TL/DR – Mofongo Style Stuffed Peppers. Get to know Mofongo! It’s a Puerto Rican dish with fried green plantains that are mashed and combined with lots of garlic and other ingredients. This recipe is a basic shrimp mofongo stuffed into bell peppers, topped with a crispy topping and baked. –
Plantains are one of the best starches available on the planet. If you haven’t heard of Puerto Rican mofongo, or if you have and you think that it might not be for you, please try this recipe. Loosely, mofongo is fried green plantains mashed with garlic, broth, salt and pepper and combined with meat, fish or shellfish into a big, starchy mound and surrounded by sauce.
This recipe takes the mashed plantain base and adds cooked shrimp, some additional bell peppers, and onions. Then the mofongo is stuffed into crunchy bell peppers and baked.
Start by halving bell peppers and removing the seeds, then coat them in a bit of oil and season them and pre-bake them for 20 minutes at 350 degrees F. Then peel two or three green plantains, which is most easily done by slicing off each tip, making an incision lengthwise down the side and then unwrapping it as if it were wearing a coat.
Slice the plantains and fry them in canola or vegetable oil. If you have extra bacon grease, add a bit of that to the oil, too! Frying can be messy, so try it in the skillet out on the grill if the weather is nice. They only take about 4 minutes on each side. Remove them onto paper towels or napkins to drain the excess oil.
Pour off the remaining oil from the skillet, then sauté lots of garlic, some onion and bell peppers until they’re relatively soft, about 8 minutes. Pour in a bit of cider vinegar and allow it to cook off, then add in some broth and reduce it by half. Meanwhile start mashing the fried plantains. This might be a little challenging, but once the cooked garlic and broth mixture are added, it gets a lot easier.
Toss some diced cooked shrimp in lime juice and salt, then stir it into the plantain mash. Once it’s well incorporated, make four balls or lumps and press them into each of the four pepper halves. Top with a quickly toasted mixture of breadcrumbs and pepitas in butter with a touch of salt and garlic powder. Bake again for about 20 minutes and then serve immediately.
It’s not exactly “easy weeknight meal” status, but it’s not that laborious and it is definitely worth it to experience a version of Puerto Rican cuisine. A brief tip on flavor: very green plantains will not have much flavor, though they are great. A green plantain that is JUST starting to ripen into a yellow plantain will have a touch of sweetness that is a perfect accompaniment to the bell peppers in this dish. For more plantain ideas, try Sweet Potato Plantain Tacos or Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Plantains with Romesco Sauce.
Mofongo Style Stuffed Peppers
Mofongo Style Stuffed Peppers have mashed cooked plantains, lots of garlic, onion, broth, cooked shrimp and lime with a crispy topping.
Ingredients
- 2 yellow or orange bell peppers
- 1 t kosher salt, divided
- 3 medium green or mostly green plantains, peeled and sliced about 3/4 inch thick
- 1/3 c canola oil plus 1 T
- 1/2 yellow onion, diced
- 5 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 red bell pepper, diced small
- 1 T cider vinegar
- 1 c chicken or vegetable broth
- 1/2 lb cooked shrimp, diced
- Juice of half a lime, about 1 T
- 1/4 c panko breadcrumbs
- 1/4 c pepitas
- 1 T butter
- pinch garlic powder
Directions
- Step 1 Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Step 2 Halve and de-seed the two peppers, coat them in 1 T of canola oil and 1/4 t kosher salt and a dash of pepper. Place them in a baking dish and pre-bake them for 15 minutes.
- Step 3 While the peppers pre-bake, heat the remaining 1/3 cup canola oil on high heat in a large skillet. Fry the plantain slices for about 4 minutes on each side, then remove to a dish covered in paper towels or napkins to drain excess oil.
- Step 4 Pour off the oil from the skillet into the trash or into a bowl to cool before discarding in the trash. Use the same skillet to sauté the onion, garlic and red bell peppers over medium heat for about 8 minutes.
- Step 5 Add the cider vinegar and allow to cook off.
- Step 6 Add the broth and reduce by about half, about 5 minutes.
- Step 7 In a medium bowl, begin mashing the fried plantains. This may be difficult at first. Add the cooked garlic, onion and broth mixture along with 1/2 t kosher salt and continue to mash until the mixture is well mashed. Add 1 or 2 T additional broth if necessary, but the mixture should be fairly thick.
- Step 8 Toss the cooked diced shrimp in the lime juice and 1/4 t salt, then add it to the plantain mash and stir it until it is well incorporated.
- Step 9 Press equal amounts of the plantain and shrimp mixture into the four pepper halves and pat it down slightly on the top.
- Step 10 In the same skillet wiped clear, heat the butter over medium heat and add the panko, pepitas, a pinch of garlic powder and a tiny pinch of salt. Toast this mixture, watching carefully, for about 2 minutes, then spoon it over the top of each pepper.
- Step 11 Bake the peppers for an additional 20 minutes at 350 degrees F and serve immediately.
