Kim & Chris in Dominica

Dominica has so many kinds of food I have not tried, despite going on month five of living here.  Breadfruit, dasheen, kenips, christophene... I'd keep going but I'm guessing all my readers in America already don't know what I'm talking about.  I'm cultivating my new hobbies of cooking and baking, but my favorite way to find new recipes is by reading food blogs, and the Pioneer Woman is not exactly posting up a storm about the various uses of passionfruit.

I did find a couple uses for fresh pumpkin, but that tastes just like pumpkin from America, so I don't think it counts.

The other day when we were at IGA we saw bags of sorrel.  I remembered someone telling me it was easy to make sorrel juice, and the bags were only like $1.50 US so I figured this was a cheap chance to experience more Dominican fare.

This is what sorrel looks like.

For the record, I do not know how to pronounce "sorrel."  But every time I think about it I end up with Jeff Buckley's "So Real" stuck in my head.  And I'm sorry if it's stuck in your head now too.

I de-seeded the sorrel and threw the petals in a pot of boiling water with some cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. You're supposed to use the real stuff but we only had ground spices.  I let it steep overnight, then poured it into a former root beer bottle because we have a real shortage on storage containers in my kitchen.

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It tastes like cranberry Christmas potpourri... which is appropriate since the only time sorrel is available and used is Christmastime.  I'm not sure if I like it.  I tried adding about a tablespoon of rum (since rum is often used as a preservative for this stuff) and at least three tablespoons of sugar, and I'm still not sure.  It kinda tastes good but at the same time I don't want a mouth full of potpourri.  At least it made our apartment smell nice while it was cooking.

I'm just going to stick with the fresh juices from the shacks.  Did you know that starfruit juice tastes like a mango-peach hybrid?  So goooooood.