Antiguan Cassava Bread

Cassava bread is one of the oldest continuously-prepared foods of the Caribbean — the Taíno indigenous people prepared it before European arrival in 1492, and the technique has been preserved by enslaved Africans and Caribbean people. The dish is essentially a thin, dry, unleavened flatbread. The squeeze-press step (using a 'matapi' woven cassava strainer in pre-Columbian times) is essential to remove the toxic hydrocyanic acid in raw cassava.

Tear a wedge of cassava bread — pale-cream, slightly speckled brown, dry-textured. Bite plain: barely-sweet, faintly earthy, mildly nutty; the texture is firm and slightly crumbly, like a thicker cracker. With a piece of warm saltfish sauce on top, it absorbs the moisture and becomes a perfect carrier. This is the oldest food on the Antiguan table — a direct line from the Taíno people who prepared it on these islands before Columbus arrived. Eating it is partaking in 1,500+ years of Caribbean continuity.

Squeezing the grated cassava is non-optional and not just for texture — fresh cassava contains hydrocyanic acid (cyanide precursor); the squeezed liquid carries it away. Eating insufficiently-prepared cassava is poisonous. The dry-griddle method (no oil) is what allows the bread to form without oil-frying — the cassava's natural starch holds it together. The bread doesn't rise; it's an unleavened dense flatbread.