Melissa Thompson

Recipes

A small pot of Melissa Thompson's hot pepper sauce the recipe was originally printed in her book Motherland: A Jamaican Cookbook
Stocks & Sauces

Ultimate hot sauce recipe

Hot sauce is a permanent fixture at the Jamaican jerk pits spread across the island. My ultimate hot sauce recipe, featuring Scotch bonnets, which are abundant in Jamaica – their fruity, hot flavour is never far from a plate.

Melissa Thompson's jerk chicken gravy made in a saucepan.
Stocks & Sauces

Jerk gravy recipe

This jerk chicken gravy recipe is a nod to both my Jamaican and British roots. You don’t really get jerk gravy in Jamaica; jerk is more likely to be accompanied by ultimate hot sauce recipe, ketchup or a sort of barbecue sauce.

Recipes, Beef Recipes

Melissa’s rich & warming slow-cooked oxtail curry recipe

Cooks in 4 Hours Difficulty Medium

Curry dishes are hugely popular in Jamaica, thanks to the indentured servants to who arrived after emancipation in the early 19th century to make up the labour shortfall once slavery had been abolished. Curry goat and curry chicken are the best-known dishes, but Curry Oxtail is a close contender. It’s a stunning dish, one that is best started a few days before you intend to eat it.