The Homemade Doubles Debate
I’m not sure that any other country or culture is as fiercely protective of their identity, as Trinidadians are about Doubles. With the rampant closures and lockdowns, the barred bars, curfews and unemployment that have come out of controlling the Covid-19 pandemic’s reach, no blow has hit harder than the dismissal of the Doubles Vendors.
Like sprouts, homemade doubles pictures started popping up all over Instagram. With no Sunday morning line up under the tarpaulin shed, how would we satisfy the ritualistic Saturday night hangover cure? What would we feed our children after church? The chorus of requests for “One with slight” and “Two with everything” have been silenced, but the song hums still in our head. So we’ve been trying our hands at making it ourselves. The result? Varying degrees of disaster and success.
From too yellow, too round crispy baras, to channa that has too little or too much run in the sauce. Daily we see Trinis in Trinidad frantically oiling and rolling dough to compensate for the profound emptiness dug out of our way of life. To be Trini is to eat doubles, but why don’t we know how to make it? For decades we have entrusted the daily bread to our chosen doubles men. We know our preferences to the nittiest grittiest details. We are picky in our individual style of it. We seek out our doubles man with more discernment than we spend on selecting a spouse. It matters how big the channa grain is, and how hard or soft it bites. Thick versus thin baras. Some bara sweet, some bara bland. Yellow bara, soggy barra, heavy pepper, no pepper, slight. Pum pum bushy and pum pum fat. What time is best to go? What time do they run out? Showing off on how long the line is by your doubles man and about the time he gave you extra. Groaning under your breath when you came for just one, but the person in front of you ordered ten.
The sweet sauce debate is ongoing. So too is the south versus north doubles. The east versus west doubles. Which doubles man does coconut chutney and who does shadon beni sauce. We have our order down to a science. How many doubles you could eat in one go. The scorn towards those who wrap and take away, compared to the pride of knowing how to swiftly yam down a hot doubles while standing, managing to only dirty two unburnt fingers. We have our family name, blood type and doubles order in our medical records. It is on our birth paper. Yet here we are, with the church closed and the pastor gone, leaving us to talk to God directly.
How does one make doubles?
The trinternet ( I’ve given Trinis on the internet and social media their own name, because if you know, you know. Trinis on social media are in a different category of behavior) exploded into violent savagery towards formerly esteemed Trini chef Wendy Rahamut, when her video of a homemade doubles recipe was shared anew. It was not just that her doubles was a horn child of a fry bake, trying to be passed off as a bara, but that she said that the doubles men had “questionable” quality baras. The trinternet came to the defense of their beloved frontline soldiers, and made her eat her words, and her crunchy wannabe bara. Now two Wendys have been cancelled. Sigh.
I have been looking at the different recipes out there and I have settled on two that I believe are worth attempting. The first is by self-proclaimed “Doubles Glutton” Reshmi, the revered Trini food blooger behind Taste of Trinbago. She taught me to make sada roti, so I personally attest to her knowledge. Reshmi pays attention to details as seemingly minor as the protein content in the flour, when it comes to selecting her doubles ingredients. She gives a wonderful history of the national food and walks you through step by simple step, to create a thin bara and saucy, rich channa. What I also love about her recipe, is the attention she also pays to the toppings. She says these are what make a doubles, and while I think it is the bara texture, channa flavour, topping combo trifecta that matters, I definitely respect a good coconut chutney.
My other recommendation would be Chef Brigette Joseph, who published a recipe on Facebook recently that I have seen tagged countless times. I’ve heard it be described as “fool proof”, and watched an entire live Facebook video of a friend making it before 5am. Like me, he has no idea what to do with flour, but his doubles turned out beautifully. So I checked out Brigette’s recipe. I love that she recommends un-soaked channa and credits this to a deeper inherent flavor of the legume. She breaks it down simply and clearly.
The truth is though, no matter if you master a homemade doubles, I do not foresee this ever becoming a meal you will start making yourself. When our heroes return to the backs of their Wingroads, with their styrofoam coolers full of steam, and step up behind their pulpits, these homemade recipes will be forgotten. That hypnotizing spoon swing rhythm, that only seasoned hands could play, dash just the right amounts of tamarind and cucumber. That satisfying hand-over of the grease-proof paper into our open palms could never be duplicated in our own kitchen. The wrap; where an open face doubles never leaks when it is hammocked into a closed package, could never feel the same as scooping channa into Glad containers. It is a doctrine in song. Holy communion.
Doubles has never been about the taste alone. Neither is convenience a factor. You would leave Trincity to go to La Romaine for doubles on a normal day. It is what brings us together. Not Carnival. The doubles line is the only non partisan decision we make. It is invaluable yet the marker of our economy. It is the only food you would willingly sponsor without asking for contribution. The only bill you don’t split. Doubles is where you come into your manhood, when you wash your hands over the drain for the first time. It is where many got their rare chance to have a sweet drink for breakfast. An Apple J dripping cold water after being lucky dipped out of the ice. It is a morning excursion, with the car glass down and steupses being sucked at our radio announcers. It is the only way to properly close off a late night, using oil and pepper to inflame the Johnny Walker in our bellies, and flour to sop it up from evacuating. Doubles is a living thing. It is an action word. It is how we live and not what we eat. As we scramble to compensate for our missed meal, we will only just feed part of the craving. For what we really want is not the perfect bara or channa, but to feel like a Trinidadian. And like I said, to be a Trini is to have a doubles.