May 2011
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He was 26 when he received two Michelin stars and is one of the most exciting chefs in the UK. Exclusively for High Life, Tom Aikens discovers what’s cooking in St Lucia
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Chef Tom Aikens eating fish stew at Top Of The Cove beach shack, Choiseul
Cedric Angeles for High Life magazine
It's lunchtime at Top of the Cove, a beach shack in the fishing village of Choiseul, southwest St Lucia. Country and western music is blaring out of the stereo (it seems everyone on this island's crazy about it), France and Mexico are battling it out in a football match on the huge TV, I've a cold Piton beer in my hand, and a big bowl of fish stew with boiled yams and plantain to tuck into. Where else would you want to be?
This is proper Caribbean cuisine. The fish were still swimming in the sea 90 minutes before and cooked on coals on the floor of the kitchen — all pretty basic, but fresh and delicious. A big part of the charm.
The meal's rounded off with a lethal shot of a local brew made from seaweed which is boiled, brewed, fermented, and then has coconut, cinnamon and rum added. An acquired taste perhaps. If I'd had more than one I would have needed airlifting out.
I've been interested in food since I was about eight years old. My mother and father were into cooking — we grew a lot of vegetables at home in Norfolk and I'm a great believer in fresh produce.
