Lee An­na Ma­haraj

Re­porter

leean­na.ma­haraj@guardian.co.tt

Chow is a snack close­ly as­so­ci­at­ed with the Caribbean. For Bar­ba­di­an busi­ness­woman Sami­ra Abed, man­go chow is dis­tinct­ly Tri­ni.

That con­nec­tion led the 32-year-old man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of The Green Mon­key Choco­lati­er and her team in Bar­ba­dos to de­vel­op the com­pa­ny’s first Tri­ni-in­spired mac­aron: the Man­go Chow Mac­aron.

“We want­ed to find some­thing that could cel­e­brate the coun­try and that felt dis­tinct­ly Trinida­di­an, you know, man­go chow is such a big part of the cul­ture in this coun­try,” she told Guardian Me­dia.

The red mac­aron, stamped with the map of Trinidad, is filled with man­go chow puree and but­ter­cream in­spired by the flavours of the pop­u­lar lo­cal snack.

“We took Caribbean man­goes and we took all the flavours like co­rian­der and scotch bon­net pep­per, lemons, and we made it in­to a re­al­ly strong and vi­brant jam. From there, we blend­ed it in­to but­ter­cream and then we took that jam in the cen­tre,” Abed ex­plained, “So we were able to have all of the com­po­nents of the man­go chow dish and then turn it with a twist of The Green Mon­key Choco­lati­er in­to a mac­aron.”

Recre­at­ing the man­go chow ex­pe­ri­ence

Abed said she and her team want­ed the mac­aron to recre­ate the ex­pe­ri­ence of eat­ing man­go chow, rather than sim­ply bor­row­ing its name.

“When you first bite in­to it, you get that man­go flavour and you get all of the cilantro and the sea­son­ings we put in­to it. Then as you swal­low it, it starts to tin­gle in your throat ever so slight­ly, but it’s not su­per pep­pery. How­ev­er, you still get all the sen­sa­tions from that scotch bon­net, which is re­al­ly cool,” Abed said.

The mac­aron was de­vel­oped in Bar­ba­dos, but Abed said the team worked close­ly with its Trinidad branch to re­lease the prod­uct in time for In­de­pen­dence Day.

A pa­tri­ot­ic sweet treat

She re­flect­ed that cus­tomers were drawn to the pa­tri­ot­ic look of the dessert.

“They loved see­ing the Trinida­di­an map on the shell, but there were peo­ple that were hes­i­tant be­cause they weren’t sure what a spicy mac­aron would taste like. They would go through the flavours, and then they al­ways jump on up man­go chow, so at that point, you know, it’s like you just have to try it. We ac­tu­al­ly had peo­ple com­ing in, look­ing specif­i­cal­ly for that mac­aron,” she re­called.

The re­sponse was strong enough for the team to bring the spe­cial menu item back for Re­pub­lic Day.

That con­nec­tion with cus­tomers and the op­por­tu­ni­ty to cre­ate flavours that re­flect Caribbean cul­ture is what Abed said is cen­tral to the busi­ness’ sto­ry.

From Bar­ba­dos to Trinidad

Four­teen years ago, Abed and her moth­er, Wendy Abed, start­ed The Green Mon­key Choco­lati­er in Bar­ba­dos. Since then, the com­pa­ny has ex­pand­ed to four lo­ca­tions across the is­land, with branch­es on the west coast, south coast, near the sea­port and at the air­port.

In 2024, they opened their first Trinidad branch at The Falls at West­mall.

Abed, who was born and raised in Bar­ba­dos, said she has Trinida­di­an roots and rel­a­tives, mak­ing the twin is­lands a nat­ur­al choice when the fam­i­ly con­sid­ered ex­pand­ing out­side Bar­ba­dos.

“ As we’ve grown in Trinidad, we’ve re­alised it’s so im­por­tant to cre­ate things that will ac­tu­al­ly con­nect with the peo­ple and the cul­ture that’s there, in­stead of just bring­ing things [from] what we do in Bar­ba­dos. So, I think bring­ing it all to­geth­er, and see­ing the mac­aron and its fin­ished prod­uct, we re­alised that this is go­ing to be some­thing that Tri­nis are go­ing to love,” she not­ed.

Putting the Caribbean on the menu

That ap­proach forms part of the com­pa­ny’s wider am­bi­tion to show­case Caribbean flavours through its con­fec­tionery.

“Along with the pas­sion that we have for con­fec­tionery, choco­lates and mac­arons, in build­ing the brand, we re­al­ly want­ed to show­case the best of what the Caribbean has to of­fer in a lux­u­ri­ous way. We are al­ways try­ing to take quin­tes­sen­tial Caribbean in­gre­di­ents and flavours like the man­go, pas­sion­fruit, rum, and sug­ar cane, and use them to cre­ate unique menu items with our mac­arons and choco­lates. We want to make sure we can get the Caribbean on the world stage and show them what we have to of­fer,” Abed said.

Look­ing ahead, Abed said the com­pa­ny hopes to ex­pand its op­er­a­tions in Trinidad and To­ba­go while con­tin­u­ing to in­tro­duce new flavours each month, us­ing each cre­ation as an op­por­tu­ni­ty to show­case the di­verse flavours of the Caribbean.