Chadon Beni Sauce

Trinidad's raw green sauce of culantro blitzed with garlic, hot pepper, lime, and water, spooned over doubles, bake and shark, and anything else that is fried

Origin: Port of Spain & Trinidad

From the journey of Culantro.

Trinidad names this herb in three languages at once, and each name is a layer of the island's history. Chadon beni, shado beni, and shadow benny are all worn-down forms of the French chardon béni, blessed thistle: the name arrived with the French Creole planters who settled in Spanish Trinidad after the Cedula of Population of 1783, and in France it belongs to a different plant altogether, the thistle Cnicus benedictus, which the settlers seem to have transferred to the spiny-edged leaf they found growing wild. After 1845 the indentured labourers from northern India called it bhandhania, from the Hindi ban dhaniya, forest coriander. The market sells it as culantro. Whatever it is called, it is the herb Trinidad cannot cook without. It goes into green seasoning, the blended marinade that starts almost every savoury dish on the island, into curries, pelau, and corn soup, and raw into the fruit chows. The island grows it seriously enough to export it: Christopher Ramcharan, writing in 1999, recorded a single Trinidadian exporter air-freighting up to 2.4 tonnes of fresh leaf a week to the United States. It is grown in the shade, because in full sun and long days it bolts to flower and the leaves turn tough. The sauce is its purest form. Leaves, garlic, a piece of hot pepper, lime, salt, and water are blended into a loose green liquid that is bottled at every doubles stand and bake and shark hut on the island, and customers are asked, as a matter of course, how much of it they want and how much pepper with it.

Ingredients

60 g chadon beni (culantro) leaves, about two large bunches
6 garlic cloves, peeled
0.5 scotch bonnet pepper, seeded, or to taste
2 tbsp lime juice
0.75 tsp salt
150 ml cold water

Method

Wash the culantro leaves well and shake them dry, then roll them together tightly and chop across the roll.
Put the chopped leaves, garlic, pepper, lime juice, and salt in a blender with half the water and blend until smooth.
Add the rest of the water to thin it to a sauce that will run off a spoon.
Rest for 30 minutes before using, so that the garlic and the herb settle together.
Keep in a bottle in the refrigerator and use within three days, over doubles, bake and shark, pholourie, or grilled fish.

Notes

Fresh coriander makes a different sauce, milder and grassier. If you must substitute, use the stalks as well as the leaves and double the quantity. Some vendors add a spoonful of mustard or a splash of white vinegar, which keeps the colour for longer.

The Gastrographer

Name: Chadon Beni Sauce
Prep time: 10 min
Total time: 40 min
Yield: 8
Cuisine: Port of Spain & Trinidad
Ingredients: 60 g chadon beni (culantro) leaves, about two large bunches; 6 garlic cloves, peeled; 0.5 scotch bonnet pepper, seeded, or to taste; 2 tbsp lime juice; 0.75 tsp salt; 150 ml cold water

Mapping Culinary History

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Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control