Pepperpot.

"The Caribbean...is a meta-archipelago...It has the virtue of having neither a boundary nor a center. Thus the Caribbean flows outward past the limits of its own sea with a vengeance and its ultima Thule may be found on the outskirts of Bombay, near the low and murmuring shores of Gambia, in a Cantonese tavern of circa 1850, at a Balinese temple, in an old Bristol pub, in a commercial warehouse in Bourdeaux at the time of Colbert, in a windmill beside the Zuider Zee, at a cafe in a barrio of Manhattan, in the existential saudade of an old Portuguese lyric. "
-Antonio Benitez-Rojo, The Repeating Island, 1996.


The author quoted above was drawing a broader observation on the manifold Caribbean identity, yet I in my natural bent could think of little but food. I could see in it-- for the purposes of this dish--one that not unlike chili, goulash, curry or gumbo is stupefying in its myriad origins and permutations, how Benitez-Rojo happened upon an essential puzzle piece of the contemporary food movement: the inclusion of the global in the local. As much as we regionalists, patriots, specialists and niche fetishists would like to think otherwise all cooking is fusion cooking.

As is so often the case one of the inaugural bonechill nights of winter last evening proved the ideal opportunity. Pepperpot is too common sense at its core, too irresistible to not be the subject of numerous national and ethnic claims. It has been prepared in so many variations that the very integrity of the dish's name is stressed to near meaninglessness. The consensus is that, by whatever route of emigration and trade, the Guyanese just north of Brazil lay the truest claim; being that their independent nationality is younger than my favorite Bob Dylan record its only fair they have something so hotly contested as their own. The culinary equivalent to a first round draft pick.

The irony of a global marketplace is that by laying so much extra-European bounty at our doorstep we are in a profound way removing ourselves from a long tradition of geographic and cultural dictates. And when tackling something so far removed from those dictates we become, in practice and expectation, a little lost. Truthfully, I didn't know what pepperpot was before last night. I made a grand old pot of some stuff and only then, after the fact--my septum scorched from blackened chilies and my senses ringing with a dozen toasted spices, did I break down and run a Wikipedia search. I made pepperpot.

Having spent the next morning searching out as many recipes as I could I found that the fundamentals are simple. First things first: pepperpot is a stew. Duh. And with the exception of a handful of American church bazaar-syle recipes nearly each involved a flavorant called cassareep, a cassava-derived syrup used to impart bittersweetness to the broth. Also, the meat aspect of the dish could be divided into two functional categories, the first a stew meat: this in my reading ran the gamut: pork, chicken, beef, goat--any and everything really. The second incorporation was of a collagen-rich meat: tripe, pig's foot, oxtail, soup bones, etc.. And finally, some vegetables--very few authors agreed on the combination, roasted with an earthy herb and chili mixture. From those general beginnings each took its own shape.

This vision of pepperpot was a wild success, and may even become an annual dish for the onset of true winter. Eat to the sounds of howling ice winds and Joy Division.

"Pepperpot"

1/4 roasted garlic cloves--roasting oil included
6 large sage leaves
1 sliced yellow onion
2 skinned and chopped med. carrots
1 medium zucchini, halved lengthwise then cut crosswise into 1/4" half moons
3/4 frozen spring peas
10-12 baby yukon gold potatoes

2 lbs. fatty country style pork ribs (basically chops cut across the bone)

1 light dash of all purpose flour
1/3 c. sweet vermouth

1 tbsp. smoked paprika
1 1/2 tbsp. brown sugar

dried chilies, toasted til nearly black--how many and what variety is up to you.

1/2 lemon

4-5 cups of stock--I used turkey, but basically anything to keep you from running tap water into your pot.

This preparation requires stages of cooking--just consider that each vegetable cooks at a different rate and work accordingly. Begin with the basic aromatics: onion, sage leaves and roasted garlic, adding with a good measure of olive oil to a medium hot soup pot with a heavy-base. Brown and remove to a bowl. Raise heat to high, add zucchini. Caramelize both sides and remove to same bowl. Repeat with potatoes, cooking them to the point where the skins show charred spots by they're internally still mostly uncooked--letting them stew with the pork, along with the fat and bone collagen will thicken the pepperpot in lieu of that second meat--save you the cost of a pig's foot. All $.79 of it.

Since the potatoes will join the stew before the others remove them to a separate bowl. Allow the pot a return to a high, near-smoking heat. Season the pork and add. As an aside I must mention my latest fetish object in the kitchen: butcher's pepper. It's a specific grind--a crack really, of basic black pepper. Since the birth of time--well, the nineties at any rate, I've searched for that specific size of crushed black pepper commonly used in steak au poivre. Most consumer brand coarse grinds aren't coarse enough, and the grist on my pepper mill will only do so much. Oh yeah, if you're over that's sea salt in the pepper mill from now on. So I finally found what I was looking for at The Pennsylvania Macaroni Co. in the strip. They also call it coarse ground, but its size is bigger and adds an almost textural dimension. It's like caviar, it pops. Look for it.

Brown the pork ribs well--I think I gave them a little more than four minutes on each side. Remove to potato bowl. Darken the dried chilies--if you're using them, in the remaining fat of the pot. Occasionally remove one; when its ready you should first of all be well aware of it by aroma alone, but as well it should crumble into flakes easily. If you prefer to flake the chilies--I did, I think it intensifies their presence, do so, then add back to the pot. Add the flour, paprika til the aroma converges then deglaze the pot with vermouth. Add in the brown sugar and squeeze in lemon. At this phase of preparation I hesitated, thinking of the confusion of flavors I was dealing with: the vermouth, the chilies, the smoked paprika. In fact it is a broad order. Just keep tasting for the right chemistry, and of course sub out what you don't like for what you do--pay no mind to your Guyanese neighbor rolling her eyes.

Return the pork and potatoes to the pot and cover with with stock. Simmer for an hour. The pork should pull easily from the bone but not fall too easily apart, and the potatoes should be, depending on size, alternately fork tender and disolving into the broth. Add the browned vegetables, and finally the peas. Season once more to taste and serve with minced white onions and scallions in vinegar.

If you can stand it let it sit overnight in the fridge. A good night of sleep helps.