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Photo by: Steve Simonsen

Golda Herman is hunched over a well-worn mortar, using a matching pestle to grind black peppercorns, garlic cloves, sprigs of thyme and sea salt. Once she's satisfied with the mix, she looks up with a welcoming grin. ''I call this my 'come-back' seasoning,'' she says, ''because it keeps people coming back for more.'' An employee of the Virgin Islands National Park and a skilled cook, Herman gives visitors a glimpse – and a taste – of what lunch was like at St. John's Annaberg Plantation over a century ago.

Hanging inside the Danish-style cookhouse where Herman works, objects that look like flotsam and jetsam are actually cooking tools. ''That dried branch of coral was used to beat eggs,'' says Herman. Picking up a lacy sea fan, she adds, ''You can sift flour with this, and the rough skin from a triggerfish still makes a great pot scrubber.''

''Johnnycakes are my specialty,'' says Eirleen January, Herman's assistant, as she kneads a mound of dough with the dexterity of a lifetime spent baking. After adding a pinch more flour and a dash of shortening, she rolls golf ball-size pieces into flat circles and pricks the tops with a fork. She places the bread balls into the bottom of a kettle and sets it on a coal-burning stove.

Fresh fish – boiled, fried or made into a delicious soup – is the cookhouse's most popular dish. ''I use yellowtail, red snapper, hind or hardnose,'' says Herman. ''I season it with scallion, thyme, parsley, tarragon and a little lime from the garden.''

As if on cue, Sonneyville ''Sonny'' Smith, Annaberg's gardener, arrives with a basket of just-picked fruit. ''When it's dry, we don't have as much in the garden,'' he says, ''but there's always banana, papaya and tamarind.'' Herman makes the fruits into thirst-quenching drinks that whet our appetites even more.

Today, Smith has also harvested plantain, eggplant and green squash. Herman prepares the vegetables to cook with the fish.

We then follow her outside where she sets the kettle of seasoned fish and veggies atop an old-time coal pot fired with coals made from the wild tamarind tree.

Come noon, it's tasting time. An enthusiastically hungry crowd has gathered around the cookhouse. Plates and forks are passed around, and everyone digs in. ''You're welcome to come back for seconds and thirds,'' Herman says with a smile. ''As long as we have, we give, until the pot runs dry.''

Baking demonstrations are offered on Wednesdays and Fridays between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. There is no charge for taste samples, but there is a $4 admission fee for ages 16 and older to enter Annaberg Plantation. To find out what's cooking, call the park office at 340-776-6201.

Posted online 04/08/02.