Curry Goat and Fishy Chips

By Tony Deyal

There is the story about the male mountain goat named “Cliff” which committed suicide when the farmer played Frank Sinatra’s “There will never be another Ewe.” In those days a goat was a “horned animal” and when men and women were forced by their loved ones to join that group, it became “a person who is blamed for causing a failure or defeat, especially in sports” or a “bad or inferior member of any group.”

Increasingly, because it is so easy to separate the sheep from the goats, we quickly learn that Caribbean cricket has a lot of these and most of them are Board officials, selectors or players who don’t know the difference between “plain” talk and “plane” talk. Now, perhaps tired of being considered a total failure, someone has given the four-letter word “GOAT” a new meaning. It is increasingly “Greatest Of All Time.”  Like other goats, they must be kidding.

However, in Jamaica, it is not the animals but, as one of the goats told another as they waited in the Kingston abattoir, “We meat again.” Although Trinis, Guyanese, Barbadians and, in fact, all other Caribbean people when they meet boast about their curried goat, Jamaican Curry Goat is the only one featured globally by CNN television. While Trinis might think that CCN was trying to “curry favour” with Jamaica, the curry flavour was what carried the day for that country. CCN noted, “In Jamaica, a mix of British and Indian influence gave rise to a localized variety of curry goat – the island’s most popular curry dish. Prepared on special occasions, curry goat is tender and aromatic, thanks to ingredients like coconut milk, garlic, onion, allspice, thyme, Scotch bonnet chilli peppers, tomatoes and lots of turmeric for a sunny yellow hue.”

What CNN did not cover and may have to do really soon is find out what is now happening to choices and tastes in food, especially snacks. We in the Caribbean may quickly have to face what the Trinidad calypsonian described as “Curry Tabanca” or what Wiktionary calls, “melancholy, or a painful feeling of unrequited love.” CNN might not send a reporter to interview Haagen Dazs with the instruction to look for a scoop, but it is food for thought. One thing is that it’s not like the old days when the French started eating snails because they didn’t like fast food. Or when ham and eggs were a day work for the chicken but a lifetime commitment for the pig. Even though goats might have a similar issue with the curry, there is nothing like a doughnut when you try to make a bagel and get a hole in one.

This is the case of CHAZZ, a Lithuania-based crisp company, which has launched the “first in the world” limited edition “Pussy flavour chips” which, it claims, were created based on research from around the world which suggests that millennials, persons reaching young adulthood in the early 21st century, are having three times less sex than their parents at the same age. CHAZZ boasts that its team is young, bold and “Socially Responsible” and that is why it took the disastrous trend very personally. Not only does the company claim that its crips have a unique flavour for brave and free individuals but after tasting it you will remember your wildest love adventures and your first real love. It also suggests that it can be a gift for “friends” or for a loved one to “initiate a romantic evening” or merely “a delight for your taste buds.”

Clearly, as far as they’re concerned, nothing beats a bud (or two). For those interested, the crisps are only distributed in Europe at the moment and are available for €9.99. Readers of this column in Antigua, Barbados and Jamaica especially, can fly British Airways directly from your countries.

Fortunately, as I learnt for your benefit (and definitely not mine) Chazz is not the only supplier of snacks with women in mind. Three years ago, in 2019, the British “MIRROR”, claiming that Tyrrells, the British potato crisps manufacturer, had launched a product which was able to have a “provocative” effect on the body, asked, “Aphrodisiac crisps are now on sale for Valentine’s Day- but do they really work?” Tyrrells claimed that its combination of honey “tinkering with hormone levels” and chilli “triggering nerve endings on the tongue” could get pulses racing.

Again, for the benefit of my regional readers, Britain is not the only place where “sexy snacks” are in, especially when watching Netflix or other TV channels. One company boasts that “Nature’s candy can be a cherry bomb for your sex life and also recommends maple pumpkin seeds or dark chocolate mint as well as Kale and Chia Chips Chili Lime. The India Times offers an article on the “15 Best Foods to Eat Before & After Having Sex.” Oatmeal, the appropriately named Raisin, Coconut and Chia seeds are included. Ginger is strongly in and red meat is also listed. I was surprised to see bananas but I understand why.

They go back to the dawn of time. It is said that Eve bit the forbidden apple because it tasted better than Adam’s banana. Imagine the Indian paper recommended oysters and that made me think about the lady who was encouraged to give her husband oysters on their honeymoon and when asked the next day how things went, she was not totally pleased and complained, “I gave him a dozen but only three worked.” What is incredible is that even oatmeal was suggested but not curry.  Imagine, an Indian paper in the home of curry, did that. In other words, we Caribbean people have to take our Turban and stuff it.

Fortunately, sex “concoctions” (regardless of spelling) are not entirely in. A Scot company is selling Gin-flavoured crisps and maybe one of these days Appleton, Demerara Distillers, Mount Gay and Angostura might follow suit but with some harder stuff. What I would stay far from are crisps that are squirrel- or hedgehog – flavoured.  I have even stopped eating hot dogs. But I do like my occasional bit of potato chip. Maybe because of the jokes like “Did you hear about the fight outside the local fish and chips shop?” The fish got battered. My favourite is, “What’s a nuclear engineer’s favourite meal?” Fission chips.

Actually, British people and I are like chips that pass in the night. They go looking for more and more things to put into their mouths and I, as a rough, tough Caribbean man, am forever thinking of going back to Port Royal and looking for Captain Kidd and his pirate chip and maybe, like every member of that dastardly crew, look for land ho.

*Tony Deyal was last seen recommending that the best way to stay off chips or aphrodisiacs is to change your name to Captain Cook.