There was a time in Pedro when Bammy was a common food in almost all homes. There are some young ones today who have no knowledge of the process involved in the making of this vital food of a few decaded past.
Most men of the area were involved in some form of fishing, and were also cultivators of staple foods to feed their families. They would fish three days each week, and farm three days, and rest on Sundays. Cassava roots from which bammy was made, used to be cultivated quite successfully in the region. It was quite a hardy crop and in years gone by. more rain used to fall in Pedro, we could actuall grow some crops.

I will detail the process of bammy making to the best of my ability. The day's bammy consumption
of the family was known by the housewives and from experience they knew how many roots were to be used each day.
The roots were stripped of the outer skina, they were grated usually into a wooden tray of fairly large size. Teen aged girls im the household were usually designated to do this job, Boys never were expected to do this. When the lot is grated it becomes a mushy, drippy pulp, and the poisonous juice must be extracted form it.

Specially made thatch bags made somewhere I dont know where. and the grated cassava was put into these bags. and the juice is extracted by applying pressure to the deep enveloped shaped bags.

To me it seemed that physics was taught in the schools there, because every home had a cassava press somewhere in the yard. Fulcrum, lever,
axis and weight was involved.

The loaded bag of dripping wet pulp, with flap turned over for protection was placed on a flat board, or plank, and topped off with another flat surface. Two long poles (levers) were wedged into a slot under a tree, and weights (rocks) placed on the end of these poles to provide pressure that squeezes out the juice from the grated roots. This pressure ia applied for several hours.

At about 3:00 PM when school was in recess, we could hear the residents living near the school knocking off the weights to get their juice ridden bag of cassava to take it to the next step. Pools of juice would collect on the ground near the press and it is very poisonous, Many thirsty animals have consumed it ans died shortly after. Goats, donkeys were prime targets.

Dried or slight;y damp powder is removed from the bag and is put into a mortar,(malta) and pounded with a fairly heavy stick (malta stick)to further crush nubs or lumps. The powder is then sifted and is now ready to be baked.

Every home had a flat Iron for making bammy, and it was accompanied by a one or two hoops of different sizes. When the iron is hot enough a hoop is placed upon it and some sifted meal is spread inside the hoop and smoothed out to a uniform depth to make a bammy. At some point the attendant would remove the hoop and use a pot stick to flip it over so both sides are done.

On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays which were fishing days, everybody had fish for dinner, and bammy was the accompanyment. When avacados were in season, they were an added bonus. I think to this day all us Treasure Beach people love to eat fish and bammy. and we do occasionally all the way up in Canada.

This was a very labor intensive process and all young ladies hated doing it, They would cut their fingers on the sharp grater, and thier blood would get into the mix. They would cheer today to hear that bammy making is now practically extinct in Treasure Beach.

Raymond, you are right on, except when the hoop is removed, you have to press it with the pot stick to let it get firm before flipping it over.

I just read your post at around 1:30 today and I had cassava bread and fish for breakfast this morning. While eating, I went through the whole process of bammy making in my mind and thought of how long and tiring it was, because I use to help grate the cassava and my mom or my older sisters would do the rest. We use to pick out the parts of the grated cassava that had the blood from our grated fingers. I also wondered if the younger generation is using some other method than the ancient labour intenive method. Just maybe there is some kind of gadget that is much easier. Just wondering.

Keep writing about the good old days. Your postings are very interesting. As I mentioned in our recent telephone conversation, I was unaware of the fact that your brother Dr. Emerson James had to do all that walking to get to school. Guess I was too young.

Love & God bless.

Your cousin.

Carol.
Love

Cousin, that seems like a very hard job. I never liked bammy but I'm getting to like it some now. Bammy is baked and sold in Sandy Bank every day still but they used a little more modern gaget if you will these days an electric grater and press now don't know how it's done though. Every time I travel to Jamaica they asked at the airport in Florida if you food like fish and bammy so I guess a lot of people bring some back here.

Cousin, that seems like a very hard job. I never liked bammy but I'm getting to like it some now. Bammy is baked and sold in Sandy Bank every day still but they used a little more modern gaget if you will these days an electric grater and press now don't know how it's done though. Every time I travel to Jamaica they asked at the airport in Florida if you food like fish and bammy so I guess a lot of people bring some back here.

I never liked bammy myself, to me it is tasteless but it was certainly a gap filler. Stale bammy was vile, and a choker.

Bammy, fish, avocado and pepperpot soup, take me back.

Memories of merry and sweet chat, sharing, family, group getogethers with song. The Zemi Makers and their secrets. The treck deep into the cave. The jolt when cohoba embraced the receptors and changed the view.

The sight of the white clouds bearing bearded strangers. The memories of the start of the madness. Power over others, gold for the European wars and the cleansing of Iberia.

DNA memories or the Muses?

Plant cassava, avocado and calalloo, one never never knows when another madness washes our shores again. Things are lining up over suh!

I remember my grandmother talking about the ' thatchry ' bammy. This was like a little sample bammy that was used to test if the iron was absolutely hot enough for baking. Boys and girls would compete to get this thatchry when it was baked.

Where on earth did Turey come from? I never heard of such things in Pedro during my lifetime.

I think Turey speaks of a time before your time and I do believe he grew in Kingston, not Pedro.

Same place as you Raymond ;) and on this earth. I emerged near Cross Roads (Kgn) 64 years ago. These things are mostly beyond current talk, we may go back 3 or 4 generations.

I refer to histories that go back 20+ generations. These stories are often written on stone, which cannot be burned. There is also much modern printed material. After 50 years, I'm just learning the language written in 3D form and inspired by the influence of the entheogen of choice of those ancestors, the seeds of Anadenanthers Peregrina.

Cohoba.

Not cohiba, the US$25 Cuban cigar.

turey, Raymond lived in the Cross Roads area before you were born, probably. You may even have seen each other!! I also may know you as I lived in that area as well. Now there you are in TB, lucky you!

Raymond. turey seems to be a mystic import, very attuned to the Tianos whom he never met! His musings confuses me as I am sure it does everybody else including himself!

Correction: Anadenanthera.

http://www.botanicalspirit.com/yopo-seeds

I sympathize Archie, sometimes brain strain can be overwhelming. Best to ignore my confused mumblings, stock up on B complex and spend two weeks in Treasure Beach away from the madness.

Raymond,

It was a sheer delight reading your post on bammy!It takes me right back to those good old days in the 1960s and '70s when I was a child watching my mother, Mazie(your cousin, Carl's wife) prepare this for us. Someone mentions "thatchry" somewhere in this chain, and it took me a long way back. I had forgotten such a thing, but what a thing it was as a child to get to be the one getting that honor -- especially if you had a slice of pear with it!
Keep on writing down our stories. My neices and nephews in Treasure Beach now have probably never seen bammy made. They just know it as being bought, "from Miss Vivi."
On a different note, I think of/speak of your mother with fair regularity because one day I was sent home from primary school with a really bad ear-ache. I was crying fairly loudly by the time I came abreast your parents' home. Aunt Emmy was outside gardening and heard me. She asked what the matter was and called me over. She proceeded to bring out a bottle of some kind of medicine and a fowl feather (yes, that was our Q-Tip in those days, you younger ones who may read this), leaned my head onto her lap, and applied a few drops into the offending ear. I have not had an ear-ache since that day and it's been close to 50 years!
Children don't forget kindness...and she used to treat our lame toes and scraped knees too with a red medicine with which your brother, Emerson, seems to have kept her well supplied

Marcia I think the red medicine you mentioned is called mercury comb. They also had the purple one called gentian violet which is still used for cuts and scrapes. I am trying to remember what the concoction for ear ache was. Was it a little jaze or something? Can't remember but those old time medicine would really do the trick. By the way, did anyone out there ever drink camphor water for pain-a-belly? ….and what about swallowing a little Vicks for a sore throat despite the fact that the bottle says, for external use only. I live in the US and trust me, after all the Octoberfest, Thanksgiving and Christmas celebration I am always happy to have some sirosee to drink. I love old time medicine. They are the best.

Oh wow, thanks for letting me know the name of the dressing Aunt Emmy used. As for swallowing a tiny dab of vicks for a swore throat, been there, done that! as the old timers used to say, "It nah kill yuh)