2nd September 2010

A lot of the time a vegan’s best plan is to be prepared. I contacted our hotel in advance to enquire about their capabilities for catering for me and it all sounded hopeful.

The resort had 4 resturants including the main buffet at The Mill where in the end I found my best course of action was to fill up at breakfast with toast and steamed veggies, hash browns, baked beans (when they didn’t decided to throw some bacon in ?!), and fresh fruit.

Mr Ikeda’s favourtie spot was the tex mex place Last Chance Saloon. Normally you can rely on a good vegan burrito at a Mexican but  so they told me everything was premade so they weren’t able to leave out meat from various dishes on the menu. They were  happy to leave the cheese off their nachos for me though.

We had our first group dinner here once all the family had a arrived and they were no vegetarian options let alone vegan. I ended up with a very disppointing plate of peppers and 4 potato wedges. Okay, time to contact the chefs office!

Just across the way from here was the Blazing Paradise Beach Grill where I would pick up a veggie burger or vegetarian pattie, whilst everyone else ordered off Saloon’s menu. I never got round to finding out if they would make me a cheeseless pizza.

The following night I knew we were eating at the Japanese restuarant Kimonos so I made sure I requested a meal by dialling zero (which became something of a catchphrase by the end of the holiday). I was expecting tofu after the chef mentioned it several times, but what I got was an ackee and vegetable curry. It was good to try the ackee, I have never had it before, was kind of like mushroom in texture, but apparently it’s a fruit.

Whether my missing vegan meal for dinner on the beach the following day was due to it starting an hour later than orginally planned or it just han’t been ordered I don’t know.  When it looked like I was going to be served the chicken everyone else was having I asked about my special order, the waitress went off to investigate in the kitchen and came back with cannelloni. Since it was topped with cheese and filled with creamy spinach it was sent back and replaced by some slices of aubergine with tomato sauce.

The buffet was really good for lots for lots of fresh salad, but if I wasn’t sure where we were eating in the evening I would fill up at lunch too just in case!

The best place ended up being the Italian: The Seville although as with all the places on the resort bar the buffet, it could take up to 3 hours to get through the meal service. I  called to check with the chefs office what was okay for me to have, the call back never came boo!  Eventually I had to rely on the staff in the restaurant.

To start we were always given yummy roasted garlic to be eaten with olive oil and bread and the last night we were also given bruschetta.

Various nights I always had the fettucine primvera but my choice of two starters were either the insalade mist ior the anti plasti misti (excluding the procuitto naturally ).

We went back for dinner at the Saloon at the end of the holiday, and I guess a different cook must have been on duty as they were happy to whip me up a  vegetable fajita this time. Not amazing but welcome as I by this point I believe I had become addicted to the salty fries and I needed to start weening myself off!

Alas I did not get to try out any (or at least I don’t think I did) of the traditional Rastafari cooking – Ital. Many Rastafari are vegetarian and vegan, which makes me wonder why it was so hard explaining myself at the hotel. The only local foods I really got to try where the fresh market vegetables some times served at the buffet and the callaloo which I loved.

I managed to find this article I remembered reading in the Metro a while back about Ital cooking and it has a recipe too.

Vegetarian? No, Rastafarian

Tags: Ital