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Best place for peanut soup ... Footy's Ital Sip

Published:Thursday | August 19, 2010 | 12:00 AM
Footy pours a cup of his famous peanut soup. - photos by Ian Allen/Photographer
Footy's peanut soup has a variety of ingredients, including turnips, and the customers love to have the pieces of okra floating on the top.
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 Daviot Kelly, Staff Reporter

No matter who we asked, they all knew where to find 'the peanut soup man' of Haddo, Westmoreland.

Footy, as he prefers to be called, has been running his peanut soup shop for 25 years. Born in Haddo, it was after returning from the United States that he decided he wanted to try something different. Initially, his soup had cow skin, but he was curious to try it without meat. After a 'vision' of shelling peanuts, the idea came to him.

"I said to a bredren, if peanut can mek porridge, it mus' can mek soup," he recalled. His friend was fearful he would "poison off people," but the first day he used two pounds of peanut, and ran out of soup long before day's end.

"So mi jus' continue wid it 'cause mi can eat a food. A it sen' all mi pickney dem go a school," said Footy. There is no secret to Footy's recipe, as he uses various ground provisions including carrot, turnip, cho-cho and fresh okra along with coconut milk ("dat gi it di flavour"). What you won't find in his soup is salt. He starts as early as 5:30 a.m. and when school is in session, he needs two pots.

Footy's roadside shop is a popular hub, especially for the children as it is cheap (one cup for $100) and healthy. He named his establishment Footy's Ital Sip after the suggestion of reggae crooner Luciano who, he said, is a big fan. He pointed out that members of the successful Reno football teams of yesteryear were regular patrons. Secret to their success perhaps?

daviot.kelly@gleanerjm.com

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