Jerk sauce, mark 1

I love, love, love jerk.  I love the spiciness, yes, but the flavor behind the spiciness is so rich, full of allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, umami, garlic, and scallions.  So far, I've been relying on store bought jerk seasoning, Walkers or Grace or some other Jamaican brand.  A little goes a very long way (2 tsp/pound of food).  For some other marinade, you would expect to need 1/4 - 1/2 a cup, but jerk is just so intense in flavor.  But how do they do it?  I've been poking around Jamaican cookbooks, but they usually seem to have sucky recipes for jerk.  I don't get it.  Too much allspice and green onion and zero umami.  It tastes like your meat is seasoned with spicy lawn clippings - yuk!  So, I took the sucky recipe I had, looked at the ingredients on the bottle of jerk, and looked at some alternative recipes.  Now I got something a lot better.

First I needed some umami.  What is umami?  Umami is basically the "meaty" flavor you get from vegetarian ingredients, like mushrooms or tomato paste.  It's that rip sticking good flavor.  Two good sources of umami for jerk paste are soy sauce and Worcestershire sauce.  Even better than the latter is Pickapeppa sauce, which comes from Jamaica.  It's a bit thicker, so better for keeping the jerk thick.

Jerk isn't super acidic (it's not hot sauce), but a touch of acid helps bring everything together.  I like white vinegar, as it is the least sweet.  Other kinds might work fine.

Interestingly, I found that a lot of cinnamon and an addition of nutmeg brought out the flavor.  Using allspice, you're theoretically covering cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg, but not really.  Allspice comes off as unpleasantly peppery at high doses.

Ginger is a big flavor component.  I didn't have it in there originally and it's vital

I will probably do some more refining.  The recipe doesn't replicate the bottled stuff, but it is still pretty good.

Jerk Sauce, Mark 1

15 scallions, chopped
4-6 scotch bonnet peppers, chopped
3 cloves garlic
1 Tbsp peeled, shredded ginger
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 Tbsp Pickapeppa or worcestershire sauce
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1 Tbsp white vinegar
1 cinnamon stick, finely ground
1 Tbsp black pepper
1 Tbsp allspice
2 Tbsp thyme
Salt to taste (should be relatively salty)

Blend everything together.  Thin with water until a thick paste is obtained.

Update Oct 2, 2014

 I made jerk chicken and compared with commercial paste.  My came back a bit grassier and milder, but still good.  I need more Pickapeppa sauce, I think

I need up upload a picture.