Mofongo Recipe: Garlicky Fried Plantains and Pork

En Español Recipe ↆ Video ↆ

Why we ❤️ it

Plantains are a staple in any Caribbean kitchen, and the delicious mofongo - never, ever to be confused with mondongo! - is one of our star plantain recipes. An amazingly flavorful dish that, while rarely made at home, you can now enjoy any time.

If I had to define mofongo in a word, that would probably be umami (savory), there are so many strong flavors in this plantain dish, but they somehow manage to work together. It truly is an unforgettable dish.

What's mofongo?

Classic plantain mofongo is a dish made of fried plantains, mashed and mixed with garlic paste and chicharrón (crispy pork skin). It is served alongside beef broth. Traditionally, mofongo is served in a pilón, a wooden mortar (the bowl-like part of the mortar and pestle).

Read more about its history and origin.

How to serve mofongo

The recipe includes a beef broth, but you can also serve it with Caldo de pollo (chicken broth), or for a vegan mofongo, leave out the chicharrones and serve with our vegetable stock.

For chicken mofongo, you can serve it alongside Pollo guisado with abundant sauce, instead of broth. Another great combination is serving it with Res ripiada, our Dominican ropa vieja-style beef.

About this recipe

As I expand on under the recipe, there are two types of mofongo: the Puerto Rican dish, which is made from fried plantains, and has become the most common one served everywhere, even in the Dominican Republic. Dominican mofongo, however, was traditionally made from roasted plantains, typically cooked by burying them under hot ashes (just like Batata asada).

In the recipe, I show you how to make both types of mofongo, though I have adapted the Dominican version to modern ovens and air fryers since I cannot make a fire to bury plantains under the ashes, and would guess that most of you can't either.

As a result, one will be the fried mofongo we all love, the other - a bit drier, I admit - it's much lighter and lower in fat content, but requires a lot more broth to serve.

If you want to make pork cracklings from scratch, follow the directions and video in this recipe.

Buen provecho!

More Mofongo recipes to try

These are other amazing mofongo recipes to try.

• Mofongo de yuca (fried cassava mash mofongo with pork rind and cheese sauce)
• Shrimp mofongo with tomato sauce (camarofongo or mofongo con camarones)
• Ripe plantain mofonguito, or mofongo relleno de pollo 
• Tostones rellenos or mofonguito cups with avocado and shrimp

History and culture

Mofongo is possibly a pan-Caribbean dish (it may exist in one way or another in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico). In an 1875 dictionary of Cuban words (1), I found a mention of a dish called "mogo" that sounds like something between a mangú and a mofongo (there's a Mexican mogo too).

There's also a Puerto Rican version called Trifongo made with green plantains, ripe plantains, and yuca combined.

In Dominican cookbooks from up to the middle of the last century, all mofongo recipes were based on roasted plantain [2][3]. And it was the case even in the mid-20th century editions. 

I also remember that my grandmother used to make a dish exactly like that, though I don't remember what she called it. I was a little kid, so no surprise.

The Dominican mofongo recipe turns out to be a different version than fried Puerto Rican mofongo, and it was made with plantains roasted under hot ashes, in the same way, we make batata asada.

Interestingly, there is also a traditional Dominican soup based on a similar principle in our collection of traditional recipes.

So, although we have made known to the world our informed opinion that fried mofongo comes from Puerto Rico, it is clear that roasted plantain mofongo was a Dominican dish probably during the same time, and perhaps - I speculate - a proto-mofongo of a common African origin also found its way to Cuba. My belief that both mofongo and mangú came from our African side of the family explains perfectly how all this happened.

My first encounter with Puerto-Rican-style mofongo was in the early 80s at Casa del Mofongo (Mofongo House), a pioneering mofongo restaurant in Santo Domingo. Today, many Dominican Restaurants serve Puerto-Rican-style mofongo, most famously, the Adrian Tropical chain. A Mocano (from the town of Moca) version bathed in a cheese sauce has made its mark in our cuisine.

So much of Puerto Rican cuisine is similar to Dominican food, owing to a common history (that only diverged during the 19th century) and during which there was constant back-and-forth movement between the two islands. We share very many dishes, share our love for the same starchy vegetables and plantain, and have rice and beans as the staple of our cuisines.

There are some differences in our cuisine, like in the spelling. What we know as guandules (pigeon peas) in the DR is spelled gandules in PR. Similar or identical dishes sometimes have different names. And some Puerto Rican dishes share a name but little else with some Dominican dishes.

It isn't surprising then that two similar dishes with the same name exist in both countries or that a popular Puerto Rican dish has become a favorite here; after all, both countries share the same influences from Taino, Spanish, and West African cuisine. Plantains were introduced to the Caribbean when they arrived on our island shortly after the first enslaved Africans arrived in Santo Domingo.

So this is my final answer: As far I can tell, fried mofongos are Puerto Rican recipes, and the traditional Dominican one is made with roasted plantains, although nowadays fried mofongo is the most popular and common in our country and we have adopted it with enthusiasm, so thanks to Puerto Rico for that.

References

1. Amanda Ornes de Perelló, Cocina Criolla. Sto. Dgo: Ed. del Caribe, 1962.
   "Mafongo [sic] [...] Se asan plátanos y se majn [sic] y se mezclan con chicharrón molido."
2. Ligia de Bornia. Comidas Típicas Dominicanas. Sto. Dgo: Arte y Cine, 1965
   "Mofongo [...] Maje los plátanos asados y los chicharrones en el mismo pilón."
3. Esteban Pichardo. Diccionario Provincial Casi Razonado de Vozes y Frases Cubanas. Habana: Imp. El Trabajo, 1875
   "[...]plátano salcochado y majado con manteca [...] En Bayamo . se denomina Mogo, que tal vez será síncopa de Mofongo, palabra de Nigricia, usada en algunas de las Antillas."