Welcome to Melendez Imports and Restaurant, Globally Inspired Mexican Cuisine and West Indies Cuisine
Mexico meets Jamaican cuisine at Melendez – Imports International Restaurant.
So a Jamaican chef walks into a Mexican restaurant — no joke — and whips up food of the West Indies, from jerk chicken to curry goat to oxtail stew, plus a vegetarian option. This two-culture menu greets diners each Thursday and Friday at Melendez – Imports International Restaurant in Berrien Springs, a modest spot with a small grocery on the side that carries imports from Latin America, Africa, and the Caribbean.
Why? Look directly across Old U.S. 31 to the main gate of Andrews University, where a student body of over 3,000 hails from more than 90 countries.
“There was a need for it,” owner Joe Melendez says about augmenting the Mexican menu. “I saw a big West Indies population here.”
“Everything we have comes in vegetarian and vegan forms,” Melendez says — flautas, empanadas, tamales, and others filled with vegetables.
And it’s closed on Saturdays, the Sabbath.
It’s a worthy stop for harvest-time road trips through the area’s fragrant vineyards, the hike, bike, and ski options at Love Creek County Park, or even a salt-cave experience at The Salt Haven in downtown Berrien Springs.
“Everything is made from scratch,” Melendez says, standing near a box of tomatoes that local farmers came and sold to him. “We don’t even have a can opener.”
One exception is the Jamaican patty, a meat pie that comes frozen and is baked here.
Mexican chef Emilio Enriquez describes five kinds of salsa that he makes. There’s the fresh salsa with homemade chips — salsa made with tomatillos, onions, cilantro, and spices that kick, but he’s toned down. There’s a special salsa for the wet burrito, followed by red, green, and fiery habanero salsas for other dishes.
Jamaican chef Paul, who’s shy about giving his last name, comes early to cook his native specialties on Thursdays and Fridays, then heads to his full-time job as a vegetarian chef for students at Andrews.
The flavors of the West Indies span several island countries, including Haiti, Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, the Dominican Republic, and the Bahamas.
Paul, who trained as a chef in New York City after immigrating 35 years ago, notes that jerk chicken was initially concocted by former African slaves who had taken refuge in Jamaica, known as the Maroons. Two spices that contribute to its unique taste are pimento, which is sweet, and Scotch bonnet pepper, which is fiery, similar to the habanero, and native to the West Indies.
The oxtail stew features tender meat on the bone, served in a savory sauce that combines lima beans, onions, green peppers, tomatoes, and other aromatic flavors. If customers try it, Paul rightly says, “They will start (regularly) eating it.”
The vegetarian option is the same stew but uses a soy-based meat substitute instead of ox.
It’s best eaten over coconut rice and beans, which are included with the West Indies dinners.
Think this place is small? You should have seen the tiny South of the Border storefront on downtown Ferry Street that the Melendez family had run — a fixture there for 34 years and the tip of a cultural iceberg. The Melendezes also delivered Mexican imports to dozens of small and large grocery stores within a 100-mile radius, at a time when many local Mexican mom-and-pop stores were emerging.
Melendez and his nine siblings pitched in on a business their father, the late Domingo Melendez, started in the 1970s by loading up a step-van with Mexican staple foods, driving it into the migrant worker camps around Milford, Ind., and selling out.
“He knew the Mexican people,” Melendez says. “He’d sit outside of their temporary homes.”
By 1980, the family moved to Berrien Springs, situated in the heart of Berrien County’s rich agricultural landscape, with a high concentration of migrant workers, and close to the university.
The family eventually grew tired of the road and quit the import deliveries.
Melendez, who’d earned a business degree and spent several years in retail management, returned home from a job in Illinois when his ailing father called for help with the business.
As the owner, Joe Melendez moved to the current location on Old U.S. 31, continuing to follow recipes his mother had taught him. You find wet tamales and wet burritos, both smothered with melted cheese. Now, there are fried plantains every day, too. Melendez prides himself on using flank steak, which is known for its flavor.