Hamilton YouTuber who demonstrates Caribbean cooking among recipients of fund for Black creators

Chris De La Rosa wants you to know that you can make Caribbean food no matter where you are in the world. 

"It's important for me to put all food and all culinary culture in a positive light," he said. "And not just that, but in a niche that breaks it down so anyone can make it no matter where in the world they're based." 

The Hamilton-based creator does all that and more on his channel, CaribbeanPot — which is shy of 800,000 subscribers. His videos have also garnered a combined total of 90 million views.

De La Rosa's channel is the YouTube counterpart of CaribbeanPot.com, a blog he started as a way to collect recipes for his kids to make someday and document the rich cuisine he enjoyed while growing up.  

Now, the channel is part of #YouTubeBlack Voices class of 2022, where creators on the site receive funding and support to help grow and enhance their YouTube channels. 

YouTube announced the program in a 2020 blog post that outlined a multi-year, $100-million fund to amplify and lift Black voices and ideas. 

De La Rosa is one of five Canadian creators — including Tosin Ayeronwi of Ottawa — who have been chosen for the fund. 

With additional funding, he plans to tell the bigger stories behind the food he makes. 

"I want to tell the stories further of not just the food, but where the food comes from. I want to tell that story as well. I don't want to always be in the kitchen." 

Many of the meals De La Rosa knows and grew up with aren't documented, and they don't have precise measurements. 

"I had to create everything from scratch," he said, "and I wanted it to be very easy for them to recreate the flavours that they enjoyed growing up, even right here in Canada." 

Growing up in Trinidad, he said, everyone knew how to cook — whether you were a boy or girl. 

"My parents have two boys and two girls, and they never assigned gender roles back then as would be normal in the Caribbean and many other places," he said. 

"My mom always wanted her sons, especially her boys, to be independent and do their own thing."