Plantain Chips

I love cooking, and I love the division of chores that Aldo and I came up with - I cook and he cleans. And he does laundry. And feeds the turtles. And cleans the litter box. And takes out the trash. And feeds the cats 90% of the time. Uh oh, I hope that reading this list doesn't make him re-think our chores. I do clean the bathroom, which he hates doing and I really don't mind it - I love scrubbing everything until it is spotless, it is very satisfying. More satisfying than sweeping the never-ending cat hair, where no matter how much you collect you feel like you are never done.

Aaaanyway, I wanted to say that while I love cooking, it would be awesome if Aldo cooked sometimes, because I bet we would have plantains, yucca, and all kinds of delicious Dominican foods more often.

This week we bought plantains and I made him promise to cook them. I'm still a bit freaked out by deep frying things - hot oil scares me. But that's probably because I don't wear pants at home. But Aldo made deep frying look so easy, so I think we will be doing that more often 🙂 Or maybe we will be cooking plantains more often, they are so delicious, and are a great alternative to rice/pasta/potatoes.

These plantain chips took only 15 minutes to make.... and we ate them in one sitting. You might want to make more than 2 plantains, they are so addictive. Plantain chips are also a great salsa-delivery vehicle 🙂

Plantain Chips

• 2 green plantains
• Canola or Vegetable oil - about 1 cup (depends on the size of your pan)
• Salt
• ½ lime

1. Peel the plantains. Aldo taught me a great way: Chop off the 2 ends. Slice through the skin to the center the long way. Then get in there with your thumbs and peel all the skin away.

2. Slice the plantains very thin. Use a mandolin (and cut-resistant gloves!) to get perfect even slices. I can't stress how much I love my mandolin and how much I love perfect thin even slices. You should definitely have a mandolin in your kitchen.

You can either slice the plantain chips into little circles like chips or into long strips. If you don't have a mandolin then circles are definitely the way to go. The only downside to the circles is that you have to remove a lot more pieces from the hot oil, and I wanted to minimize that.  I used the mandolin to slice the plantains into long strips.

3. Fry the plantains. Add about ½ inch of oil to a sauce pan and heat it up. Now here's the part that freaks me out. To check if the oil is hot enough, wet your fingers and fling the water droplets in the oil. Step away quickly because it will pop and splatter like crazy. Wait it out until everything is calm again. Please don't sue me if you get burned. This is the way Aldo does it.

Gently place a few plantain strips into the oil using tongs. If the oil completely covers both sides of the plantain, then cook them for a total of 1 minute. If the oil doesn't cover the whole plantain strip, then fry for about 1 minute, then carefully flip and fry for 1 more minute. You will know when they are done when they start forming tiny brown specks but will still be a beautiful golden color all over. But don't let the whole plantain turn brown. If the plantains brown in less than 30 seconds, your oil is too hot. Turn the heat down a bit and try again with a new batch.

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Using tongs, carefully remove the plantain from the oil and place them on a paper towel. Press into the paper towel gently so it absorbs some of the extra oil. Sprinkle salt and squeeze some lime juice over them.

Add a bit more oil to the pan, wait until it heats up, and cook the rest of the plantains. Don't forget the salt and the lime juice on the other batches!

Enjoy these as a snack or as a side dish. Yum!