Callaloo…Not Just For Breakfast Anymore

Callaloo is a green vegetable traditionally used in Jamaica for breakfast, especially with salt fish, fried dumplings, yam and banana.

It is a rich source of nutrients, particularly minerals, vitamins A, B and C, protein, iron, riboflavin, ascorbic acid and amino acid.

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Food For Comfort

When we psychologically want to return to earlier, familiar, happier times, especially those spent with family and close friends, we seek out foods that bring us comfort by reminding us about such times. These foods are connected with feeling good, and we turn to them when we are needy.

We also want comfort foods during periods of high stress, threat, or crisis to take us back in our minds to safer, carefree times of childhood. We sometimes use these foods as a form of celebration or special reward.

Comfort foods provide a sense of fullness and emotional satisfaction long after they have been eaten. Comfort foods are not meant to be particularly healthy or nutritionally correct, but they soothe our tummies and put our minds at ease.

People in a new or unfamiliar environment will try to find their own version of comfort foods. Usually that means ethnic, national or regional comfort foods. Jamaicans want their salt fish and ackee with Johnny Cakes. Trinidadians want their bake and shark or roti and mauby, Barbadians want their flying fish. The food brings something familiar and gives a sense of continuity, emotional security, or even compensation.

Men and women seek comfort from different types of food. Men tend towards cooked food - steaks, fried fish or chicken. Women tend to find comfort in pastry, ice cream, or chocolates. Whatever ones choice of comfort food, however, the result is usually the same: it makes the eater feel better about him or herself and the situation that demands it