What is a Plaintain?

Question

Ahh!! Thank you.
Now can anybody give me an Tanzanian recipe with it in it. I had some when I was there and I forgot what all the ingredients were. I think there was onion, tomato, garlic, coconut, oil and that's all I can remember.
If anyone reconises this recipe in some way could you please let me know how it is made?

The banana he used was very hard, sort of like a very unripe banana. Is that a Plaintain? It was not sweet at all and very difficult to peel and made your hands really feel sticky.

"Anjalee" thankyou I would love to get some recipes from you.

Oh and by the way it was in Zanzibar that I had that dish not Tanzania, I also remember schredding the coconut and puting it in a gauze and straining the juice for this dish. It wasn't a curry dish.

Answer 1

Just an aside......Zanzibar is part of Tanzania, so many of the foods you eat in Zanzibar are also found in Tanzania.
Also, the cooking bananas used in Africa are not quite like plantains, although plantains will work with most dishes. Tanzanian cooking bananas stay green forever (not really, but it seems like it) and are always hard. You often have to boil them before frying simply to soften the fibers in the banana.

It sounds like you had a dish with fried cooking banana. My suggestion would be to sautee, in oil, some diced onions (as many as you want), then add some lightly boiled banana (if you use plantains or cooking bananas, otherwise they probably don't need to be boiled) & finally coconut & tomatoes, continuing to sautee.

To prepare the coconut, shred the interior with a knife or grater. Tanzanians use a device called an "mbuzi" (translates to goat) to shred the interior of the coconut. You then rinse & strain the coconut a couple times. The strained juice is great for adding to beans or rice for added flavor.

You can serve the entire concoction over rice or noodles or simply eat it by itself. Please remember to add salt or pepper to your taste. Also, a touch of sugar can help bring out the sweetness of the bananas.

Is this the dish you were talking about? I hope you find a way to make it,

Answer 2

(m)

Plantains are bananas that are generally used for cooking, as contrasted with the soft, sweet banana varieties (which are sometimes called dessert bananas). Plantains tend to be firmer and lower in sugar content than dessert bananas and are commonly used when green or underripe and therefore starchy. Plantains are a staple food in the tropical regions of the world, treated in much the same way as potatoes and with a similar neutral flavour and texture when unripe. They are grown as far north as Florida, the Caribbean, the Canary Islands, Madeira, Egypt, and southern Japan or Taiwan and as far south as KwaZulu-Natal and southern Brazil. It is assumed that the Portuguese Franciscan friars were responsible for the introduction of plantains to the Caribbean islands and other parts of the Americas. The Spaniards, who saw a similarity to the plane tree that grows in Spain, gave the plantain its Spanish name, platano. It is also commonly known as Ribwort in western herbal medicine.

Tanzanian Curried Chicken-Banana Soup

4 Tablespoons peanut oil
1 3-lb. chicken, cut into pieces
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
2 Tablespoons curry powder
1 Tablespoon dried red chile, ground to a powder
2 teaspoons black pepper
8 cups chicken stock
1 large tomato (or 4 canned tomatoes), peeled and chopped
1 cup coconut, grated (DON'T USE SWEETENED!)
2 ripe bananas, sliced into chunky quarter pieces
In a Dutch oven, brown the chicken pieces in the oil. Remove chicken, reserving, and add the onion and garlic to the pot. Sauté until soft, then stir in the powdered chile, the curry, and the black pepper and fry for 2 more minutes. Add the tomatoes, stock, chicken pieces, and coconut, bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes.
When the chicken is done, remove, let cool, then strip away the meat and cut it into bite-sized chunks, discarding the skin and bones. Add it back into the pot with the banana chunks. Simmer 10 minutes.

When ready to serve, ladle into bowls.

Answer 3

Plaintain Stoba (An Antillean Stew)
Recipe #41032
Another taste of the Caribbean! This stew is unique in that it's made with "plaintains," also known as cooking bananas. (Prep time includes "soaking" time if using salted beef; time will be much shorter if you use ham or bacon)
pot of stew
½ day 8 hours prep
1 lb salted beef or ham or bacon

1 large onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

3-4 tablespoons oil
2 plantains, cooking bananas,medium-ripe

1 large sweet potato

3 large white potatoes

3-4 cups pumpkin (aka as "pompuna" in the Caribbean)

2 medium tomatoes

1 tablespoon brown sugar

water

1 tablespoon butter

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1/8 teaspoon cinnamon or allspice

Not the one? See other Plaintain Stoba (An Antillean Stew) Recipes
1.If using salted beef, let set overnight in cold water.
2.Then use frest water to cook it in.
3.(Or use ham or bacon).
4.Saute onion and garlic in oil, until translucent.
5.Cut vegetables into 1" chunks.
6.Add vegetables and meat to onions and garlic and barely cover with water.
7.Add butter, tomato paste, and cinnamon or allspice.
8.Simmer until vegetables are tender.

Answer 4

Well, raw banana is called plantain. In India, every part of the banana plant is used. I am not aware of the Tanzanian curry, but I sure can give you yummy Indian plantain recipes. We eat them every day!

Answer 5

khbm is very very correct. I ATE SOME PLAINTAINS THIS MORNING AND GAVE MY DAUGHTER SOME 4 LUNCH. Bananas and plaintains are green when raw. Banana is especially sticky when unripe. Ripe plantain is always yellow in colour. Used as food whether ripe or unripe. Ghanians use unriped plaintain 2 cook their famous foofoo. They also fry, boil, roast it.

Answer 6

Plantin is a smaller banana that is very firn. If you saw and felt one, you would think it is not ripe. They are very good for use in cooking and remain sweetish.

A Plaintin is used in a lot of S American and Cuban cooking.

They retain their shape, texture and sweetness when cooking.

Plaintain is good to fry and drissled with a carmel sauce or fryed in brown sugar and served as a desert.

Answer 7

It's lke a regular banana but it rots grosser on the outside, but is good on the inside. You can fry them or warm them up int he microwave. You can't eat them raw. They are best served rolled in sugar and wrapped in egg roll wrapper. Personally, I don't like them just cus they're super sweet and I pretty much hate all bananas in general. They're also larger by comparison.

Answer 8

All the above answers are correct.
The place to get them would be wherever you have African stores, Asian, or Carribean . They are mostly sold in such places since these are the people who eat them most. ps, dont forget to cut them up into fryable sizes, you cant fry a whole one just as it is you could cut them up like chips, or sliced into quater inch round sizes.. remember to peel the skin off first too!!!

Answer 9

A plantain in looks resembles a small banana. I never tried one so I cannot tell you if it also tastes like a banana.

Answer 10

A type of banana from south America.