Coconut All Over My Life

Coconut All Over My Life

                So this spring the chefs at the dining hall organized and hosted Hiram’s version of Iron Chef. The secret ingredient was Coconut. What a dream? Coconut; yes, I will write it with an uppercase C because I love it that much.

                My team and I made Coconut meringue atop a slice of pound cake with blackberries, Coconut smoothies, Coconut jalapeño syrup and a Coconut shrimp and scallop casserole. We came second, but, apparently, we got reports that the judges cleaned their servings of the casserole. I refused to blame them.

                It is quite the simple “throw together” (as worded by my mom) of tastes and colors, but ‘amazing’ is an understatement. Read below and try it.

1 Red, Green, Yellow Peppers julienne

1 Habanera Pepper diced

½ cup Fresh Cilantro and Parsley chopped

4 Potatoes diced

½ Can of Coconut milk

Salt and white pepper to taste

7 deveined shrimp

7 scallops – halved

1 ½ Cup of flour

Bread Crumbs

Melted butter

Preheat Oven to 375⁰

Sauté peppers shrimp and scallops

Boil potatoes

Grease casserole dish and coat with bread crumbs

Mix sautéed and boiled components in a bowl with flour

Wisk Coconut milk, salt, pepper and herbs

Scoop half the mix then a layer of the milk mixture

Make another layer of the sautéed then milk mix

Then coat top with a thick layer of crumbs and drizzle butter

Bake for 30 minutes

”Nyam til yuh belly full” (Eat to your heart’s content)

                On thinking up this dish I remembered curry coconut chicken/fish, whichever one we felt for on a Sunday or Thursday. I regret not making Rundown, a traditional coconut and mackerel dish that I will write about in another entry, but til then I’m off to try the combination of lamb and Piña colada.

Eat well,

In the laterz,

Gillian M.

Gillian.millwood@live.com