Tasting the soul of Grenada: Journalist Nicola Adam travels to the Caribbean island of Grenada and chats to private chef Joachim Jammeal. Joachim is switching up culinary culture in Grenada with his take on locally-produced vegan food. Joachim, who has more than 90,000 followers on Instagram, can cook up a storm anywhere - here he is at the beautiful Magazine Beach
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@JoachimJammeal
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@JoachimJammeal
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TravelTranscript
00:00My name is Joachim and I started back when I was like 11 years old with my mum, just
00:11like being curious and watching what she was doing and before I knew it I was actually
00:15cooking the meals for me and my family at home and yeah that's where cooking began for
00:19me.
00:20And where did the vegan cookery come in?
00:22Right, so when I started having my own realisations like in life, like me noticing like animals
00:28and like them having emotions and family just like me, it became hard for me to like consume
00:34it anymore, you know.
00:35So I was just curious, I tried out the plant-based foods that was around me available and I thought
00:41it was good so I started experimenting using the same knowledge I had with cooking the
00:48meats or fish and I was like this is amazing and I felt like I could do it.
00:52So I was happy eating that way and I think that's what's most important and I stuck with
00:56it and then I started offering it and it was kind of scary for me like because Caribbean
01:01people love meats so they actually took it on really well, like they took the whole island
01:07by storm, everybody was talking about me and my vegan cooking and how good it was and I'm
01:11grateful for that and I'm here now.
01:12So how did you start kind of cooking professionally, how did you take it out of your kitchen and
01:17start cooking for people?
01:19Well, I remember one friend was the one who had to like, who like reminded me one day
01:25like because everybody kept asking at work, I used to work at the airport doing aviation
01:29like check-in flights and stuff and I used to always bring my own food or friends would
01:34always bring some for me and they like, the one thing they would always say is like sell
01:38this, like sell this like because it's so good.
01:41I wasn't as confident as yet but I took it on eventually, as I said one day a friend
01:47was like nah, today you're going to, like tomorrow you're going to sell and she sat
01:50me down and she was like this is how you're going to do it and I came the next day I did
01:54some aloo pies, it's like a potato pie and sold out and every day after that I was just
01:59selling out and I was like wow and then I just, I decided to leave the job because what
02:05was my side hustle, food, was making more and so yeah I just stuck with that instead
02:10and I always love feeding people, seeing people react to good food so it's you know, it was
02:16like easy for me to just like do that for a living now and be happy every day.
02:21And what's the basis of your cooking, what foods are you know, where do you start on
02:26your food, have you got sort of base things that you use?
02:31Base things, oh definitely, definitely mostly Caribbean style so we start with, we start
02:37with onions, garlic, chive, thyme, seasoning peppers, hot peppers and yeah a few other
02:44things but those are the popular ones that we use.
02:47And if you, if people were to come here and try one vegan Caribbean food by you what would
02:53it be, what's your favourite?
02:57I would say the Calhoun coconut milk with the dashi, with the dashi salad.
03:02Okay yeah.
03:03But there's so many more, there's so many more honestly, there's so many more.
03:07I would say also a good coconut red bean choux that I make from scratch or coconut
03:14mixed with, sorry red bean mixed with black bean, it's a really good choux.
03:18And what are the health benefits you've seen from being vegan?
03:23A lot, I only suffered one thing health wise back then which was like sinus and sinus is
03:30like true dairy so I cut that out so obviously that was an instant reward for me like living
03:38my best sinus free life like no longer worrying about the headache that the mucus brings and
03:43all of that and the excess mucus but also a lot more energy than I thought.
03:48I was always energetic but then becoming vegan and eating a lot more like fruits and raw,
03:54raw fruits and vegetables as well because I incorporated a lot of raw in my diet and
04:00brought a next level of energy that I never knew existed.
04:04What else?
04:06And yeah like just, just like the enjoyment of food because it's so different from what I knew,
04:11from what I was so accustomed to cooking every day yeah and now it made me more,
04:15more adventurous with my, with my recipes.
04:19It certainly sounds like you're on to, you're on to something there aren't you?
04:23Do you want to just tell us again where we can find you on social media?
04:26Oh yeah, you can find me on social media at Joachim, Jamil, J-O-A-C-H-I-M is my first name.
04:32My next name is J-A-M-M-E-D-L.
04:36Brilliant, thank you so much and thank you for the lunch, it was amazing.