoof’s interview on CNN (June 25, 2010):
  Escaping it all to sail the Caribbean

What’s your passion? Have you taken it cruising?

Let us know. Email kathy@forcruisers.com or leave a comment below.

Cruising provides a perfect pace for getting to know cultures.

You shop in the markets and eat in your own kitchen – or on the streets. This is so much more satisfying than living in hostels and hotels and eating in restaurants – where everything you do is a commercial tourist transaction.

As cruisers, we can hang in a culture a while and get involved. To get to know a place and a culture, it always helps to have a mission, and though I usually have several “missions” (things that I am seeking out or interested in), so often my mission has been to get to know the language.

Really, if you can’t talk with local people then you miss out on so much

It’s like watching a movie with the sound turned off. Or you are relegated to dealing only with the designated cruiser “handlers” – those locals whose job it is to help cruisers get their needs met ashore.

The richness of the culture is captured in its language – when you learn a bit of the local language, you get to be another person for a little while, you get another life. You get a new set of emotions and personal characteristics, because they don’t match English one-to-one. To be “sympa” in French is so much better than just being “nice”. And in Spanish, there are all these nice verbs for doing things in a relaxed, friendly way: paseando (strolling), platicando (chatting) ….

So, because I love becoming part of new cultures, I pay attention to the words that people use in the countries where we cruise. I mimic local speech whenever I can, and write down words and phrases that I hear. But even more effective:

I find myself a local “teacher”.

I ask locals to help me learn the local dialect – and they accept happily, flattered by my interest in their language. Plus I am always willing to return the favor and teach them some English – but only if they want!

My teachers are seldom actual “teachers”. In the French islands of the Caribbean, some of my favorite teachers were women who were from continental France but had paired up with local men, had children and become part of a huge island extended family. They were super because they had a somewhat outsider’s view but were immersed in local culture and traditions. I would ask “Do people here … (whatever)?” and they would answer – “Well, personally I would never because I wasn’t raised that way, but everyone from here does that all the time.” There is nothing more enlightening than hearing people complain about their in-laws.

I always ask my “teachers” about much more than just language – I ask them about the cultural norms: when you greet people and how, all the little courtesies, how you can relate to children, etc, etc. My teachers become my friends. Oh, and my best French pronunciation coach was one teacher’s five-year-old son.

Along the way, I started teaching.

Some cruisers asked me to teach them Spanish in preparation for cruising Venezuela and the Western Caribbean.

I love to teach: before cruising I taught business computing as part of my business. I gave my classes in my students’ cockpits, at picnic tables on the beach, and at local cruiser bar/restaurants. It was the perfect environment for teaching language: I gave homework that required them to get out in the streets and chat up the locals — and then report back on the often humorous interchanges.

My friends were amazed because I could make education-hostile cruisers eagerly stay up late doing the homework I gave them, and I loved the challenge of teaching adults something that could give them such immediate rewards.

So then my students asked me to write a book.

And I began – teaching classes along the way. I developed my course book as I taught, and it provided the basis for what later became my book Spanish for Cruisers.

I loved my “research”. Every place I go, I HAD to seek out locals to fill in the blanks for the local language. I HAD to get to know diesel mechanics from Cuba, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, because I had to find out what words they were using.

I HAD to get to know the people working in the boatyards because I had to figure out what they were calling all the terms that made up boatyard work. If there was an upholsterer in town fixing cruisers’ sails, I had to meet him, because I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to get direct information. I had to find out what terms the dock attendants understood in the marinas – they might not be using “nautical” words at all.

So my research has always given me a reason to get to know people. It made me reach out because I just couldn’t pass up an opportunity that might not happen again. The result (Spanish for Cruisers) was a book that only a cruiser could write!

Years later, when I began writing French For Cruisers, the research got really interesting, because in addition to all the nautical and mechanical topics, it was critical that I cover the phrases that would let cruisers enjoy the food and wine of France and the French islands.

My research was now taking me to markets, to bakeries, to French and French-Creole restaurants. I ate, I drank: Research was tough! And I HAD to cruise the French canals!

So for me, research and fun are closely linked. They keep me curious – and they allow me to have an impact on the cruiser-local interactions. So many cruisers are out there communicating with the locals because my books have given them the tools to do so. Where will this passion take me next? — ¿Quién sabe?

6 Tips to get you talking

1. Speak! The more you speak, the easier it gets. You learn by making mistakes. Don’t wait until you’ve got it right, start talking!

   “Your mission is to amuse the locals with your attempts to speak their language.”

2. Learn the basic greetings and courtesy phrases such as “please, thank you, excuse me, and you’re welcome” and use them every chance you get.  Greet people you pass on the street, and always those you approach in a store or office. Using these greetings and courtesy phrases will help your hosts see you as a courteous person, and will also loosen your tongue, making it easier to get out even the more difficult words.

   Also learn to say: “I am sorry, I don’t speak much Spanish/French.” This wins you points because you are letting people know that you don’t expect them to know English, and you wish you knew their language.

3. Learn the pronunciation rules. Practice pronouncing key words and phrases in your phrase book. The more practice you can get speaking aloud, the easier it gets, and the better you sound! Practice with words that you will actually use.

   Find a local to sit down with you and listen to you pronounce the words in your phrase book. It’s a great way to make a new friend.

4. Cheat! If you don’t know the correct word, try the English word with Spanish/French pronunciation. (This is an excellent reason to learn pronunciation.)

   When you are shopping and don’t know the word for what you want: pronounce a common brand name with a Spanish/French accent.

5. Develop your own little speech describing yourself, your family, your voyages, and whatever you’d like to share with people, using the sentences in this chapter as a base. Then start practicing it on the people you meet in markets, restaurants, the marina office, etc. Embellish it with additional details as you become more comfortable.

   This technique helped me learn to converse when I first arrived in Nicaragua in the Peace Corps. People love the opportunity to get to know you!

6. Take a class. If you can find a class in port, sign up for it. And/or find a local tutor to work with you during your stay.

   Combine inland travel with a week long language course. You often have the option of housing with a local family for even more practice. Certain towns are known for their language schools (eg Antigua, Guatemala; Merida, Venezuela).

About Kathy Parsons

Kathy Parsons is author of the books, Spanish for Cruisers and French For Cruisers, popular language guides for boaters.

Together with friends Pam Wall, Gwen Hamlin and Beth Leonard, Kathy conducts “Women and Cruising” seminars at boat shows, answering questions that women have about the cruising life. She is the founder of this website, Women and Cruising, which provides advice, inspiration and resources for women cruisers.

Kathy Parsons has spent much of the last twenty years living aboard and sailing the US, Bahamas, Caribbean and Central America. Along the way, she has pursued a number of passions: diving, hiking, and inland travel, and learning and teaching foreign languages.

Before cruising (BC) Kathy Parsons worked as a social worker, Peace Corps volunteer in Nicaragua, researcher, computer consultant and corporate trainer, more or less in that order.

At age 35, she closed the business, rented the Maine house, and sailed south for the Bahamas with her husband. Finally she found something she could stick to: cruising on a sailboat.

More info

Kathy Parsons’ Language Guides for Boaters:

• Spanish for Cruisers (2nd edition)
• French For Cruisers

Related articles:

• Language for cruisers (Admiral’s Angle column #36)
• Taking Passions Cruising (Admiral’s Angle column #41)
• What Kathy Parsons likes most about cruising
• Kathy Parsons’ advice on setting up your galley and cooking onboard

What’s your passion? Have you taken it cruising?

Let us know. Email kathy@forcruisers.com or leave a comment below.