Experimenting with Spices
A low-carb jerk marinade made from scratch, plus some research behind why jerk spices belong in a health conscious kitchen
THE SPICE SERIES
Sophia Mohammed
6/30/20264 min read
My mom's marinade was all in her head. She'd throw things into the bowl because it felt right, a bit of this, a bit of that, and somehow, every single time, it was perfect. There's just one problem: her version used brown sugar and orange juice, so when I moved to a low carb lifestyle, jerk quietly dropped off my family table.
Somewhere along the way, I'd also stopped experimenting with flavour the way she did. Life got busier. Routine felt safer. Trying something new just stopped feeling worth the energy. Looking back, I'm not sure that trade was a good one.
This year I decided to bring jerk back into my weeknight meal plan, without giving up low carb eating. So I adapted my mom's concoction. Same marinade, same heat. Just less sugar.
Method:
Rough chop the scallions, habaneros, garlic, onion, and thyme, then blend with everything else until smooth.
Add salt and pepper to your taste and liking.
This makes about 2 cups, and the marinade keeps in the fridge for up to 2 weeks
Growing up in the Caribbean, I ate a lot of jerk chicken. It got me through late nights studying at university, and it became the family favourite on weekends with friends.
What's actually doing the work in jerk seasoning?
Scallions, garlic, ginger, thyme, habaneros, allspice, nutmeg, cinnamon. That's the real backbone of a jerk marinade, and every item on that list is naturally close to zero carbs.
A teaspoon of ground allspice has about 1 gram. A whole habanero chilli has less than that. You can build a huge amount of flavour on this list without moving your daily carb count at all.
Brown sugar: 1 tablespoon, about 13 grams of carbs.
Orange juice: half a cup, about 13 grams of carbs.
That's 26 grams of sugar in a marinade you're rubbing straight onto dinner.
Here's the swap:
Instead of brown sugar, I skip it or use a teaspoon of allulose. Allulose caramelises and balances heat the way sugar does, without the blood sugar effect. The allspice, cinnamon, and nutmeg already taste sweet on their own, so dropping the sugar barely changes anything.
Instead of orange juice, I use the zest of one orange plus extra lime juice. You keep the citrus aroma without the fruit sugar.
Where are the carbs actually hiding?
Swaps to have a play with:
Tamari for coconut aminos
Habaneros for 4 Thai red chillies
Fresh thyme for 1/2 tablespoon dried
You'll need:
4-5 scallions, roughly chopped
3-4 cloves garlic
1 small onion, roughly chopped
1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
4 sprigs fresh thyme
3 habanero peppers (remove seeds for less heat)
2 teaspoons ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/3 cup tamari
2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (more for a thinner consistency)
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
Zest of 1 orange
Juice of 1 lime
Salt and black pepper, to taste
Real food doesn't need to hide anything
Serve with cauliflower rice and a lime-dressed cabbage slaw for a plate that's fully low-carb and doesn't taste like it's missing anything.
Tips:
About 1 cup of marinade covers 6 boneless, skinless chicken thighs.
Marinate at least 1 hour; overnight is best.
Grill over medium heat, or roast at 200°C, turning halfway through, until the internal temperature hits 74°C. Usually 40 to 45 minutes depending on the oven.
This is the part I keep reminding myself. A jarred jerk sauce from the supermarket will usually list sugar, often more than one kind, somewhere in the first five ingredients. Made from scratch, jerk marinade doesn't need any of that. The spices are doing the work the sugar gets credit for.
If you'd like more recipes and real food swaps, subscribe to The Nur Notebook. And if you're a homeschooling mum quietly wondering whether your energy and your plate are connected, I'd love to chat. A free Discovery Call is always the place to start.
Low-carb jerk chicken marinade
Sophia is a health coach, homeschooling mum, and retired Chemical & Process Engineer. At Nur al fajr she works with homeschooling mums who are ready to Notice, Understand, and Realign, one honest step at a time.
In a 2020 Penn State study, published in the Journal of Nutrition, 12 men aged 40 to 65, with overweight or obesity factors ate the same high-fat, high-carb meal on three separate days: once with no added spice, once with 2 grams of a 13-spice blend, once with 6 grams (basil, bay leaf, black pepper, cinnamon, coriander, cumin, ginger, oregano, parsley, red pepper, rosemary, thyme, and turmeric).
Researchers drew blood hourly for four hours after each meal, and only the 6-gram dose lowered the inflammatory markers they were tracking. It's a small study, 12 men, three meals each. Still, four of those spices, cinnamon, ginger, black pepper, and thyme, are sitting in your jerk seasoning right now.
There's mixed but persistent research on cinnamon lowering fasting blood glucose, turmeric and ginger reducing inflammation and garlic lowering hypertension risk factors. These studies are usually modest in size, dose-dependent, and the trials tend to be small, however, the pattern across all of these is that positive effects show up - reaching for real spice over a bottle with sugar as the second ingredient is still a reasonable move.
I remember lots of laughter, my dad's stale jokes, the shimmer of hot coals, smoke in the air, and the sting of habaneros in my eyes. That smell still does something to me.
