DOUBLES AND DIPLOMACY

WHAT do doubles, the hugely-popular Trinidad and Tobago-created street food, have in common with high-stakes international diplomacy?

For T&T’s Foreign Affairs Minister Dr. Amery Browne, the two appear to be intertwined.

In fact, Dr. Browne, who is leading T&T’s campaign for the presidency of the United Nations General Assembly in 2023-24, introduced delicious doubles to more than 176 diplomats he is lobbying.

The minister did so at a launch event that took place in New York, the seat of the UN.

“Many of them had never tasted anything like this before,” Browne reported, “and I was so proud to see them repeatedly coming back for more.”

Doubles, a uniquely T&T sandwich of curried sandwich flavoured with spicy sauces, has become internationally popular and has been enjoyed by the world’s top foodies and featured in leading culinary publications.

BBC Travel has described doubles as a “seductively spicy street snack.”

The dish was created in the 1930s in the southern town of Princes Town by first-generation descendants of Indian indentured immigrants.

There are now hundreds of doubles vendors throughout T&T, and the meal could be savoured for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Doubles are typically served from a wooden box.

Early itinerant doubles vendors operated from bicycles.

Browne said that at the New York event, “special effort was made to have the authentic wooden box, cooler, assign and overall ambience.”

T&T is proposing Ambassador Dennis Francis for the presidency of the UNGA.

Each of the 193 countries of the UN has a single vote on the matter.

The presidency would take place amid the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian war and tensions at other global hotspots.