This dish from Cote D'Ivoire is simple but satisfying. Alloco is the name for fried plantains usually eaten as a street food snack in Cote D'Ivoire. However, what makes these different is the tomato stew served alongside them. Also, the addition of hard boiled eggs was new for me. I usually pride myself on making perfect boiled eggs, but these must have gotten away from me. The grey ring around the yolks generally means you've overcooked them, fun fact!
The tomato stew starts with sautéing onion and red pepper until soft, then adding minced garlic.
Next comes chopped tomatoes and spices. I used some West African curry for this. The recipe I used called for Maggi cube. Eventually I will get my hands on some and try it out, because it seems every recipe I come across calls for one. It seems to be just an all-purpose seasoning either in a bouillon cube or sauce.
To make it into more of sauce, I then added some tomato paste with a bit of water to thin it out. At this point you can add chicken or anything else you want. I left mine plain and kept it the consistency of a sauce rather than a stew.
Next come the fried plantains, the actual alloco. There's nothing special about the way these are made. I decided to do more of a shallow fry than a deep fry like I usually do. I had been having issues with plantains from the grocery store never ripening, these were still rather starchy and didn't have the sweetness that fried plantains usually have, but I think that worked well with the other savory ingredients.
I wanted to make more of a meal out of this, so I served them with some white rice and the boiled eggs. The recipe I used didn't mention the boiled eggs anywhere, but the pictures featured them, so I figured I'd give it a shot. I was pleasantly surprised by how all the components went together. I have of course eaten fried plantains with other savory ingredients (they go great with stewed greens) but had never had them with anything tomato-y. And I'd never paired boiled eggs with tomato sauce, but honestly everything worked great together and ended up being a really satisfying meal.
Recipes Used: Alloco and Tomato Stew
Comments