Conch soup

Ingredients

• Conch or squid700 g
• Coconut milk600 ml
• Cassava400 g
• Green plantain2
• Carrots2
• Onion1
• Garlic5 clove
• Bell pepper1
• Coriander30 g
• Achiote1 tsp
• Limes2
• Vegetable oil40 ml
• Salt and pepperto taste

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1. 1

   Pound the conch with a mallet and cut it into small pieces. Squeeze lime over it.

   20 min

2. 2

   Fry the onion, garlic and pepper in oil with the achiote until soft.

   8 min

3. 3

   Add half the coconut milk let down with water and bring it up.

   6 min

4. 4

   Add the conch and simmer forty minutes, until tender.

   42 min

5. 5

   Add the cassava, plantain and carrot in large pieces and cook twenty minutes.

   22 min

6. 6

   Add the remaining thick coconut milk and warm it five minutes without boiling.

   7 min

7. 7

   Scatter with coriander and serve with lime and fried plantain.

   5 min

About the dish

Conch meat is tough and needs pounding. It is beaten with a mallet until it softens and then simmered forty minutes — without both steps it stays rubbery.

The coconut milk goes in twice: thin milk at the start for cooking the vegetables, thick at the end. Boiling the thick milk splits it.

The Garifuna — descendants of Africans and Carib peoples — live along the coast from Belize to Nicaragua, and this soup is theirs. UNESCO recognised Garifuna culture as heritage in 2001.

Worth knowing

• — Squid stands in for conch: it is softer and needs ten minutes rather than forty. Worth remembering, so as not to overcook it.
• — Strip the woody core from the cassava; it never softens.
• — The soup should thicken on cassava starch rather than flour. If it is thin, mash a couple of pieces in the pot.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories

560 kcal

Protein

34 g

Fat

28 g

Carbs

46 g

More from Honduras

• Baleadas — A wheat flour tortilla folded over refried beans, soured cream and crumbled cheese.