Pastelón

This Puertorrican girl prefers the lighter version of this dish, made with mashed boiled plantains. Cut the unpeeled plantains in half and boil until soft but not mushy, a fork will find just a little resistance. Drain in a colander and remove the peels. Mash with a fork, you may want to add a bit of softened butter or a little oil. Substitute the mashed plantains for the fried ones and everything else is the same. You can add olives, capers, and little cubes of ham to the beef as it cooks.

You can buy the frozen ones too. I find that when I want maduros (ripe plantains) I want them now, not in a week. So waiting for them to ripen is not usually an option. I use the frozen ones and I'm happy with them.

As always with me and plantains, I can't seem to buy ripe enough ones. The flavors in this dish are so perfect, except my plantains were not sweet and more like tough potatoes. :(( Buy super ripe plantains and then, wait a few more days before cooking with them. One day I'll get them right!

If I can’t get plantains, can I use regular bananas?

Getting the plantains to the proper level of ripeness is an exercise in patience. Most super markets don't come close to selling them in the state you would like them to be. I buy the most ripe ones I can find, put them in a brown paper bag in my pantry, and leave them alone for three to four weeks. To make maduros the plantains need to be black. Do not be afraid of a black plantain even if its starts to get a little fuzzy. The hot leaf lard you fry them in will take care of everything!

Here's a good guide to identifying plantain ripeness. http://muchogusto.com/index.php?page=plantain

Only green, un-ripe bananas will work as substitute for plantains (and only works for some recipes and not for others) or sweet potatoes can be substituted.

The beauty of a pastelón is that it admits variation. My other used to do it with mashed potatoes and the meat in center, cheese on top. It can also be done with breadfruit, yuca, yautía or whatever other starchy veg you have at hand. .

Beyond Meat...Impossible Burger...crumbled meat substitutes are quite available these days. They work very well and rarely can any difference be noticed in dishes like this one.

I saw this recipe right when the stay-at-home order was issued in California, got green plantains and now, four weeks later, after being in a paper bag the entire time, the plantains were finally black and soft. And oh my god when we fried them--we could have skipped the rest of recipe and just eaten those fried plantains, haha

@Jinna, put the plantains in a paper bag with a ripe banana. Seal the bag. They'll mature quickly.

Yes, olives and capers are traditional in this dish as is a scant layer of green beans.

Love the tip about spooning out the fat from the picadillo. I make it without cheese and on a stovetop, also adding cooked green beans to the picadillo, which I think turns the dish into piñón.

I would advise against regular bananas, they have a higher sugar content and less starch than a plantain. Bananas will probably turn to mush after baking. I'd try maybe a sweet potato because it's starchy and sweet.

We have always used maduros, firm enough to cut with a knife, yet soft enough to know instinctually how sweet it will be. Mom makes her sofrito in big enough batches to throw in plenty of heaping spoonfuls, with plain canned tomato sauce, sautéing the picadillo base before adding the meat. If you skip the cheese and double the eggs, you’ll get a nice chewiness. No raisins — ever.