Fried Sweet Plantains
Fry Ripe Plantain
The Sacred Sunday Dinner
A proper sweet plantain is stubbornly useless until it develops a mottled black peel. A Jamaican Sunday dinner is an overcrowded plate of fiery meats and heavy stews that demands a quiet, sweet counterpunch, so you wait until the fruit looks damn near ruined, its yellow skin bruised black and the dense starches yielding to natural sugars, then fry it low and slow. Picture an elder at the stove carving each quarter-inch bias slice, then drop the fruit into hissing vegetable oil and pull the pieces the second those edges blister deep bronze.
Before you start
Buy the plantains a week in advance.
You can find plantains in almost any American supermarket, but they are invariably sold green or stark yellow. A yellow plantain will fry up dry and starchy. Leave them in a warm spot in your kitchen for seven to ten days until the skin is almost entirely covered in large black spots and slightly soft to the touch.
Ingredients
- plantains2 large
- neutral oil or coconut oil3 tbsp
- sea salt1 pinch
Method
- 01
Slice the plantains on the diagonal.
Use the tip of your knife to lightly score the skin lengthwise and peel it back, then cut the flesh slant-ways into oval slices about 1/2-inch thick. This geometry isn't just for looks; it maximizes the surface area that hits the hot oil, ensuring deeply caramelized edges.
- 02
Heat a shallow pool of oil over medium-low heat.
Add just enough oil to coat the bottom of a wide skillet, about a quarter-inch deep. Let it get warm and shimmering but not smoking; high heat is the enemy here, as the dense natural sugars will burn long before the starchy interior has a chance to soften.
- 03
Fry the plantains low and slow in a single layer.
Carefully lay the slices into the oil without overcrowding the pan. For the first two minutes, you can loosely cover the skillet to trap steam and coax the center into a perfect custard-like texture, then uncover.
- 04
Flip when the edges turn a deep, crispy golden brown.
After about three minutes, check the underside. Once richly caramelized, flip each piece gently with a fork and fry for another two to three minutes until perfectly golden on both sides.
- 05
Drain and serve immediately.
Transfer the hot slices to a paper towel-lined plate to drain the excess oil. Hit them with a microscopic pinch of sea salt to make the natural sweetness pop, and serve hot alongside rice and peas to balance a heavy Sunday meat.
Notes
Don't mess with perfection.
Resist the urge to sprinkle with sugar or spices. A properly ripened plantain is aggressively sweet on its own, and adding sugar will only cause the exterior to burn in the pan.
From Cook Jamaican in America.