A Taste of the Caribbean

My ex-husband and father of my son is Puerto Rican. He lives in a little town in the northwest part of the island called Quebradillas. When we were married, I learned to make all sorts of Puerto Rican dishes, but this one is probably my favorite. It's called Tostones (pronounced toes-tone-as) which literally translates to stones in English. Basically, it's just fried plantain. You can not eat plantain raw like you can a banana. You have to cook it to get rid of the naturally occurring acid the fruit produces. Otherwise, you will burn your little mouth.


This is a plantain. The bottom one that you see there. Yeah, that one. That's the plantain. The top one is a somewhat largish banana. Ideally, when making Tostones, you want your plantain to be green (unripe), because as they ripen they sweeten and Tostones are traditionally a savory, potato chipy, kind of snack/side dish. However, I went to three stores before I even found plantains here in Springfield, MO, so I wasn't going to be picky about the ripeness of my plantain.


You can't really peel a plantain like a banana, especially if it's a green one. You're going to have to use a knife to get the peel off. You just need to make a shallow cut through the skin down the entire length of the plantain, and then wiggle the fruit out of its wrapper.


Cut the plantain into 3/4 to 1 inch slices. You want them this thick, because in a minute we are going to smash them flat as a pancake and if you slice them too thin things just won't work out properly. Trust me on this.


Heat vegetable oil over medium heat and fry your plantain slices until golden.


This is a proper plantain smasher. That's what I call it, I'm not sure what the official name for it is, but plantain smasher works for me. I purchased this one in Puerto Rico. Surely, someone, somewhere in the United States sells these, but I'm not sure. If you don't have one, just use the bottom of a glass to smash your plantains.


Move your golden, fried plantain slices to a paper towel lined plate to drain.


Then you put a single slice into the plantain smasher


And SMASH! This is my son's favorite part.


Now you have a flat plantain. It's almost a Tostone, but not quite.


To turn it into a full fledged Tostone, you have to fry it again. Fry it for about three to four minutes until golden brown and slightly crispy on the outside, but still a bit soft on the inside.


Drain on a paper towel lined plate again and add whatever seasonings your creativity allows. We just went with your basic light salting. Since our plantain was yellow instead of green, our Tostones had a slight sweetness to them. If you go traditional and use a green plantain, your Tostones won't be sweet. They will have more of a potato type flavor. I almost didn't get a picture of the finished product, because the Tostones were being eaten almost as fast as they were being taken out of the hot oil. Notice the half-eaten one on the bottom left.


Seriously, Son, you need to at least wait until they've cooled off a bit. Oh, and um, cut your fingernails.

Migas!

Hey, look! It's a meatless cooking lesson. My son is going to cook migas. Now, migas certainly can have meat added to them, but we went meatless for this meal.

First thing you should do is go ahead and chop all the veggies and herbs, so that they will be ready to go when you need them.


Chop yourself some onion


Then some green bell pepper


And a red bell pepper. I think my baby has this chopping thing down. Look at those knife skills.


Now you are going to need to finely dice an jalapeno. You might want to wear gloves when handling hot peppers, but we didn't have any rubber gloves in the house. Instead, my son was very careful not to touch his face and then he immediately washed his hands after handling the pepper.


Last but not least, chop up some cilantro. About 1/2 a cup should be fine. The recipe also called for chopped tomatoes, but neither my son nor I like tomatoes (unless they come in the form of salsa, ketchup, or marinara). Therefore, we left them out of our migas.


Now crack about ten eggs into a bowl. Make sure you don't get any shells in there. Nobody likes crunchy eggs. Add a bit of milk or half and half to help make the eggs fluffy.


Give the eggs a good whisk and then set aside for a minute or two.


Add a few tablespoons of canola oil to a skillet and fry about four corn tortillas until they're crispy.


Once you have your tortillas nice and crispy, chop them up into bite sized pieces.


Melt some butter in a skillet over medium heat.


Add the onions and bell peppers. Cook until nice a caramelized. Hey, the stirring skills are getting better too.


Now go ahead and add the tortillas and jalapenos to the skillet with the onions and bell peppers. Turn the heat down to low.


Let the pan cool down a little bit and then add your eggs to the skillet.


Once your eggs have set up, add about a cup of shredded cheese and the chopped cilantro.


Top with salsa, sour cream, avocado, etc... and dig in. Yummy!

Cooking Lessons Continue

Next on the menu are Comfort BBQ Meatballs. *sigh* More meat. I'm sensing a theme here and I'm not exactly sure what it means.


First you need to put about a pound to a pound and a half of ground beef in a bowl and then add your oats.


Then add a cup of milk


Then you need to finely chop some onion. Not too much. A couple of tablespoons will do. Now add that to the bowl.


Oh yeah. Don't forget the salt and pepper. Son, that seems like an awkward way to put salt in a bowl. Is your hand on backwards or something?


Now give it a stir. Mmmm, oatmeal cookies. Oops, sorry forgot where I was there for a moment.


Roll the meat mixture into little balls and refrigerate for about 45 minutes, so that they firm up a bit. Otherwise, they will fall apart when you try to brown them.


Once those little meatballs are cold give them a roll in some flour, just enough to lightly coat the outside.


Place the flour coated meatballs in a skillet and brown on all sides.


Work in small batches. If you learn nothing from Julia Child, learn this, do not crowd the pan. Transfer the browned meatballs to a casserole dish.


Once you've got the meatballs all browned, make the sauce. You'll need ketchup, sugar, white vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, and some more finely diced onions.


Pour the sauce over the meatballs and wish for better lighting in the kitchen. The meatballs look a little yellow. Moving on.


Cook in a 350 degree oven for about 45 minutes.


While you are waiting for the meatballs to cook, clean up your mess. Mom doesn't like a messy kitchen.


This cute, little creature will be happy to help you clean up the floors.


And just to balance out all this meat, here is what I had for dinner. Pappardelle with spiced butter.

My son could eat his weight in these sweet and tangy meatballs. Try them. You'll like them.

My Daily Walk

There is a wonderful walking trail behind my house. I usually walk in the mornings and then my son and I ride our bikes in the evenings down this trail. These are some of the sights I see on the way. The pictures were taken with my phone, so they are not great quality.







This is a picture of a community park that thinks it's a farm, or maybe it's a farm that thinks it's a community park. Either way, it's a cool concept and it has a playground, a fishing pond, lots of barnyard animals, and plenty of gardens.

Steak Sandwiches

Steak Sandwiches? What the heck? I'm a vegetarian! Oh, well. I'll find something else to eat. My son saw this recipe in the Pioneer Woman Cookbook and wanted to make it. Who am I to deprive a little carnivore? We didn't have any Worcestershire sauce and he didn't want any of Frank's Red Hot. Actually, he did at first, but then chickened out at the last minute. What I'm trying to say here is our version is a loose translation of Ree Drummond's version. Let's get on with it, shall we?


First you slice an onion. I was told the goggles were for the deadly onion fumes. I'm not sure what the fatigues were for. It may have something to do with the fact that we are currently getting a free preview of the Military Channel this month, but I'm not sure. WATCH THOSE FINGERS, SOLDIER!


Add a 1/4 stick of butter to a skillet and melt over medium-low heat.


Add your onion to the pan and caramelize them. Stirring occasionally.


While you are waiting for the onion to caramelize, go ahead and slice up some cubed steak into 1 inch strips. I think I need to buy a cutting board specifically for meat, because I refused to let my son cut his meat on my veggie cutting board. Sorry, ain't gonna happen. WATCH THOSE FINGERS, SOLDIER!


Don't forget the onion! You don't want those babies to burn, just caramelize. When the onions are a nice golden-brown color, remove them from the skillet and set aside for a minute.


Back to the steak. Sprinkle it with seasoning. We used seasoning salt, lemon pepper, and black pepper.


Add a couple of tablespoons of butter to the skillet.


Add your strips of steak to the skillet and cook until nice and brown.


Add the onions back into the skillet and warm them back up.


Next, slice yourself a roll. WATCH THOSE FINGERS, SOLDIER! Yeah, he got tired of me doing that too.


Now, butter that roll. Lots of butter in this recipe.


Toast the bread in a skillet, on a griddle, or in the toaster oven as we did.


After your bread is toasted, spoon on the steak and onions. You can add cheese if it suits you. My son wanted it plain.


The verdict: Messy and delicious!