Jamaica Farm-To-Table
PETER JOHANSEN heads for the Caribbean hills, where food is fresh, local and delicious.
WE CLAMBER ABOARD Milton Murdock's pick-up truck and climb a narrow, rutted road to his farm near Santoy in western Jamaica. Passing a steeply sloping valley, we see his grove of fruit trees: custard apples, sweetsop and soursop, six varieties of breadfruit,
pomegranates and more. The terrain demands terraced farming; barriers of stone and aromatic couscous grass fight soil erosion.
But that doesn't stop Murdock from cultivating a dazzling array of other crops on his 75-acre property. He has herbs: six types of basil, cilantro, chives, lemongrass, tarragon (“my favourite herb — I use it in everything,” he says). Vegetables, too: arugula, pattypan squash, Oriental eggplant, heirloom tomatoes. And microgreens, his flagship: from mint and carrot tops to red cabbage and red amaranth.
He invites us to taste popcorn sprouts, which grow in the dark to preserve their sweet corn flavour. He perches a fresh-picked coconut on his tractor, hacks it open with a machete, and invites us to savour the milk. He plucks a fig from a tree; its intense freshness astonishes.
My wife Oxana and I are visiting Murdock because of dinner the previous night. It was a Chef's Showcase, scheduled five nights a week at Negril's Sunset at the Palms, a tranquil, treehouse-style resort where we cossetted ourselves to renew wedding vows. The dinner fired our senses: the beauty of twinkling lights strung through a canopy of palm trees, the deep chirp of tree frogs, the fragrance of frangipani and pink ginger, the caress of a gentle Caribbean breeze.
And taste — oh, the tastes. From an outdoor cooking station came a steady stream of magnificent dishes: perfectly seared mahi-mahi with microgreens and risotto in orange butter sauce; velvety pumpkin ginger bisque; a salad featuring roasted cherry tomatoes in balsamic vinaigrette; a grilled lamb chop with herbed potato mash and coffee sauce; a lemon-strawberry gâteau stuffed with mascarpone and chocolate ganache.
The resort's chef, Dwight Morris, called Murdock one of his secret weapons. They met in 2012. Fascinated by the farmer's products, Morris started buying them the following year. “I didn't want regular stuff from commercial suppliers out there,” Chef Morris said. “It takes so long to ship imported vegetables here that they aren't at their best. I was blown away when I visited the farm with the variety of his crops and his knowledge and passion.” Morris even persuaded Murdock to buy and sow seeds just for Sunset at the Palms — among them seedless watermelons, heirloom tomatoes, edible flowers and sweet corn.
That doesn't come cheap, of course, but in 2017 the resort doubled its daily per person food budget. That allowed Morris to purchase from other local providers, too, visiting to see how they produce things. “We want to be the food destination for Negril and long-term for the Caribbean,” the chef said.
…Sweet potato and cornmeal puddings are so popular they've caused traffic congestion…
None of this surprises Philip Rose of the Jamaica Tourism Board. “Over the past five or ten years, there has been a commitment to ensuring that our culinary offerings not only meet but exceed visitors' expectations,” he says. It's a wise policy, he adds, because food is a top reason people choose a vacation destination — and why they return. Jamaica has the highest percentage of repeat business in the Caribbean, Rose notes. He admits such iconic items as jerk chicken remain key to the country's identity. “It's woven into our culture, into our DNA, and we're very proud of that. But Jamaica isn't limited to that. There's so much more.”
That's a far cry from 2001, when the general manager of the Sandals Resort in Montego Bay, Horace Peterkin, complained local products were too tiny a part of his multi-million-dollar kitchen purchases. He begged farmers to produce more – while acknowledging they were challenged by lack of both irrigation and labour-saving technology. Backing words with money, Sandals joined forces with the Rural Agricultural Development Authority and the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture to teach farm management skills. As it turns out, Milton Murdock was one of those on the 2001 course.
Even now, government officials are encouraging greater investment in agriculture, and setting up loan programs to help farmers expand capacity. “If we focus more on growing our own produce, we would reduce the need to import and satisfy the demands of our markets, which also results in an increase in our gross domestic product,” Nigel Clarke said last year. Clarke represents the country's agricultural interests abroad. “The data suggest that wherever agriculture goes, that's where Jamaica goes.”
Jamaica has also invested in culinary training, bringing chefs and producers together to understand each other better. “As a result,” says Philip Rose, “items even on resort buffets or in lovely street-side stalls are the very freshest possible.” Examples? Rose, a vegetarian, practically swoons as he recalls a dish at Half Moon Resort in Montego Bay: breadfruit gnocchi, a traditional Jamaican fruit given an Italian twist. And in the next breath, Puddin' Man Edgar Wallace of Just Coool, whose sweet potato and cornmeal puddings cooked over a coal fire are so popular they've caused traffic congestion in tiny St Ann.
Back home in Canada, where winter makes Jamaica seem a world away, I learn Chef Morris left Sunset at the Palms a couple of months after our visit. I worry the link between Murdock and the hotel might snap — until the new chef, Conrad Moore, assures me that won't happen under his watch. “Dwight did exceptionally well,” Moore said. “He created a really good team that I inherited, and a really good system of local supply. He helped bring the resort to number eight out of 80 Negril resorts on Trip Advisor.” Moore aims to bring Sunset at the Palms to top position. In his first two months, the resort indeed rose a notch.
In part, that continuing commitment may stem from similar biographies. Both were influenced early by culinary families. Morris's parents were chefs at Negril resorts (“I was constantly around conversations about food at home”). Moore's cousins entered the industry in their teens (“They had so much fun, it didn't seem like work to me”). Both chefs joined Jamaican resort kitchens, scrambled up the career ladder, and eventually polished their training at US schools — Morris at the State University of New York, Moore at Ohio's Hocking College.
Both gained foreign experience. Morris worked at the storied Sagamore Hotel in the Catskills and The Breakers in Palm Beach, largely in Asian
restaurants, leading to a penchant for fusion cooking back in Jamaica. Moore joined Celebrity cruise lines, which he says provided superb training, bringing him to international ports where exotic products challenged his creativity.
That range of background isn't lost on farmer Milton Murdock. He says he grows whatever crops chefs want — “I'm really a custom grower for most of the time” — but he tries to introduce them to unfamiliar products, too. “My primary challenge is developing demand for new products,” he says. “Ex-pat chefs will know about exotic products or be open to them. But local chefs don't. I have to educate them.”
Even so, Chef Moore complains there's so much demand across Jamaica for local fruit that it's getting hard to source some of the country's iconic items, including sweetsop, soursop, Jamaican apples and ackee. “It's easier to get American fruit,” he says. “Local farmers need to step up.” But that hasn't stopped Sunset at the Palms from providing that wide array of local dishes guests visit Jamaica for: coconut pancakes, curried chickpeas and pumpkin, callaloo frittata, boiled green bananas, codfish with ackee, Blue Mountain coffee, oxtail stew, and more. National cuisine is the focus of weekly cooking classes at the resort, too.
Chef Morris and the resort's operations manager, Romeo McIntyre, were picking up an order at Murdock's farm a couple of years back when they were struck with an idea: why not offer hotel guests a farm tour? “With so many people now trying to have a healthy lifestyle, we saw the benefit of the farm-to-table experience on display as a winner,” McIntyre recalls. “With the wide array of products coupled with the knowledge of Mr Murdock as a champion farmer for Jamaica, we saw where this could be an exciting prospect for our guests.” Those guests would pick produce, perhaps try fishing in a tranquil pond on site, and enjoy it all as part of an on-site lunch.
The plan awaits needed approval from a couple of government agencies, one of which has recently signalled its okay. McIntyre hopes remaining bureaucracy will be cleared in time for a soft launch in early 2019. Meanwhile, they're test driving the experience with selected repeat guests, getting user feedback along the way.
Until then, settle for our feedback: this truly wonderful farm-to-table-and-back-to-farm experience made us appreciate deeply Jamaica's culinary prowess. Bland buffet fare is a thing of the past.