LITMIR.BIZ

      A cook serves up jerk at Faiths Pen—a lively collection of fastfood stalls along the highway that crosses the island between Ocho Rios and Kingston.

      Even more exciting is Hurston’s description a century later of an actual hunting expedition with the Maroons. As an anthropologist, she was trained to discern cultural and ethnic truths. But in one extended passage, what she discovers is the unforgettable flavor of jerk pork.

      “All of the bones were removed, seasoned and dried over the fire to cook. Towards morning we ate our fill of jerked pork. It is more delicious than our American barbecue. It is hard to imagine anything better than pork the way the Maroons jerk it. When we had eaten all that we could, the rest was packed up with the bones and we started the long trek back to Accompong.”

      Thanks to Americans who have followed in Hurston’s footsteps, the jerk-scented “trek back to Accompong” has never ended. The Maroon method of cooking and preserving pork has become a Jamaican national treasure, inspiring commercial spice mixes, bottled marinades and the use of the word “jerk” around the world.

      The word “jerk” itself, as with so many in Jamaica, is something of a mystery. Most Jamaicans offer the non-scholarly explanation that the word refers to the jerking motion either in turning the meat over the coals or in chopping off hunks for customers. Still, there is a more serious explanation.

      “Jerk,” writes F. G. Cassidy (who penned the Dictionary of Jamaican English published in London in 1961), “is the English form of a Spanish word of Indian origin.” This process of linguistic absorption is so common in the Caribbean that it is persuasive here. Cassidy says that the original Indian word meant to prepare pork in the manner of the Quichua Indians of South America. Thus, jerking was learned from the Indians, either the Arawaks or others from across the Caribbean, and preserved by the Maroons. There’s also an undeniable link to the Dutch word gherken, meaning “to pickle or marinate.”

      Until recently, jerk remained a dish made with pork, true to its roots. Now roadside pits and “jerk centers” dish up chicken, fish, shrimp—even lobster. Until recently, jerk was found only in parts of Jamaica with strong Maroon traditions, including the interior known as Cockpit Country and a tiny slice of Portland on the northeast coast at Boston Bay. Now jerk is sold everywhere, and its irresistible scent, which impressed Lewis and Hurston in their day, fills the air.

      At this jerk stand in Port Antonio, near the mecca of jerk, Boston Bay, chicken is cooked over coals made from burning wood and pimento (allspice) branches. Jamaicans short on space often saw oil drums in half and build a fire on the bottom of the drum while cooking the meat on a grill above it.

      Several of the best jerk purveyors are still on the beach at Boston Bay, somewhat off the tourist track and therefore frequented by Jamaicans. These eateries are little more than thatch-roofed huts built over low-lying, smoldering fires. On top of these fires you’ll often find sheets of tin, blown off some roof in a storm, that are used as griddles. The meat is cooked on these sheets, covered with plantain leaves.