12 Weird Caribbean Foods You’ve Got To Try (Or at Least Read About)

No trip to the Caribbean is complete without trying various authentic local dishes. While the Caribbean is famed for its beautiful white sand beaches, lush landscapes, and luxurious resorts, the region is also well known for its delicious food, which features a fascinating melting pot of different flavors and fresh ingredients.

Caribbean food is comforting, hearty, and super delicious, but there are some dishes that even the bravest of eaters fear. For example, have you ever eaten goat water soup or salted pigtail? If you like Peppa Pig, likely not. To learn more about the strange side of Caribbean cuisine, here are 12 weird foods in the Caribbean that only the most formidable eaters can tackle.

Table of Contents

Goat Water Soup

Let’s kickstart this list with goat water soup, also called kiddy stew. This intriguing recipe originates from the island of Montserrat, where it is considered the national dish and a national stew. The sound of goat water soup might not sound appetizing, but it’s known to pack a punch with rich flavors and spices.

This soup usually uses most meat from a male goat (ram). It’s also not uncommon for goat bones to be included in the recipe. Aside from the goat, this dish calls for onions, herbs, scallions, hot green peppers, ketchup, garlic, salt, pepper, and water. When the soup is ready, most Caribbeans serve it with rice or crispy bread rolls.

Chicken Feet

Chicken feet aren’t just popular in the Caribbean. They are eaten worldwide, especially in Asia. However, they are prevalent in Jamaica, where they are used to make stews, soups, and curries. Typically, chicken feet are boiled in Jamaica, but they can also be braised and steamed. Regarding flavor, they taste like regular chicken but with a gelatinous texture.

In Jamaican cuisine, chicken foot soup is the most popular chicken foot dish. To make it, chicken feet are usually slow-cooked and mixed with a broth that contains yams, green bananas, dumplings, potatoes, and various spices. Chicken feet soup is served with rice or a crispy bread roll like goat water soup.

Salted Pigtails

We don’t know about you, but the thought of eating salted pigtails sounds pretty awful. Despite not being the first part of the pig people would ask for, salted pigtails are a surprisingly popular Caribbean delicacy. They are eaten in the Caribbean primarily because Caribbeans strive to eat every part of the animal.

Often referred to as Pig Tail Palau or Pig Tail Callaloo, many Caribbeans consider salted pigtails a comfort food. In Puerto Rico, many people microwave salted pigtails and put them in a sandwich with mayonnaise and cheese. Meanwhile, people in Jamaica, Guadeloupe, and Trinidad and Tobago make salted pigtail stews and soups. Regarding taste and texture, salted pigtails are tender, chewy, salty, and meaty.

Breadfruit

The Caribbean is well-known for its vibrant exotic fruits with juicy fillings and sweet flavors. However, some fruits are also bizarre, especially the breadfruit. Brought to the Caribbean from New Guinea during the colonial era, this large green fruit with a jagged exterior belongs to the jackfruit family.

Inside, you’ll discover a soft, creamy white pulp with a slightly sweet flavor. Despite this sweet taste, many say the breadfruit tastes more like a vegetable than a fruit. It’s often compared to the potato. In the Caribbean, people fry the breadfruit and eat it as a snack, side dish, or dessert. It even finds its way into some salad dishes.

Guyanese Black Pudding

If you’ve been to the United Kingdom and eaten a full English breakfast, you’ll have already tried this next dish. Brought to the Caribbean by the British, this unique food item is made with pig blood. Yes, you read that right; pig blood is used to make Guyanese black pudding.

To make it, pig blood is mixed with fat, oatmeal, herbs, and seasonings and encased in beef or pork runners. The black pudding is then fried before being served. It may sound strange, but black pudding is delicious. It has a rich, meaty, earthy, and nutty flavor you can’t compare to anything else. Black pudding is often served in the Caribbean with a mango sour dip.

Mountain Chicken

Mountain chicken used to be found on several Caribbean islands, but now it is usually found only in Montserrat and Dominica. Before you bite into a mountain chicken, you’ll likely spot its odd shape. That’s because it’s not chicken. Instead, mountain chicken is a frog dish.

So, why do Caribbeans call a dish made from giant ditch frog mountain chicken? Interestingly, they do so because the frog has a taste and texture similar to chicken and makes a strange noise that sounds like a clucking chicken. The frog’s legs are seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic, thyme, and vinegar, coated in flour, and shallow fried until golden brown and crispy.

Irish Moss

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The next weird Caribbean dish on our list is Irish Moss, a food item that neither comes from Ireland nor contains moss. Instead, this food is a Jamaican beverage whose main ingredient is seaweed, specifically Gracilaria spp. However, it is believed an Irish immigrant introduced Jamaicans to the beverage, which counts for something.

This Jamaican beverage involves boiling seaweed in condensed milk with honey, sugar, vanilla, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Some Irish moss recipes contain rolled oats, strawberry syrup, and peanuts for added flavor and texture. Besides its wonderfully sweet and aromatic taste, Irish Moss reportedly has many health benefits. It can help lower cholesterol, boost heart health, and manage blood sugar levels.

Tree Mutton

For those who don’t know, mutton is meat from a mature sheep. As such, Caribbean tree mutton sounds strange and confusing. That’s likely because it has nothing to do with sheep. Unlike anything you’ve eaten before, tree mutton is monkey meat. Yes, some people in the Caribbean eat monkeys.

People in St. Kitts and Barbados started eating the vervet monkeys, or green monkeys, to combat overpopulation after the species grew dramatically after being imported from West Africa. The monkey’s meat was called tree mutton because it reportedly tastes like mutton. Most commonly found on menus in Barbados, tree mutton is usually stewed with various vegetables and spices.

Roasted Iguana

Eating a giant lizard is weird to anyone from a country that doesn’t have exotic animal species, like me, in the United Kingdom, where deer is about as exciting as it gets. However, in the Caribbean, eating iguana is common, especially in places like Trinidad and Guyana.

Often called “pollo de los árboles,” which translates to “chicken of the trees,” iguanas in the Caribbean are most commonly marinated in various herbs and seasonings and roasted. Once roasted, the lizard is cut into smaller pieces, seasoned with fresh produce, such as onions and chives, and eaten. It can be served on its own, in a soup, or as part of a stew. Its flavor is compared to chicken.

Roasted Conch

The penultimate weird Caribbean food on our list is roasted conch. Conch is the name given to several medium-to-large sea snail species recognized for their beautiful shells with a high spire. While it may sound weird to eat, snails are a popular food across the globe, particularly in France, Italy, Spain, and the Philippines.

In the Caribbean, they’re most popular in the Bahamas, appearing in many dishes, such as conch salad and conch fritters. However, the local favorite is roasted conch. Once roasted, conch has a chicken-like appearance, chewy texture, and salty flavor. Its taste and texture are often compared to that of calamari.

Solomon Gundy

Another strange Jamaican food that makes our list is Solomon Gundy. Perhaps one of the tastiest weird Caribbean foods on our list, Solomon Gundy is pickled fish pâté made with smoked red herring, although shad and mackerel can also be used. In the Caribbean, this pâté is most commonly served as an appetizer or snack with crackers.

To give the pâté more flavor, the pickled fish is minced and spiced with thyme, pimento berries, onion, and Scotch Bonnet chili peppers. A warning: Scotch Bonnet peppers are renowned for being among the world’s hottest peppers. Therefore, Solomon Gundy might not be suitable for anyone who doesn’t like much heat in their food.

Cow Heel Soup

We’ll end our list as we started it: with a weird Caribbean soup recipe. This time, we have cowheel soup for you. Cow heel soup is a top-rated traditional recipe in the Caribbean, especially in Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica. It is loved because it’s filling, hearty, comforting, and rich in flavor.

Despite the cow heel’s gelatinous tissue and bones, this soup dish looks delicious and tastes great. To make it, the heel is cooked in a rich broth with onions, thyme, butter, garlic, bay leaf, Scotch Bonnet pepper, peas, carrots, potatoes, okra, and scallions. As expected, the cow heel has a rich, gamey, and meaty flavor.