Hey everyone hope you're having an amazing day! It's Mark Wiens, I'm in Beautiful Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean and today we are gonna well we're on the island of Trinidad and we are gonna go on a food tour up the coast. starting on the East Coast We're gonna have some roast fish and then we're gonna make our way up into the mountains where we are gonna go to a cacao farm and they're gonna cook uh, some indigenous local food for us for lunch and then we'll be continuing on to probably the most iconic one of the most famous beaches in all of the island of Trinidad called Maracas Bay My first ever Bacon Shark. It's gonna be an amazing day of delicious food and I'm gonna share everything with you coming up right now in this video really quickly before we start this video. I'm in the Beautiful Trinidad and Tobago and I Just wanted to let you know Mark Wiens and Kiva Smoked Ghost pepper is available now. it's an all-purpose seasoning I Love the heat I Love the flavor. You can really use it on just about anything you eat. From salad to soup to curries, it just oh it is so good and it's available now. I'll have the link in the description box. We are on the east coast of the island of Trinidad today and we're beginning at a place called Dr Fish. This is a Hidden Gem tucked away in the neighborhood. It's beautiful here. We're in for a treat. Today we are gonna have some roast fish and I believe some Lobster Oh this is so laid back, so chill here. This is such a cool setup here. Like on the side, there's some grills and hot plates going. You can already smell the green seasoning. This is a beautiful setup. Oh, is that the green seasoning? Okay, Oh, you can smell that shadow Benny Fresh things garlic Shadow Bunny time Big Time Small time might be something nice inside. Oh yeah, you want to rub it all over skin on the inside? Okay, yes you gotta. Oh, and you've made some slits on the side so it fill it up with that green seasoning? Yeah, it's on top. Oh nice plants inside? Okay, great. Oh sweet potato. Too foreign. Yeah, it's starting to sizzle immediately. Quite an assembly that's quite a deluxe packet with the fish. So many things. Oh, there's something going on in the grill too. Oh, the lobsters are inside of there. Oh, they're already going. Oh the lobster. Just almost forgot about the lobsters that's gonna roast and bake and steam all together. Oh the lobster. Oh wow. Nice. What kind of seasoning have you done with the Lobster Doctor? Okay, mix up with a little whatever crisis in the ground up and some cheese on top as well. Yeah, nice. Thank you. Gourmet Cooking Dr Fish Dr Roast fish. Oh yeah, this is hot pepper sauce. Yes. Okay, so there it is. The finished plate. The Lobster Plate by Dr Roast fish. Nice garlic seasoning. and then that hot pepper. Yeah, okay, all right Dr Fish Here we go. This is the roast fish. Hot, fresh, all that seasoning. Thank you very much. We are sitting down on some tree stumps. Laid back atmosphere. Oh nice. and we've got Oh Yeah! Zach I need your help? So this is a fresh Snapper Local Snapper man. He does the green seasoning layer. then he roasts it and then adds on a bunch of his own sauces. There's pineapple. there's corn on here. There's the hot pepper over here and extra hot pepper. The whole bottle. exactly. Let's go in. Oh that is. Saucy We toppled off the fork. Oh no, it's okay. You can tell it's not overcooked. it's juicy. Um, oh, that's fresh. The green seasoning is nice. Really juicy. I'm gonna go in for a little bit of that hot pepper. Oh yeah. well with the addition of the hot pepper. Oh, that was awesome actually. I'm gonna try one of those plantains before we move over to the before we move over to the Um. Lobster Oh and the shoes on top? Yeah, here's a secret ingredient here. Great! Sean Some cheese on the top to kind of like plaster it and plaster all the juices in. Okay, and we got the lobster, which is absolutely fully loaded. Again, seasoning on top of seasoning I think Dr fish I think he added pineapple and corn on top of here. and then those sausage and cheese on top. Oh man, we're gonna have to. We're gonna need some leverage to get this Lobster out. I Don't know if the plastic? yeah I Don't know if the plastic fork is going to cut it I'm gonna have to reach in with my fingers. Meaty lobster. look at the amount of toppings. It's just fully loaded. Oh you can smell the smokiness of it too. I'm gonna actually re-up on that. Hurry up on that sauce. Oh wow, the immediate smokiness. All of the like juices and steam of the lobster have been contained in that that uh, foil packet. So the juice is just like re-embedded into themselves like it rains its own steam when it's inside. and all of those sauces and the cheese. But we need some hot pepper. The juiciness of that. Lobster Oh that hot pepper sauce is delicious. So many things going on here. There's even fries down. plastered below. there's fries. a little bit of that hot pepper. Oh that was a delicious way. An amazing way to start this day. The roast fish goes delicious I Love the Smoky juiciness of that Lobster and Dr fish. Uh, he's just such a like, soft-spoken such a kind man. from here. we're back on the road. we're heading up the coast and actually deep into the mountains. but that was an incredible journey to get here through the mountains. it's so Lush and green and beautiful. Braso Seco is a remote Village in the mountains known for their indigenous community and for growing some of the best cacao on the island. We came here well to First have lunch but then we're gonna learn about the cacao harvesting process. People used to preserve their meat for a long time as we didn't have no electricity so they would put more like salt on it and season it and put it down. all the water just well. Basically dehydrate from the chicken. all the smoke so quickly. We're gonna see the process of the buccaneer which is the indigenous traditional process of smoking preserving. Meats You'd light a fire, you'd put the meat over wood and sticks in a grill and let it sit a couple feet above the smoke so that it just absorbs that smoke and it dehydrates. Put a Banana Leaf over it to steam it to also trap in that Steam and smoke as well. So then with that chicken smoked chicken? yeah but then you cook it with coconut milk. Okay, so it is. Oh sweet Pea zentaro. Okay, a few dishes are already prepared. It smells delicious. We're gonna have rice we're gonna have Taro and that smoked chicken smells incredible as soon as she opened that lid and also some Of The Dashing The tarot leaves as well. hello I mean it's in the buffet line ready? Yeah with the leaves? Yeah Oh with that tarot leaves Okay, this is the smoked chicken. Foreign of that smoked chicken is so good. and all the different dishes I mean I think this has been like an Adaptive indigenous meal of Trinidad um like they were all mentioning is that electricity hasn't been here for that long. So when they would, uh hunt an animal or when they would have meat or have a chicken, the way to preserve it was to smoke it. This chicken has actually been smoked and then cooked in coconut milk and yeah, so sauces right? Reduce down, jump into my Drumstick jump in another drumstick. Beautiful. Oh yeah, sounds good. Your smoke rings all the way to the Bone Oh So Soft Yeah and juicy still too and then after and then at the same time it's been like stewed down again with coconut milk to give it more flavor. I think I'm gonna pour on a little pepper sauce though to make it even better. Um well the chicken is amazing. and then with that pepper sauce, that fruity, spicy saltiness. oh man. The Boiled Taro! Which tarot you'll find all over? And then she just kind of sauteed it down with some aromatic cabbage and pumpkin and carrots and onions. That was great. Oh with the leaves too. Yeah yeah. I Like how how everything just kind of mingles together on your plate. it is. Yeah. But definitely the highlight is that smoked chicken. and you can you can. see as you go down you can see all those herbs that are Caked Up in the chicken as well. That chicken is just flavoring. Big flavor to mix with all of those those local carbs and roots smoked meat. The flavor just goes goes a long ways foreign. I Guess you're gonna stop by my place where we made the chocolate bars. Okay all right so you have it's It's starting from the the tree to the bar through the bar. Daisy Hike So my first part is we to show you a tree talk a little bit if you have any questions feel free to ask I actually kind of like questions. Thank you. Okay we're gonna start walking around the Estates and see the cacao. They really take care produce some of the best quality cacao actually in the entire world. The indentation only reaches here in the breadfruit. You have indentation right to the almost to the end of the leaf. Okay so that is different because a lot of people what At a glance they say look at bread Food tree. It looks like a bread for tree at least when it's nothing. It's not a bird. Okay so these are chat. This is the flowers here. Okay we're just passing by a shatine tree but you can see like the branches are also a bit sparser. Yeah it looks like right? this is the correct one. is the other one that looks very similar is highly poisonous. This one I'm joking. this one is good for the brain. Yeah, very good. A little sourness and a little spinachy taste to it. Oh yeah. great. You got to get some brain food for the hike. Oh man. Carl is a walking Encyclopedia of knowledge of herbs and plants and life. Knowledge was a distinct tribe. The Arawak were very distinct to indigenous people groups from yeah from Trinidad Okay, so people mostly people who live in this community is part of those Carib and Arawak Yeah, but these this these islands we're so close to South America that they were traveling from Venezuela to come across here. Okay, so some of them just remained here and especially in the Advent of the cacao industry. Then they just remain here because they are the people who know about cacao. These are trees that bear their fruits on the trunk as opposed to the end of the branches, right? So all these are the flowers. and he said the tree is called coniferous. Yes, any tree that there's this fruit in the trunk is a carnivorous tree. Very interesting. Oh, we found the ripe one. Yeah, Oh yeah, I can reach it. Oh I Love my tippy toes. Okay so you don't want this watch because you remember beautiful look at that color yellow and red. Okay, they used to pay people I'm going to clean this because oh once the nipples are covered, it's not going to be so this is the nipples. Look at them here again, you see. Yeah, so this is coming for us trees when it's clean. Yeah, because this is the higher people. Trinidad Used to be second largest producer of so they used to hire people just the most. These trees. That's where the the flowers form right? Exactly produce more fruit Exactly. So you need to clean off this because if this have a set of thing on it like that, it can't be nothing. These are ripe. but yeah. totally different colors, different varieties, different varieties. Okay, that's that's the problem with them. Some type of hybrid. This one is a this. This is the Um. Trinitario. The trinitarian. So this is a natural hybrid so that oh so that's in your wild. The other hybrids on them is, what do you mean? Don't worry. All right. Oh yes, it smells so good immediately. Yeah, that smells really nice. I Know the seed is um much. You hold on to that too. Um so sweet and milky. Yeah, it's really good. Really good. Almost the same kind of taste as a sour shop. There's kind of like that sweet sour milky creaminess. Oh easy like that. You see. Give it a snack and then it cracks open and then you could just suck the the pop off the thing. now and the seed is a lot. The seed actually lowers your cholesterol levels. Oh that one is even sweeter. They're all different so you can suck that membrane Delicious, sweet and sour milky flavor off of it. and you can actually chew those beans. Oh, they're picking the is that a Kashima Oh nice family. Kashima It's like a custard apple. Yeah, it's in the same same family. Yes, okay, but here it's called Kashima Kashimay Yeah, oh it's beautiful. I don't know who gave it the name. so somebody give it your name. Such a beautiful yeah. Such a beautiful fruit. Directly from the the tree, this is called the Kashima Oh it's so beautiful I Love these little little spikes. Yeah and they're kind of soft as well. Before they arrived, they're totally green. Oh okay. I'm gonna pop this open. Oh, you can feel this. the juice just squeezing out of it. Oh beautiful, Beautiful. Yeah. just perfectly made to be consumed. Um, oh, there's a few things better than fresh fruit off the tree that's so creamy, slimy, and milky. Um, Sweet Sour custardy. It literally is like custard. Yeah, almost 10 contained the juicers coming out of my mouth right now. everybody don't rule. You see? Oh, they're just coming out here. Oh, you see the little flies. so they had to inoculate the beans. So you see all the the beans start to turn already. Yeah, because they're Lily white when you first come. when you first see it. Oh yeah. so if you just press your hand here you could feel the heat coming off of it. Yeah so more. and that's where I want it. So yeah what what? Just watch it. you see we're here to see the next process of the of the chocolate making. and these are the seeds that we just ate. But this is the fermented so how long would they ferment for these will film in for about seven days. So tomorrow seven days we're gonna take it out. Only seven day. Okay what's already inside you see if you would a a bean that is not fermented. it's a totally different color. Oh yeah. more shower that's kind of sorry, more sour, more yeah. so all that is faster when it dries out a lot. Oh I like it like a little vinegary exactly after it ferments, then it dries right Sun dries for four to five days or so and then from there you'll have the the chocolate nibs or the little the dried seeds. That's right which can then be consumed as is as chocolate or can be further processed into bars or into the world. the world of chocolate as we we know it. Um so welcome to the Chocolate Room. This is what we um call the chocolate room because basically from the drying it, every single thing after that could be done inside this room. so this one has been now roasted. That's that complex dark chocolate flavor where we will put all the ingredients right. So in here it has the coconut, cocoa, butter and sugar. This is the cacao. This is extra cocoa, butter and sugar. foreign, really creamy. Oh yeah, so that's the entire process. all the way. From the fruit to the chocolate bar. this one is the dark chocolate. 70 percent. Oh wow yeah. a combination with the coffee. Oh yeah, if you love coffee, you're gonna love that. Oh it's so good. You know from here we're driving down to the coast to one of the most famous uh beaches in all of Trinidad and bays and we're gonna eat a food that I think is also one of the most famous Foods in all of Trinidad foreign Mako Shark: Okay so we're at Uncle Sam's and Sons Bacon Shark. Is it like a something that you have to eat when you're here. That's one of the rockets and it's also one of the most famous Foods I think in all of Trinidad Yes, correct. We're starting all the way from the big chunk of shark. Oh yeah, so much meat? Yes and so Bacon Shark is one of those foods that you've heard of before you before I ever came to. Trinidad I've heard of Bacon Shark I Was excited to try it. So finally here in the place where it originates. Oh I'm so excited and we're going to see the entire process of how they make it here. Starting with a big chunk fillet of shark that's going to be marinated and fried along with the bake which is actually not baked at all I think but we'll find out. so you want like pretty thin slices, thin slices. okay so it lays flat. Spicier. Is this the green seasoning? Yes. Cilantro? okay garlic. The shadow bunny garlic, ginger and hot pepper pepper. okay this is black pepper. you know. fresh seasoning? Nothing much of it does. Oh what's our season that we do everything and make a package. Okay shark seasoning, lemon make like a little the Trinidadian green seasoning treatment get everything in it that gets kind of like a watery like a watery seasoning marinade. and then the shark slices go in there and that's going to marinate for a few minutes before it's fried to go with the bake to come out nice and golden brown. So I would like probably um sugar is this is among the east so I'll put this baking powder Lions baking powder water I Have to keep it soft and moist smooth so it's quite a special dough. and it's like silky smooth but kind of want it to be fluffy, fluffy and like aerated at the same time. Light and fluffy. Okay so this is the dough after it's been rested and then it's made into individual ball sized for the for the bakes. and then I mean they don't cook it. You order it, they cook it fresh. That's going to go into the oil right now. Freshly rolled out directly into the oil. So in fact it's actually not a really baked at all. The bread is not baked, it's actually deep fried. Oh and it kind of floats to the surface, puffs up up and floats to the surface and Bobs around in the oil. Oh it's beautiful fresh big in here that's ready. Now we're gonna fry the shark. So that's the marinated shark Now it goes into a flower bath. just get to coating of flour to make it crispy foreign. So along with a bacon shark one of your signature items is also the the pie with shrimp potato pie with shrimp. The Aloo pie with shrimp. Okay so we're gonna see that process as well, but that's the potato mixture goes in the center. Okay let's folded over and roll it out a little bit, hold that go into the fryer. Yes! so that Aloo pie gets stuffed. It gets uh, pinched together in a envelope and then like flattened out, then directly into the deep fryer. So those shrimp get the same marinade as the shark into the flour and then into the oil to deep fry as well. Fully loaded. All right. Okay so that's the shrimp. Aloo pie with shrimp. Thank you very much you come out here. That's a It's a big open-air countertop facing the sea. And then you get your bacon shark. You get your Olive pie and you can go dress in season as you like over at the the buffet seasoning station. I'm gonna load up with the hot pepper sauce first. going heavy, going heavy on the Peppa heavy on the Peppa the garlic sauce, the garlic sauce, and uh, squeeze of the sweet Tamarind sauce. All right and the shadow bunny you gotta have Shadow Benny the culantro sauce. Maybe a bit of this. Oh yeah, okay, I'm going for the hot pepper sauce. You put pineapple on dollar pie too. Put it all on. just a few slices on the uh, a few cucumbers start to build a mountain fully fully loaded. Let's go. Oh yeah Zach How many times have you done this? the the walk, the walk from the bacon shark to the beach to take your first bite. Oh this is a Trinidadian Pastime right here. Oh it's coming high tide right now it's coming up high I think it's perfect right here. We should just stand right here get the breeze in the back. My first ever bacon shark. Oh I Can't wait I Can't contain myself. This is one of the most famous foods of Trinidad something I've been waiting my whole life to try. Oh, it's just cradled within that fresh bake and again, it's not actually baked. it's a fry. Oh it's huge, loaded with all those sauces and pepper and garlic. Look at the layers of that. Oh and that's amazingly sturdy and stable. The engineering on that that bake bread. It's amazingly like like balloony, but it actually is like quite stable. It's fried on the outside. um okay let's go. Um oh wow. all the seasoning on that. Oh because it's that marinade that seasoning that initial juicing of the shark with large then breaded and deep fried it just like seals in all of that spice and seasoning. And then with all those toppings. oh man, the shadow bunny, the pepper sauce, the garlic. Tamarind to like bring it together. It is an amazingly perfect combination with the shark because it's slightly gooey, it's fluffy, it's like really light, but it's kind of crispy and oily all at the same time. Tiger's coming up. but man, that bacon shark is man is good and that shark itself is just like a fish but really firm. Whoa. I'm gonna take it. Okay Zach come on in here. let's do the Aloo pie. Let's do a break in the center if we're not gonna destroy it. Okay, we'll break in the center of the alupai. Look at that cross section. fill up with one one shrimp that fell out. but again, that shrimp is marinated in the same thing as the shark. Oh yeah oh that's amazing. That's incredible too. Start Fried potato. yeah that gives it another texture plus more of the Indian the Indian flavor with uh with the jira? yeah with the potatoes, the spiced potatoes, the coriander, and a nice pop of the shrimp. Shrimp is nice. The shrimp is like bouncy. It's just a handful of sauces and onions and Shadow Benny Um, and it doesn't even feel greasy, it just feels like comforting and warming in your stomach. It's amazing how stable and well engineered that bread is that just went down so easily. Final Bite: Um oh wow, that was worth coming to. Maracas Bay Okay so finally to end this tour and this day we've come up to the lookout. the Maracas Lookout Pretty much everyone I think stops here either. Oh hello, hello yeah. look at that sunset tonight. It's beautiful milk in this one. Yeah. foreign. Oh yeah, that's sweet. The snow cone is a great way to wrap up this day after that bacon shark. It's like desserts and you can kind of keep mashing the ice until it liquefies. All right. Another excellent day and Trinidad and Tobago always good to hang out with. Zach Vanessa Big thank you to visit! Trinidad for sponsoring this entire trip for arranging everything and setting everything up. and there will be a lot more videos about Trinidad and Tobago So stay tuned. All the videos we're traveling all around eating the best food and just learning about the amazing culture and incredible people. So stay tuned. Lots more videos and I will see you on the next video. Good night see you on the next video.