lsanderson | Food Wednesday at the NY Times -- All Plantains, all the time

Thumb-Wrestling With Plantains Is Now an Optional Sport
By AMANDA HESSER

SIX years ago I received a call from a man named Edwin Rodriguez, an unemployed janitor. He had invented a plantain peeler and wanted to know if I would like to see it. A few days later Mr. Rodriguez's prototype arrived in the mail. It was carved from wood and painted green and lemon yellow like a child's toy — and was otherwise the most phallic cooking tool I'd ever seen. I quickly tucked it into my desk drawer.

But when I tried it out in the privacy of my home kitchen, it worked ingeniously. There was a blade for trimming off the ends of the fruit and cutting seams into the peel without harming the inner plantain. And at one end was a spade-shaped wood piece designed to mimic a thumbnail — the implement that, in the absence of a plantain peeler like Mr. Rodriguez's, is normally is used to wedge under the peel and lift it in strips. Peeling a green plantain is not like peeling a banana. The skin sticks, and if you're not careful you can easily split the fruit's flesh; you need a sharp paring knife and good knife skills.

I called Mr. Rodriguez to tell him I was impressed by his invention and wanted to write about it.

"Where can you buy it?" I asked.

"Oh, but we don't have a manufacturer," he said. With regret, I explained that it would be hard to write about a product that readers couldn't experience for themselves, and encouraged him to call back once it was in production.

One morning this past October, a man called and exclaimed: "It's Edwin! I have my plantain peeler ready!"

"Um, who?" I said. "And what?"

"Remember? The plantain peeler — I made the plantain peeler!"

Two weeks later I went to East 108th Street to meet the inventor. More

A Fruit That's Good to Eat Before It's Sweet
By MARK BITTMAN

I HAVE no idea why the common bunch banana, which is almost always eaten ripe and sweet and is consequently sometimes called a "dessert" banana, became a staple in the United States, while the equally important plantain has remained largely a part of Latino cuisines. There's nothing negative to be said about common bananas, but of the several hundred species of bananas, plantains are probably the most popular, in part because they can be eaten at any stage of ripeness. More

Recipe: Mofongo
Recipe: Tostones With Shrimp in Ajilimójili Sauce
Recipe: Tostones
Recipe: Baked Plantains

A Taste of Ghana
By LYDIA POLGREEN
ACCRA, Ghana

PEOPLE travel to Africa for history and for scenery but never the food. I don't get it.

I have found that Africa, with thousands of languages and cultures, each with its own cuisine, always rewards an adventurous eater.

Maybe the problem most travelers have is that finding good African food isn't always easy. Tourists are usually advised to stick to the hotel buffet. While a few countries, especially French-speaking ones like Ivory Coast and Togo, have developed an indigenous take on restaurant culture, many Africans prefer to eat at home. Barring that, they'd rather grab a bite on the fly. Even as a correspondent based in Africa, I am not always lucky enough to snag an invitation to eat at someone's house, so my main source of authentic African food is on the street.

And few countries reward the sidewalk chowhound as well as Ghana. From rough-hewn sheds, women sell sharp wedges of starchy yam, perfectly fried in splendorously saturated palm oil and slathered with a fiery sauce of pulverized Scotch bonnet peppers and garlic. From stainless steel bowls perched atop their heads, women dish out hearty bowls of perfectly spiced stew and rice, endlessly customizable with a plethora of condiments, from crunchy vegetables to a hard-boiled egg.

On a recent reporting trip to Ghana, I sought out some of my old favorites and discovered some new ones. In both cases, to find good street food you have to go where Africans eat on the run: bus stations, markets, busy intersections, construction sites.

"You have to look where people stop and rest a minute," said Eddie Nelson, a Ghanaian businessman and fellow street food devotee I met over a fistful of kelewele, a delicious snack of cubes of ripe plantain tossed in hot pepper, ginger and other spices, then fried until the sugar in the plantain caramelizes along the squared edges. More

Food Stuff
Imported From Spain, via Queens and SoHo
By FLORENCE FABRICANT

After 35 years in business, 17 of them in Jackson Heights, Queens, Angelica and Marcos Intriago, who own Despaña, an importer of Spanish products, have opened a shop in SoHo, at 408 Broome Street (Lafayette Street).

Spanish meat and sausages like chorizo and morcilla; about 50 cheeses; olives, preserves, piquillo peppers, tinned white asparagus, olive oils, vinegars, smoked fish products and boquerones (white anchovies) are available in small, convenient sizes at prices 10 to 15 percent above wholesale. For example, aged Manchego is $14.75 a pound, and an 8.45-ounce bottle of 16-year-old Amontillado vinegar is $7.75.

The shop also sells casseroles and paella pans. Sandwiches like tomato bread with serrano ham and goat cheese are made on the premises ($6 to $7.50): (212) 219-5050.