Air Fryer Chef: Let’s Cook Something New –Plantains

It is hard to believe — that we’re starting a New Year! And, I’m beginning the new year by cooking something entirely new to me — plantains. This tropical fruit is a staple in the diets of much of Central and West Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America. It is unusual to see plantains in grocery stores in our part of the country. However, I stumbled upon plantains totally by accident when a home grocery delivery order was mixed up. After I realized that my familiar bananas were not delivered, I took things in stride and began to study up on plantains. Plantains resemble bananas, but they are totally different. As I quickly learned, plantains are starchy, firm and heavy. They are bland in flavor with none of the sweet, traditional banana characteristics. The fruit must be cooked — boiled or fried — prior to eating. Then plantains become incredibly versatile with use in both sweet and savory dishes. I decided to keep things simple and fry a small batch of plantains in my air fryer. I coated the plantain slices in oil and sugar. The sugar carmaelized and the slices turned out crispy, sweet and soft — perfectly on my first try. Yeah!

How do you like your plantains? Sweet or Savory

I’ve eaten both the sweet and savory culinary versions of plantains and like them both ways. We were served plantains at a small, local authentic Mexican restaurant. The sweet, sliced plantains came as a side dish at breakfast along with eggs and ham. The plantains appeared to be sautéed in butter and topped with syrup. Yum! At a Liberian buffet party, plantains were served as a savory side dish along with spicy chicken fingers, rice and very spicy mustard greens. These plantains were also sliced and fried. However, they were not sweet. They perfectly complimented the spicy Liberian dishes.

Plantains look like a large banana. Although plantains are botnically a fruit, they are treated like a vegetable in cooking applications since the texture is comparable to a potato than a traditional banana. Plantains are starchy, not sweet. Plantains can be consumed when they are immature (green) as well as ripe (yellow) and overripe (blackened skin) — but they still must be cooked.

The plantains which we recieved in our grocery order were ripe to overripe. I set them on my kitchen counter out of the way and actually forgot about them for a week or two. During this time period, the plantains ripened even further. The skin became blackened and the fruit was softer — but the pulp was not spoiled — it was still usable.

Recipe

Here are the ingredients for my fried plantains:

If you don’t have raw cane sugar; light brown sugar can be substituted. A little oil is needed to coat the slices, even though I’m using an air fryer “fry” the slices.

To make this recipe, first cut off the ends of the plantains. Score lengthwise with a knife and peel. Slice on an angle.

Coat in oil and sprinkle on sugar.

Since I decided to fry only one plantain — such a small batch — I used my air fryer. However, you could instead bake these in an conventional oven.

For the air fryer method, place the coated slices in a single layer in the air fryer basket. Set the fryer to 400 degrees — this is a hot setting but we are frying the plantain slices. (For a conventional oven, line a baking pan with parchment paper and lay on the slices; bake.) Turn the slices over after 7 minutes; fry for 3 additional minutes (10 minutes total). The slices are a little sticky; use tongs, fork or spatula (conventional oven) to turn them over.

Remove the grate out of the air fryer basket. (A kitchen tongs is handy to grab the center knob of the grate.) The plantains are sticky — I used a knife or fork to reach under the slices and lift them off.

As the plantains fried, they softened. The sugar hardened and caramelized making them just a bit sweeter. I could detect a slight banana flavor. The Mexican restaurant served the plantain slices with syrup which revved up the sweetness even more. And, I enjoyed the plantain slices when they were still warm.

It worked great to “fry” one plantain at a time in my small air fryer. It certainly was much easier than getting out a deep fat fryer for this process or heating up the conventional oven.

I’m a person who like to know everything about the topic at hand. So, I enjoyed learning about plantains. Cooking plantains has been on my culinary “to do” list for quite a while. It is easy to become spoiled having groceries delivered to your doorstep rather than traveling out in inclement weather to do shopping. So, the plantains were quite an unintentional surprise leading to an interesting cooking experience. And, what an easy recipe. Enjoy!

I’m looking forward to many rewarding culinary experiences in 2026. Let’s stay positive about our world.