Sea grapes (served with coconut and curry), hand woven baskets full of urchins, sunsets, fishing boats, and yes, the invevitable McDonald's. Some photos from Suva, Fiji...
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Sea grapes (served with coconut and curry), hand woven baskets full of urchins, sunsets, fishing boats, and yes, the invevitable McDonald's. Some photos from Suva, Fiji...
Nice pics Jennifer...I always love the time that goes into all the veggie bundles...
Yep that's Suva Market alright and I see there's now a MacDonalds next to the old Regal Theatre on Victoria Parade but in all my years in Fiji, I've never heard of "sea grapes" before. Could you enlighten me here? Sure the locals weren't gently pulling your leg as they are wont to do?
Also did you catch up with Dr Tarte at USP? She wrote quite a good monograph on tuna diplomacy as memory serves.
Great pictures of the market! When I was visiting Fiji as a member of Tribewanted, I made it out to Suva and snapped some pictures of my own at the market. You gotta love the colors there!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fightinjoe/1245044284/in/set-7215760168031…
As for sea grapes, they're a type of sea weed that has a thin stem that is surrounded by bunches of little buds, kind of like little grapes. If you could imagine taking a blackberry and stretching it out, and then making it more salty than sweet, you can kind of imagine the experience. When you eat sea grapes, the little buds pop in your mouth, so some think it's similar to eating caviar.
In Japan, they've got sea grapes as well but they're about half the size and much more delicate. To eat them in the west, I think we'll have to come up with a better name than sea WEED. I've heard some people trying to promote "sea vegetables"!
Seagrapes aka Nama is served with coconut milk concoction alongside boiled fish. Notice on the right of the 'seagrapes' are bundles of a fern-like vegetable, which is also served with coconut milk extraction aka 'miti'.
Those Sea Urchins in the baskets, are also a delicacy for those with the stomach for it. As far as I know, the Urchins are cut in halves, the content spooned out and splashed with lemon juice, sprinkled with your favorite chillie...Bon Appetit!
As for Mcdees... Super Size me!
Thanks for the details, Laminar Flow. I was with a fellow researcher who told me they were seagrapes (veggies from the sea) but I didn't know the details!
And here are a few more details from my fellow researcher: Indeed there is such a thing as sea grapes. Caulerpa racemosa. Fijian name: nama. They're harvested off the reefs.
Nama! Aha! Never heard 'em called sea grapes before (mind you it's been a while) but that's a pretty catchy term. Branding like that could up their export potential.