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Wednesday, October 3, 2001
Outside the box

Ask Food Network kitchens
   Q: I have been trying to expand my culinary repertoire to include Latin and Caribbean foods and recipes. However, a lot of recipes call for plantains. What color should I be looking for? How do know if they are ripe?
   - CARIBBEAN CONFUSION
   A: The wonderful thing about plantains is that they truly are a versatile food. As a plantain ripens, its high starch content changes to sugar. The answer to your question is that plantains are good at any stage; it just depends on what you want to make.
   Plantains are a relative of the banana, but are bigger, less sweet and need to be cooked before they are eaten. Plantains also keep their shape when cooked, unlike bananas, which get mushy.
   Green or "unripe" plantains contain a lot of starch and very little sweetness. Their starchy flesh is used more as a vegetable than a fruit. They can be used in soups, stews, and curries or boiled and mashed.
   The next stage of ripeness is when the skin is mostly yellow with a few black speckles. In this stage of ripeness, the plantain has lost some of its starch and is slightly sweet. Plantains at this stage can be thinly sliced and fried, mashed or they can be baked until tender and served with roasted meats.
   When a plantain is totally ripe, the peel is almost completely black. Although these plantains might look past their prime, this is when their sugar content is the highest but the flesh is still nice and firm. It is at this stage that the plantain most resembles a banana. A ripe plantain can be used in savory or sweet dishes. I like to pan fry them with some butter rum and brown sugar and serve over ice cream.
   When buying plantains, they should be firm and not mushy or cracked. If you need ripe plantains and only have green ones, they ripen at room temperature, out of direct sunlight, in a few days.

   Q: I was at my fish market on Saturday and they were having a sale on "special" crabmeat. What makes this crabmeat so special? What kind of crabmeat is it?
   - WAITING TO MAKE CRAB CAKES
   A: Packaged crabmeat sounds like a crab-lovers dream: no shells, no picking, no mess, just the sweet delicious crabmeat. But there is a tricky part: which one to buy.

Atlantic blue crab

   Picked crabmeat is usually from Atlantic blue crabs. Because raw crabmeat is difficult (if not impossible) to pick, all picked crabmeat has been steamed, the packages are labeled fresh or frozen. Once frozen, the meat cannot be labeled as fresh. Crabmeat is pasteurized, which kills the Listeria bacteria.
   Crabmeat from the swimming, or back legs is called "lump," or "jumbo lump." This style of crab is excellent in recipes where you want to see large pieces of crab. "Backfin" crabmeat is from the body and legs of the crab. The pieces of meat are smaller than lump pieces, and there are usually more pieces of shell. Backfin crabmeat is good in recipes where the meat should be noticeable. "Special" crabmeat, is also known as regular, deluxe, flake, or white, and is small pieces of shredded crab from the body and legs. This meat can have lots of flexible shell and it must picked over carefully before using. This type of meat is great for any recipe where the meat will be pureed or price and taste is more important than appearance and presentation. "Claw meat" is also available, as is "minced crabmeat"; both are small pieces of reddish-brown meat. "Cocktail crab claws" are sold with the shell still attached.



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