My Wonderful Fried Plantain Meal

Courtney, Laura, Annie and I went to waffle house. They know us there by now.

Me sipping my hot cocoa. Annie is next to me. My true love.

 This is a weird picture, I acknowledge that. But it's my form of before and after.

Caramelized or burnt.

Doesn't it look freaking delicious?? Well it was.

Bout to have my world rocked by this plate of food and Scandal. Can't help it. It just happens that way.

For about an entire month I did not cook anything except one meal. That is embarrassing, but what can I say? I’ve been trying to college and stay sane. Both of those things haven’t been going great, but hey it’s the most stressful semester of my life so far. I’m impressed that I’ve stayed alive.

One weekend I had a bunch of friends over and we worked our way through $22 dollars of junk food and two chick flicks. It was great. After my friends left at 8 the next day, I wandered into the kitchen. I hadn’t eaten anything that day since we had been to Waffle House at 11. And in the kitchen I concocted a meal that I am to this day incredibly proud of. (In the midst of all of these self-esteem killing college apps one must take pride in the little things.)

My Wonderful Meal:

• 1 fried plantain
• 2 chicken quesadillas

Tip: Eat while watching Scandal. Overwork yourself with excitement and then fall asleep.

Yes. I know. Impressive. Just hand me the medal.

This is why I am proud of this meal. 1) I came up with it all by myself. 2) It was delicious 3) It was incredibly fatty but I convinced myself it was healthy 3) It reminded me of Germany.

Number three may seem weird but let me tell you a story. My host family was pretty big, so we didn’t go out on adventures much. It was March or one of those boring months and we were all bored. (That was redundant. Oh well.) My host mom, Sophie, decided to take me and my sister, Louise, to a museum and a market in Frankfurt. We spent hours in the museum and then walked to the market which was full of international foods and bought two plantains and lots of other crazy foods. That night we fried up our plantains and watched The King’s Speech. It was one of my favorite nights in Germany that I can remember.

That was my story. Now here are the directions to make my awesome meal.

1. Heat enough oil to fry things in. This should be done in a pan.
2. Peel plantain.
3. Put plantain in hot oil. Fry until caramelized. Or burnt if you can not control them like me.
4. Grab two corn tortillas from fridge. Some cheese and leftover chicken too. If you have all of those things. If you don’t then I guess you are screwed. That sucks.
5. Spray pam on both sides of tortilla (this makes them crispy). Heat one side
6. Flip it over and immediately fill with cheese and chicken and fold in half. This is a crucial moment and it may cause you to panic. But don’t stay calm and everything will turn out fine.
7. Wait until they are prefect. Or overestimate perfect and wait until they are burnt.
8. Put on plate with plantains. Take to computer and turn on TV show. Good.

Now a moment on plantains. They are not from Germany. Even though this is what I think of. They are from Central America. African food uses plantains too. So equator region. There are sweet and savory forms of plantains. Personally I like to make myself sweet plantains but buy salty plantain chips with lime. That is the way to go. But you can literally prepare them in a thousand different ways. Fried, steamed, grilled, baked or boiled and more. There is also a drink and flour. And the leaves can be used as plates. Basically it is a wonderful fruit. (Wait. Is it a fruit? Or a starch. Shit. I don’t know. Now I’m confused.)