You might have just done a double take and said to yourself, “Golden Krust? Really?”

Yes, you read that correctly — Golden Krust, the Caribbean fast food chain. Now please allow me to explain.

Golden Krust started as a restaurant in the Bronx 25 years ago and now has 120 franchises along the Eastern Seaboard. After tasting Golden Krust’s most popular item, the Jamaican patties, I understood how they’d managed such explosive growth. Fillings vary from jerk chicken to shrimp to soya, but the spicy beef patties are by far the best seller. I recently received 200 spicy beef cocktail patties as a gift and started serving them as hors d’oeuvres at dinner parties. These mini patties are always the first to go and a hot topic of conversation — guests actually fight over the last ones! In fact, they are so popular that I decided to investigate their secret. I contacted Golden Krust and was invited to take a tour of its patty-making facilities. They wouldn’t disclose the proprietary recipe for the spicy beef patties, but it was a treat to see how the patties are made — 400 every minute! Check out the following video for footage of the tour.

Golden Krust Jamaican Patty Production from Cravings on Vimeo.

I like the mini beef patties because they are the perfect proportion of crust to filling, and they also have a bit of a kick. Besides that, they are perfect for parties. Don’t believe me? Try one for yourself!