Hi Everyone,
The herb chadon beni is to Trini cuisine what that special fine thyme is to Guyanese cuisine – ever present, a favourite and a signature flavour. Chadon beni, also known as culantro and saw grass herb is the type of herb that can be chopped and eaten raw, combined with other herbs and aromatics to make green seasoning, and it can also be pureed into a sauce to be used as a condiment. It is as a sauce that I find chadon beni most delicious.
Chadon beni is not widely available here in Barbados and when it is available, you have to get to the market early to buy it from the vendors that grow the herb. I buy several bundles to make chadon beni sauce – simple, easy and quick to prepare. Later in the day, generous spoonsful of the sauce are spread over my food. Yum, yum, yum! I even find myself mimicking a Trini accent to accentuate the love and enjoyment of the chadon beni sauce.
Chadon beni, garlic, hot pepper, salt, a little lime juice and some water is all you need to create chadon beni sauce, which is sometimes referred to as a chutney. In Trinidad and Tobago, it is a must-have with Bake ‘n Shark. Actually, the sauce/chutney is widely used just as how we’d use pepper sauce or achar. Unlike pepper sauce and ahcar, chadon beni sauce is a fresh sauce (not cooked) and needs to be