Floribbean cuisine to highlight the month of May

Florida plus Caribbean equals spicy fusion cuisine, to quote the Rob Report, "At its best, New Floribbean cuisine is bright, colorful, and tantalizing." It's a marriage of the familiar and the unfamiliar. The complexity of the spices and soft fruit and citrus flavors can be a bit daunting at first, but then again, no great dish was loved on the first taste.

"What on earth is Floribbean Food?" The answer ties back into the wonderful melting pot of cultures found in the city of Miami. Floribbean is generally a mingling of culinary influences from Caribbean islands like The Bahamas, Barbados, Haiti and Jamaica. These island cooking styles have mixed with Miami's proximity cities including Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and creation style unlike anything else in the world.

New Floribbean which will take place from May 14 to the 19 at the Governor's Restaurant and Terrace is a cuisine is the evolution of nouvelle cuisine and fusion cuisine based on indigenous ingredients. Nouvelle cuisine focuses on fresh local ingredients, smaller portions, with local fruits and vegetables, all presented with flair. A number of herbs, fruit, vegetable garnishes and fresh greens are used to give the dish a healthy, straight from the kitchen feel.

"It's a dynamic mixing of flavors: elaborate pairings of powerful spices, slowly melts away into softer flavors. A wide variety of fruits and fruit juices are used to augment the flavors of the spices," General Manager Anura Dewapura stated.

Menus utilizing mangos, papaya, avocados, plantains, various hot peppers and other island specialties mixed with abundant seafood are now the norm in floribbean cuisine. It also blends hot, spicy Caribbean flavours with "softer" accents of cinnamon, honey and allspice in addition to oregano, cumin and cilantro. When Floribbean dishes combine elements from all these traditions, you will definitely see heat from peppers balanced by sweetness from fruit. Other elements such as coconut and rum are common, too. New techniques and flavors will be added on keeping the evolving Floribbean cuisine deliciously exciting.

The menu consists of Salads: Lagoon prawn ceviche, Tropical salsa, Cilantro-chillie oil, Spicy tropical gazpacho, Mini crab cake, Fried platano, Seared tuna, Roasted coconut flakes, Charred pineapple salsa and more. The Mains: Jerk spiced chicken, Pumpkin-chille hash and Mango salsa, Adobo rubbed lamb rump, Yuca-plantain mofongo and Orange mojo, Cuban style pork chop, Baja rice and beans and Red pepper-papaya jam and Seared modha, Roasted corn, Roasted tomato-pepper escabeche and Pipian. The Desserts will include Jamaican style rum cake with flambéed pineapple sauce, Malibu infused crème brûlée and Appleton rum glazed fresh mango and vanilla ice.