I’ve been making plantain chips for a bit, and I’m always dissatisfied with them. If my plantains are too ripe, the chips can’t crunch up. Not ripe enough and they lack the slight sweetness I love.
I decided to grab the greenest ones at the market to slowly ripen them at home, but even that’s a bit wonky, as they tend to ripen on top but not the bottom, which leaves me with something peculiar and delicious, but certainly not what I’m looking for.
So, how do you consistently get plantains in the Goldilocks zone?
might be worth looking up some Panamanian patacones recipes and see if you can find some good tips or tricks.
I’m in Panama right now and only learned about plantain chips, locally called patacones, since I got here.
there are tons of local stands that sell them, and every person makes them completely differently in terms of crispiness, thickness, flavor, seasoning, but fairly individually consistent.
I have the ones I like, but I’ll say the most consistent ones, that is the large batch processed ones sold in supermarkets, are less sweet.
just throwing out some patacone thoughts since I’ve been here, and since I love patacones now.
they’re extremely popular in Panama, so you might find some pretty good recipes.
Double frying and pounding them between fry sessions seems to be the only difference between their recipe and mine. I’ll give it a try!