This mountainside Rasta eco-retreat and organic farm is well worth the 20- to 30-minute drive from Negril. It’s an opportunity to see a slice of real Jamaica away from the resorts, and to have not just a fantastic meal but also a cooking demonstration on Ital, a Rastafarian culinary tradition focused on organic foods and simple cooking over open wood fires. (Though frequently Ital cooking is vegetarian, that is not the case here.)

Seventy percent of the ingredients used are grown or gathered on the 7.5-acre organic farm, from the fruits and vegetables to the herbs, curry, allspice, honey, and coconut oil.


After a pineapple-ginger juice welcome drink and an informative tour of the farm, you retire to an open-air jungle kitchen for your cooking lesson. The meal changes with the seasonality of ingredients—perhaps pumpkin soup, red snapper steamed in banana leaves, plantain patties, Jamaican lobster, coconut-banana sushi, cedar-plank chicken, or bean cakes.

The price covers the farm tour, full meal (three courses at lunch, four at dinner), two glasses of wine per person, and roundtrip transfers from Negril.