Jamaican Festival Recipe

Name: Jamaican Festival
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 55 min
Yield: 8 servings
Cuisine: Jamaican
Ingredients: 200 g plain flour; 100 g fine cornmeal; 3 tbsp caster sugar; 1 tsp baking powder; ½ tsp salt; ¼ tsp ground nutmeg; 30 g butter, softened; 150 ml milk; 150 ml vegetable oil, for frying

Jamaican Festival

Slender, lightly sweet cornmeal dumplings cooked until golden, crisp outside and soft inside, served with jerk and fried fish.

35 min prep and cooking plus 20 min resting 55 min start to finish Serves 8 servings Easy

Why This Is Worth Making

They are sweet bread sticks, and they go with the most savoury food in the Caribbean. Festival is the side that arrives with jerk chicken, jerk pork and fried fish at every Jamaican roadside stall: elongated, golden dumplings with a touch of sugar, a crisp skin and a soft, close crumb. The sweetness is a counterpoint to the heat of the jerk.

The dough is plain flour, fine cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, a pinch of salt and a little nutmeg or cinnamon, mixed with a spoonful of butter and enough milk or water to make a soft dough. It should be smooth and slightly sticky, a bit softer than a bread dough. Rest the dough for 20 minutes before shaping, which lets the cornmeal soften.

Divide it into 8 pieces and roll each into a log about 12 cm long and 2 cm thick, with tapered ends. Wetting the hands helps with the shaping.

Cook in oil at 175°C / 345°F, in batches of three or four, for about 4 minutes, turning, until golden. They puff slightly and darken. Drain on kitchen paper and serve straight away, hot, with plenty of black pepper on your jerk.

Build the Meal Around Jamaican Festival

Jerk chicken
Fried fish
Escovitch fish
Ginger beer

Making Jamaican Festival, Step by Step

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Mix the flour, cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Rub in the butter.
Add the milk gradually and knead to a soft dough. Rest for 20 minutes.
Divide into 8 pieces and roll each into a log 12 cm long with tapered ends.
Heat the oil to 175°C / 345°F. Fry in batches for 4 minutes, turning, until golden. Drain on kitchen paper.

Related guide: Prep, cook and total time.

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Worth Knowing Before You Cook

Rest the dough before shaping.

Keep the oil at 175°C / 345°F.

Serve hot.

Leftovers

Best eaten warm. Keeps for 1 day and reheats in a hot oven.

Common Questions

How long does Jamaican Festival take to make?

20 minutes of preparation and 15 minutes of cooking, plus 20 minutes of resting, so allow 55 minutes from start to finish. The recipe serves 8.

What's in a Serving

No nutrition figures are given for this recipe: they cannot be worked out reliably from its ingredient list (how much frying oil the food takes up cannot be known from the recipe). Why some recipes have none.

Vegetarian

Jamaican Festival

Build the Meal Around Jamaican Festival

Making Jamaican Festival, Step by Step

Worth Knowing Before You Cook

Leftovers

Common Questions

What's in a Serving

Your notes on this recipe

Cooked this? Keep a note for next time

Build the Meal Around Jamaican Festival

Making Jamaican Festival, Step by Step

Worth Knowing Before You Cook

Leftovers

Common Questions

What's in a Serving

Your notes on this recipe

Cooked this? Keep a note for next time

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