In Dominica, "figs" do not refer to the sweet purple fruit you would think. Instead, people from Dominica use the word to mean green bananas. So the "fig flats" I made to celebrate their independence day on November 3rd are fritters made of mashed green banana.
Fully green bananas are actually pretty difficult to find in grocery stores around here. Most of them are already a couple days from being ripe. Luckily I was able to find some mostly green ones. The flavor of green bananas is far different from that of a ripe banana. It's more starchy and not very sweet.
The bananas are peeled and then chopped and put into boiling salted water until tender.
Once removed from the pot, they're mashed into a consistency of mashed potatoes.
Then you add some veggies. The recipe I used called for "seasoning peppers" along with a basic green bell pepper. Seasoning peppers are sweet peppers of the same species as habanero but with none of the heat you would expect. They are normally red in color, which would have given these fritters more color. As a substitution, I used cubanelle peppers, which are the lighter green ones you see above.
The peppers are mixed in along with onion, garlic, and seasonings. The recipe I used called for Goya seasoning, which mostly likely refers to "sazón" which I substituted with ground coriander and cumin. The mixture is then chilled to firm up a bit.
The mixture is then formed into patties and then placed in a pan with a bit of oil to fry.
Once browned, they're ready to eat! What's interesting about these fritters is that there is neither flour nor eggs in the mixture. The green bananas act as both binding agent and a starch, so it makes for a very quick and simple preparation.
I decided to serve these with some sauteed spinach and sprinkled some red pepper flakes over everything just for a little more of a kick.
Recipes Used: Fig flats
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