Vendors test the syrup's readiness by dripping it into a cup of cold water, an old sugar-candy technique used with no thermometer involved.
Fresh grated coconut is cooked in cane syrup with ginger until it clumps into a chewy candy, pressed flat and cut into bars sold from trays along Grand'Anse's coastal roads.
Why it's made this way: The department's dense coconut groves along its Caribbean coast make coconut candy a natural extension of Jérémie's confectionery tradition, distinct from the peanut tablets more common up north.