Food: A History of Sila Part 3- The Cape Verdes

The Cape Verdes had fabulous fresh food. The fruit options were kiwi, banana, pear, apple, orange, lemon, lime, pineapple, and fisheye fruit. They were all pretty inexpensive, so we had as much fruit as we dared carry. The only problem was that the fresh food would go bad if we waited too long to eat it. We added another fruit hammock just for pears. We also bought a fruit basket made out of juice cartons.

The kiwis were delicious and kept for a long time. Unfortunately, we only bought fifteen or twenty of them the day we left the dock and could have easily eaten double that many. We would cut them into quarters and eat the fruit off of the peel, which was sacrificed to the fish in hope that they would sacrifice a fish to us.

We bought a bundle of bananas during our visit. When we went to stock up on fruit, we accidentally bought plantains instead of bananas. Imagine, poor Aunt Mary cutting up a banana into her cereal and nearly getting sick from the combination of uncooked plantains and the rocking boat. We ended up tossing them overboard for sling shot practice as we were approaching Antigua because we did not want to bring fresh food from foreign countries. We had a bag of pebbles we had saved from France. Mama would toss the peel overboard from the bow while someone in the stern attempted to hit the moving target while the boat was randomly about. Then mama would toss the inside and we would fire at it. Jack hit two plantains while I only hit one.

The pears were some of the best. We bought dozens of firm pears that ripened into juicy, mouth- watering fruits. Thankfully we discovered the pears pretty quickly and got a large basketful of them. We limited our pear consumption to one per person per day. When we were down to only two more pears, there were heated debates or bets on backgammon games to secure more fruit. For example, I lost half of a pear to Jack in backgammon.

The apples were about average but made good snacks for a hungry sailor. The oranges were so-so. We didn't use up much valuable fruit space on them. The lemons and limes were a little bitter but wonderful to have. We used an entire lemon on my fish. I definitely think we didn't waste the lemon on that fish.

I think the best fruit was the pineapple. We ate two in port. There was no better dessert than a slice of fresh pineapple. We crossed the Atlantic with two pineapples for two wonderful lunches.

Fisheye fruit is a fruit with a tough shell that you cut in half. You would take a spoon and scoop out the contents.  It was filled with orange goo and green seedlike crunchies. Swallowing them felt like swallowing fisheyes. We never found out their real name because we were only told the name on Portuguese once and couldn’t remember it.

Easily the best produce in the Cape Verdes were the sweet potatoes. They were the best I have ever tasted. The insides were white instead of orange like American yams. We baked them and The Masher of The House mashed them. We also fried the leftover mashed sweet potatoes with eggs in the morning. The delicious sweet potatoes were sweet and flavorful. We had them three times in the Cape Verdes. Sadly, Jack explicitly asked not to have this wonderful food so we only ate them a few times on the crossing.

Before leaving Mindelo, Mama bought some tuna steaks from a fisherman a few hours after the tuna was caught. Daddy seared them in a fry pan. They were delicious: large and still had the skin on. There was also one piece of bone, per steak, that we picked clean along with the skin. At the time, it was some of the best tuna that I had ever had. Later, I caught my own tuna while crossing the Atlantic and that was even better.

Jack and Mama also bought a small bag of peppers. Jack told me they were very sweet, so I took the tiny pepper and ate it. I would have strangled Jack if I could have with my mouth under the faucet drinking. Daddy took the peppers and cut them up. He made a hot sauce with them. It was wonderful in the middle of the Atlantic when everything needs to be spicy or it tastes like nothing.

There is still a part four, five and maybe more! Some tittles will include French Bakeries for Breakfast or Tapas Tornado.  So keep an eye on the blog! – Porter