Island Crust Patties at Rocco’s and Molly Rose

When Hurricane Melissa hit Jamaica on Tuesday October 28, the UN team on the ground said the damage from the category five storm caused a level of devastation “never been seen before” on the Caribbean island. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, as of Wednesday December 3, approximately 279,000 people remain displaced. 

For Melbourne-based, Montego Bay-born chef turned cyber security expert May Heinz, the enormity of it all landed during a phone call with her Jamaica-based father,  who is based in the UK, but will soon head to Jamaica to help with relief efforts. She describes him as “staunch, disciplined, the type who never cries”. When he fell silent trying to hide his tears, she understood the crisis was far worse than anything that could be fully understood from afar.

“You hear about these disasters and think, ‘My God, that’s terrible’,” she says. “But when it’s everyone you love – your neighbours, your childhood friends, your whole community – it hits differently.”

Heinz wanted to do something joyful, rooted in culture and unmistakably Jamaican to raise funds for recovery efforts across the island. The result is Island Crust Patties, a series of pop-ups running across Melbourne throughout December, with an ambitious goal to raise $50,000. The pop-ups kicked off at Fenton Farmhouse last weekend. There’ll be three more pop-ups this weekend: at Rocco’s Bologna Discoteca from midday to 4pm on Friday December 12 and Saturday December 13, and at Molly Rose from midday to 4pm on Sunday December 14. 

The pop-ups focus on the patty – “Jamaica’s answer to the Australian meat pie,” as Heinz puts it. It’s a golden, flaky staple with a deep cultural lineage. Born from the Cornish pasty during England’s colonisation of Jamaica, it’s shaped by African and East Indian spice traditions blended in through slave trade and lifted by the island’s signature scotch bonnet, thyme and pimento. 

Heinz honours that lineage by making her pastry the traditional way – ice-cold butter folded into a curry spice-spiked dough – and fills it with three options. The classic beef patty uses slow-cooked mince seasoned with thyme, allspice and scotch bonnet. The jerk chicken version uses thigh instead of the mince usually found in patties; the meat is marinated for a day before being braised and pulled, giving it a smoky, gently fiery depth. The vegetable option pushes further with jerk-marinated pumpkin roasted until caramelised, then folded with braised cabbage and capsicum for sweetness and texture. “It sounds simple, but making these brought me right back to childhood,” Heinz says. “It felt ancestral, like I was creating this menu with my ancestors beside me. I had goosebumps.”

At this weekend’s events there’ll be DJs, cocktails, patties and Heinz’s jerk tomato sauce, which will also be available to purchase by the bottle. “If I was to put sauce on a patty in Jamaica it would be blasphemy, yet if I was to provide a savoury pastry in Australia without a sauce option I would run the risk of being flogged as a heretic, so I'm glad we were able to reach a happy medium,” she says.

Funds raised will be split between community organisations recommended to Heinz by the Jamaica Tourist Board, including Breds Treasure Beach Foundation and the Sandals Foundation.

www.islandcrustpatties.com