SALISBURY — Within the kitchen at Caribbean Island Cafe, Fitzroy Hamilton is cooking up a special form of soul meals.
Not fried rooster, black eyed peas or cornbread. Hamilton focuses on oxtail, jerk rooster and curry goat — dishes he doesn’t want a recipe to arrange.
“My cooking is from inside,” Hamilton mentioned. “I’m not cooking from a e-book. I’m cooking naturally.”
Hamilton and Ricardo Raffington are the duo behind Caribbean Island Cafe. The tropical spot is positioned within the colourful pink and yellow constructing at 994 W. Innes St., subsequent door to Salisbury’s iconic Dairy Queen.
“I’m a Jamaican cooking Jamaican meals,” Hamilton mentioned. “You may have a Jamaican spot, however you’ve bought to have that contact too.”
Born within the island’s capital metropolis of Kingston, Hamilton spent plenty of time within the kitchen at an early age. His culinary aptitude helped him land a job in a resort kitchen when he was 19. Hamilton finally moved to the USA and moved out of the kitchen and onto the eating room flooring as a waiter. After a four-year stint at a resort in Virginia, he moved to West Palm Seashore, Florida and labored as a server at a resort.
Rooming with just a few Jamaican cooks who additionally labored there, Hamilton mentioned they ate higher meals at residence than the company had been being served on the resort.
“I mentioned, ‘Oh my God, individuals have to style what they’re lacking,’” Hamilton mentioned.
Hamilton finally moved to Rowan County the place he began working as a chef at a Jamaican restaurant owned by Raffington’s uncle, Glenroy. Glenroy was additionally the one who introduced Raffington to the USA from Kingston.
“He’s like my function mannequin,” Raffington mentioned. “He despatched for me from Jamaica and I stayed with him first and began attending to know America and the neighborhood.”
Just a few weeks earlier than Glenroy handed away, Raffington mentioned his uncle gave the imaginative and prescient to proceed the household’s culinary legacy. Raffington took his uncle’s recommendation and opened Caribbean Island Cafe with Hamilton. The duo selected the constructing the place the restaurant is positioned and set to work renovating the kitchen, which had been left barebones after the earlier tenant moved out.
Virtually the one factor within the kitchen, Raffington mentioned, was a dish sink that’s now watched over by a big framed picture of Bob Marley.
On the primary day Caribbean Island Cafe opened, Raffington mentioned the road snaked out of the door.
“We had so many individuals right here, I used to be overwhelmed,” Raffington mentioned. “We didn’t have sufficient meals on the time as a result of it was the primary day.”
The restaurant has continued to be a spot for individuals to get pleasure from genuine Jamaican delicacies that’s exhausting to seek out anyplace else in Rowan County. The highest vendor is oxtail, a typical delicacy present in Jamaica and different Caribbean islands.
“In the event you don’t have oxtail, it’s going to be an issue,” Raffington mentioned. “They’re going to start out a battle.”
One other favourite amongst diners is jerk rooster. The normal Jamaican jerk was a solution to cook dinner pork, however it’s now a typical manner that beef, seafood and rooster are seasoned with a robust, sizzling mix of herbs and spices. Curry goat is one other menu merchandise staple and prospects additionally clamor for seafood dishes like pink snapper or jerk salmon.
No matter a buyer finally ends up ordering, Raffington guarantees it will likely be good.
“The meals is effectively seasoned,” Raffington mentioned. “It’s not your common common meals. That is actual residence cooked meals.”
Caribbean Island Cafe attracts in locals and vacationers alike. Raffington mentioned truck drivers and vacationers will peel off the interstate and drive down Innes Road simply because they noticed the Jamaican restaurant listed on Google. Salisburians who’ve visited Jamaica or different Caribbean islands will come to seek out flavors they fell in love with on their sunny holidays.
Prospects don’t cease in only for Hamilton’s cooking. In addition they peruse the cabinets of Jamaican components, medicines and snacks additionally supplied by the restaurant. Raffington retains a cooler stocked with Jamaican sodas like D&G and Ting, imported from the island.
Though Raffington nonetheless has ambitions within the reggae music business as each an artist and a producer, he’s glad he adopted his uncle’s footsteps into the restaurant enterprise.
“I like to feed a neighborhood,” Raffington mentioned. “That’s our tradition.”
Someday Raffington want to marry his ardour for meals and music and host a reggae pageant catered by Caribbean Island Cafe. Within the meantime, he needs to ensure the restaurant continues to be a spot the place individuals come for a scrumptious meal.
Relaxation assured, Hamilton will likely be within the kitchen tending to a pot of cooking oxtail, attempting to “catch that taste” prospects love.
Caribbean Island Cafe is open from 11 a.m.-9 p.m. on Monday by means of Thursday, 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Friday and Saturday and from 12-8 p.m. on Sunday. Extra details about the restaurant will be discovered on-line on its Fb web page.
