Anse-la-Raye, St. Lucia – The old woman in the T-shirt and gray ballcap picked up the parrotfish from her steaming pot and laid it in front of me on a big piece of aluminum foil. The fish, still whole, seemed to eye me as if we’d seen each other before.
I think we had. That morning I scuba dived past an entire school of these beautiful, pastel-colored fish. I never thought I’d be eating one a few hours later. I didn’t even know parrotfish were edible.
But everything swimming around the Caribbean island of St. Lucia appears edible. And you don’t have to go to an expensive restaurant to try it. How about in front of the cook’s house?
Yes, I ate my parrotfish in front of the cook’s tiny A-frame home where her neighbor’s kids played PlayStations on their wooden porch. Hundreds of Lucians meandered around me down the narrow street mixing amicably with tourists displaying unfortunate reggae dancing skills.
It was Friday night in St. Lucia and everyone on the island – and more and more around the Caribbean – knows that this means it’s Fish Friday. It’s a simple concept, really. Whatever the local fishermen catch that day, they set up a cheap stand on a narrow street, cook it up using simple island recipes and sell to the public. Lucians from all over this 238-square-mile island between Barbados and Martinique come for a little music, a little drinking and a lot of fish.
This isn’t one of those shlocky tourist gimmicks where a cruise ship pulls up to a dock and you’re greeted by phony Rastafarians selling bad necklaces. The only boats I saw at the neighboring beach were little fishing boats bobbing up and down in the warm Caribbean. And no American Express bus could navigate the narrow streets of Anse-la-Raye.
Fish Friday isn’t very touristy because it isn’t very accessible. Without a rental car, you need a hunger for seafood and adventure. The concierge at my hotel in Rodney Bay Village, about 11 miles north of Anse-la-Raye, said taxis wanted $80 U.S. for a round trip. I asked if they would like a pint of my blood, too.
I mentioned public buses.
“Oh, I wouldn’t take a bus if you have never been to St. Lucia,” she said.
What? Why? Too dangerous? I’ve taken the No. 15 down Colfax. I can handle it.
So a South African buddy, Neil, and his English girlfriend, Claire, and I walked down to the main drag and caught a bus – a packed mini van, actually – to the capital of Castries for $2 Eastern Caribbean (about 75 cents).
Castries was chaos. Thousands of people filled the streets in what seemed like Carnival without the parades. Reggae and hip-hop music spilled out of crowded, ramshackle restaurants and the manic transportation center had all the organization of curfew under martial law.
Dying for hunger and to get to Anse-la-Raye, I was in no negotiating position for a cab.
But Bradley, the kind bus driver, agreed to take us there, wait until we finished and return us to our hotel for $50 E.C. (about $19) each. I asked what he’d do while we were there.
“I’ll party,” he said, suddenly grooving in his driver’s seat.
As we negotiated the hairpin turns up and down St. Lucia’s lush hills, the crackling aroma of fish frying in the open air overwhelmed us as we entered this pleasant little fishing village. They had closed off the narrow road closest to the Caribbean Sea and it was lined with fish stands, makeshift bars and Piton beer umbrellas. Lucians in colorful island print clothes sat on their tiny stoops. A speaker standing 10 feet high blared Lucian artists such as Kakal, Qpid and Ninja Dan.
Red Lobster this was not.
We weaved our way through the crowd and saw crude wooden tables with chalkboards listing the fish being served. At a stand listing lambi (conch), octopus and shrimp, a heavy-set woman in a yellow Piton T-shirt served me a big bowl of octopus for $20 EC (about $7.50). It couldn’t have been simpler with just the rubbery bits of tentacles floating in a little broth, and it couldn’t have been better.
At another table, the three of us shared red snapper for $10 EC ($3.75) and then came the parrotfish for $20 EC. The cooking process erased the rainbow stripes, and the gray gills underneath were a little disconcerting, but it was piping hot and flaky. And, of course, it could have been fresher only if it had hopped on my plate from the sea.
Fish Friday began in 1999 as an alternative to the Jump Up, a massive street party featuring international cuisines, drinking and dancing in Gros Islet, the town next to Rodney Bay Village. Today more than 20 vendors set up shop in Anse-la-Raye, which has attracted guided tours from ritzy resorts.
That was the only fly in my rum punch. There’s no better way to spoil this authentic slice of Caribbean life than watching lumpy, sunburned tourists dancing to “Gloria” and “Celebration” or seeing some accountant from Orange County walk around in a knit skull cap.
But the rum was as sweet as the Caribbean air, and I’d spent less than $12 U.S. for the freshest fish in the world. Suddenly, I felt like dancing.
