Three Young Women at the Délices d’Haïti Food Stand
From left to right: Kerenne – Jemuma – Iné
Photograph by www.DiscoverParis.net
Yesterday at the Foire de Paris, I happened by a food stand called Les Délices d’Haïti. Seeing that there were not many customers there at that moment, I decided that it would be a good time to pause for lunch.
Barquette Créole
Photograph by www.DiscoverParis.net
The lunch menu (called Barquette Créole) offered four dishes for only 7€, a fair price! The dishes were Riz Djon-Djon (rice with mushrooms), Poulet (chicken), Pickliz (coleslaw), and Bananes Pesées (flat plantain fritters). A can of Oasis orange soda was 2€ extra.
I found all of the dishes to be delicious and spicy. The rice was made with djon-djon, a black mushroom native to Haiti. During cooking, the mushrooms release a grayish-black coloring that gives the rice its gray color and the dish’s distinctive flavor. Spices from Haiti (the exact names of which I never found out) gave all of the dishes piquancy. I liked the fried chicken leg and was told that it had been marinated for twenty-four hours in lemon juice and mustard. I enjoyed the coleslaw, but had to remove some of the tiny slices of red pepper that gave the salad a too spicy kick. The bananes pesées were fun to eat. Soft on the inside and crusty on the outside, they are prepared by mashing or flattening slices of plantain and then frying them like fritters.
Délices d’Haïti, located in the town of Pontoise (about twenty-five kilometers to the northwest of Paris), has a Facebook page.
Délices d’Haïti
2, route de Menandon
95300 Pontoise
Tel.: 06.58.79.86.99
The Foire de Paris continues through Sunday, May 11.
