'Ital', Jamaican Vegetable Soup - Ital is Vital

 

Ital Jamaican vegetable soup is vital, a completely natural soup that will help with your liveliness, the tenet being that what you put into your body should enhance Livity,, not reduce it. This magic soup sure will make you feel good.

The idea in Ital cooking is that everything is un-processed, no additives, no salt, nothing, food cooked straight from the ground with what you have, no going to the supermarket ye' here. Well, Rastafari I hear you but we don't grow anything let alone okra or coconuts in Winter in Cumbria. 

Ingredients:-

This is what you have dish but

Sweet pots or yam
Onions
Okra
Squash of some sort
Carrots
Garlic
Ginger
Thyme
Spuds
Some sort of bean
Spinach or green
Coconut milk
All spice berries
Stock

Jamaican Rastas don't eat no meat, putting dead things into their tummy is an anathema to them and they may have a point. This though is a poverty dish like so many from so many countries throughout this blog, cheap to make, a use up recipe and feed many with good food, 'every time you stir you add love'. I like that.

So in a little olive oil add chopped veg: onion, pots, sweet potato, pumpkin or squash, carrot, stir about for a few minutes, add garlic, lots of fresh thyme, a tbls of grated ginger, a few all spice berries, stir for two minutes then add some water and a veg stock pot. Next add some protein, a tin of red kidney beans or black eyed beans, simmer for five minutes.

Next add two whole fresh chillies with the stalks on, leave them intact, you want a background note of chilli and when serving someone may choose one or two and burst them open or leave them alone.

Add okra topped and cut into big chunks and chopped spring onions, add a tin of coconut milk and simmer for another few minutes. When your pots and carrots are cooked add some fresh spinach, simmer for five mins. Season with black pepper.

Ital is vital for your Livity, Rasta is right.