Saturday, December 10, 2011

Trinidadian Chickpea Doubles

I have to share my new favorite local food with you all - the famous Caribbean "Double".It is a sandwich made with two flat fried "breads", called "bara" filled with curried chick peas or garbanzo beans, commonly called channa (from Urdu/Hindi/Bhojpuri "chanaa"). Topped with a variety of spicy chutneys (mango, cucumber, coconut, tamarind - I had the mango) and extra pepper sauce made from Scotch Bonnet peppers (ranging from a dash "slight" to much more), this delicacy is undoubtedly the most popular fast food in Trinidad and Tobago. It is usually eaten for breakfast, and sometimes lunch, but can be a late night snack as well (which it was in my case).

The bread is a quick bread made of flour, baking powder, salt and ground turmeric, which gives the bread its yellow color. It is flattened to a thin round disk about four or five inches in diameter and fried until golden brown. The bara (from Hindi/Bhojpuri "bara") is then filled with the channa ready to be sold. There is no set recipe for the channa, which can be just curried or mixed with curry and dhal (split peas, usually the yellow variety, from Hindi/Bhojpuri "dhal").





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