Anchorage Daily News

Down at the Juneteenth celebration, past Fat Boy Ribs and a booth full of Democrats, right near the Hawaiian barbecue, Beulah George was cooking up curried goat and ox tail, pigeon peas and plantains, and sharing a little of herself.

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She's cooked for decades, for her church and for her own big family of eight kids and their friends. Now, for the first time, she was trying to see whether the public was willing to buy in and experience her Caribbean culture, through food.

It's always been about food and family for George. Nothing different on Saturday. A son and a daughter and her husband were all helping in her Juneteenth booth on the Delaney Park Strip.

The setting was ripe. There was live music, and vendors with food or stuff like sunglasses to sell or groups like the Alaskans Against the Mining Shutdown eager to hand out information. Two 21-year-olds with music names of 2wenty and Tha Boss were giving away a CD mixtape they made, Cold Summer Vol. 1.

On a cloudy, chilly afternoon, the only thing lacking at Juneteenth was the crowds. Business was better on Friday, when it was sunny. One man tried the curried goat and came back an hour later to tell George he had never had it before, and it was delicious.

Juneteenth is an annual event celebrating slavery's end.

George had been out there cooking since early in the morning and plans to be back again today. She shared a sample of one of her prized dishes, the slow-cooked ox tail, and it was spicy and tender, falling off the bone.

One of her secrets, she said, is soaking meat, whether it's beef or chicken or mutton, in water mixed with a couple of cups of vinegar, to cut away the sliminess. She uses Island Spice curry. But don't bother asking her about other spices. Her secret.

"I don't think they'll find it here, and if they do they don't know how I mix it," she said.

She was born on Anegada, a spit of land in the British Virgin Islands, and then moved to St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands. They ate from the land and the sea, fresh mangos and lobster and seafood few know of in the north, like conch and whelk.

So the pickings seemed a little sparse when the family moved from St. Thomas to Anchorage in 1980. One of George's sisters lived here and liked it, but missed family.

The produce seemed old and they couldn't get their familiar foods. Even the milk tasted odd.

Anchorage was a lot less ethnic then. Now more than 90 languages are spoken in the schools and George orders her goat and ox tail from Red Apple or New Sagaya.

Their family still gets together every Saturday for a potluck, games and home movies, said Tina George, 42, the oldest daughter.

She's always been known as a good cook, son Patrick George, 38, said. She cooks for taste, not necessarily by the recipe. When she wanted to introduce her children to another part of their roots, from German ancestry, she cooked the cabbage in fish stock with green bananas, and it was good, Patrick said.

"I'm her personal food taster," he joked, and is glad of it. He and his brothers have made a living as professional paint ball players, traveling the country for tournaments.

But still they come home to Anchorage, where their mother, now in her 60s, can be counted on for comfort food.

Find Lisa Demer online at adn.com/contact/ldemer or call 257-4390.

GOOD TIMES: The Juneteeth celebration, with the theme "unity in the community," continues today from 2 to 8 p.m. on the Delaney Park Strip near L Street. Find out more at

juneteenthalaska.com

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