Plátano Fufu

This makes a great side dish with steak, rice and beans. Something of a mystery, it was prepared for me in the Colombian town of Armenia by a journalist from Bogotá who claimed it to be Cuban. When I later asked around in Cuba no one had heard of it, but anyway, it's a tasty dish.

INGREDIENTS
3 or 4 ripe plantains (depending on size)
1 or 2 large onions
1 large green pepper
1 red chili
salt

METHOD
Boil the plantains in their skins until they're soft. This will take about 30-40 minutes, and you'll need a good sized saucepan for them to fit without breaking, since they can be pretty hefty. You can check by pricking them with a fork through the skin. While they're cooking, cut the onions and pepper into long thin strips and fry in oil, adding the chili and salt. This isn't supposed to be a hot dish, the chili just adds a little flavour, so don't overdo it.

Once the plantains are ready, you'll need to peel them. Unless you have rubber hands this is the tricky part, since obviously they'll be pretty hot. Run them under the cold tap for a while first. Also it helps if you chop the stalk off at the end before trying to peel them - it doesn't fall away as easily as you might expect. Once you've peeled them, chop them crudely and put them either back in the rinsed saucepan or in a large bowl. Mash them with some oil or butter, then add the onion and pepper and mix together, and there you have it - a scrumptious Latin American side order of somewhat obscure provenance.

A note on plantains - they are a culinary staple in many parts of the world, including Colombia where they come chopped and boiled in stews, sliced lengthways and sauteed, crushed and deep fried in their green variety, even oven-baked and served with condensed milk. In England they're less common, at least among white people. When I first tried to buy them on Shepherds Bush Green about ten years ago I was warned away and told they weren't bananas (the cheek! I've planted the things with my own hands.....). But now they're becoming a bit more familiar here, and are even available in more enlightened supermarket branches. Anyway, the thing is you can get them green or ripe and they are basically different vegetables with different uses. Make sure you get ripe ones for Fufu.