Susan asked me to get some bananas for her when I went to the grocery store a few days ago. I unwittingly came home with two plantains. Sigh.
I pondered making Mofongo – a Puerto Rican dish using plantains, garlic salt, chicharron, and cilantro. After a chat with our son and his family this evening, we decided on Tostones – fried plantain chips. I think of Tostones as a minimalist version of Mofongo. I sliced the plaintain in 1/2″ discs, smashed them using the side of a cleaver, dusted them with garlic salt, and fried them in EVOO. I garnished them with fresh Cilantro.
So, dinner was fried slices of holiday ham, my interpretation of Tostones, and some deli-counter green beans with toasted almonds – cold and crunchy. I will have to try Tostones again later this week, cutting them thinner and frying them twice. Dinner looked like this:
Such an adventurous cook!!
Very kind. The older I get, the less concerned I am about preparing a dish that is a total disaster. We are all running out of time to learn new things. We must be brave in the face of potential failure in order to get the most out of what remains of our time. 🙂