Vegetarian recipes from Trinidad and Tobago

Cooking in Trinidad and Tobago crosses two inheritances: that of indentured workers from India, which brought split peas, chickpea flour, turmeric, cumin and roti, and that of West Africa, which left leafy greens, okra and taro. Coconut milk and oil provide the fat, while scotch bonnet pepper and chadon beni — a long-leaf coriander — give local marinades their recognisable smell. Callaloo belongs to the second line: taro leaves, okra and coconut milk simmered then blended into a thick purée, served beside rice rather than on its own.

The Sunday meal turns on one saucy dish with rice, boiled ground provisions and a hot condiment or two, and many tables go without meat the rest of the week. Baigan choka is the plainest example: a whole aubergine charred over the flame, mashed, then woken up with garlic and onion dropped into hot oil, eaten with a flatbread. Pholourie, a small leavened split-pea fritter, is sold on the street with mango or tamarind sauce and shows how pulses stand in for meat here, right down to the snacks.