I arrived to mecca (Nassau) July 4th and from the moment I arrived, one question (among the many others) plagued my thoughts: how the hell am I supposed to eat vegan in Nassau? You see, The Bahamas could be comparable to the South with so many dishes whose first ingredient is butter. We eat a very starchy diet and because we are surrounded by beautiful oceans, seafood is bae for those who don’t have allergies. It’s a very rare thing to find a person who doesn’t like seafood for not liking it sake. But before arriving, I knew there would be some challenges.
Staying with non-vegan and very traditional relatives. I love my family, I really do and I was so very fortunate to have one of my aunts let me stay with her for the week that I was in Nassau. Thing is, she’s from ‘da Island, meaning very old school, traditional ways about a lot of stuff. So while there, she did her best to accommodate my weird food patterns. She didn’t put pork in the peas n’ rice just for me and there were a few other starch options like stuffing, local yam and lots of native fruits in her house. Sunday dinner was almost a force-able request to eat the piece because, “it good fa ya.” So I complied.
Eating out at typical Bahamian restaurants. During my short week there, I knew that I would be catching up with as many friends and family as I could possibly squeeze in while still tending to my business affairs. This meant of course, eating out. This was more challenging for me because salads at typical Bahamian restaurants have not evolved much beyond the Iceberg lettuce, tomatoes and onions and I found it hard to spend money on a weak salad when I’ve grown accustomed to so much more. This made me miserable because really, beyond that, there wasn’t anything on the menu I could eat without breaking the rules. Peas n’ rice (which I’m sure they didn’t opt out of using pork or salt beef), potato salad, coleslaw, baked macaroni are common meatless menu items that have eggs, butter and all that good stuff. Conch chowder, conch fritters, cracked conch, and fried snapper are among my favorite seafood items. So yea…as you can see, beyond a “green salad”, my luck was bucked.
At one restaurant, I was able to plead with the server to have the salad guy (the guy who makes conch salad) make a tropical salad without the conch. It was pretty good, except I needed the pineapple to be a little riper than they were to add more sweetness. By my third attempt at eating food out I caved and ordered the crack conch with a side of macaroni and “green salad”. I was little concerned that the cheese would upset my stomach, but it digested okay. I thought I would have missed the cheese more after tasting it, but it was like meh, it’s aight. Another outing involved a sushi restaurant and I of course bought veggie sushi and seaweed salad. It was great sharing my personal and culinary adventures with my culinary friends over food I could actually eat without concern for hidden ingredients.
Expensive groceries. This is typically my cry in Exuma after having gotten used to spending $50-60 for two weeks worth of food. Now that the country has implemented VAT on our already mostly imported foods, for many Bahamians I can certainly understand the struggle and challenge to eat healthy when you can buy a mini chicken snack (snack meaning the fried chicken comes with fries) costs $3 and will have you feeling full whereas a 12 oz. fruit smoothie is close to $6. In another post I will share my shopping list for items I bought to take with me to Exuma. This was the least challenging thing because I didn’t do any cooking while in Nassau.
Now that I’m in Exuma and I’m cooking all of my meals, I’m at ease and I’m sure I won’t be eating out hardly, if ever, here.
Vegan 365 