February 13, 2008

Bananas and plantains

So, I found this blog post and thought it would be appropriate to explain the difference between the two. Basically, in Puerto Rico, guineos are bananas and plátanos are plantains. The term guineo comes from Africa, which brought bananas along with slavery. Bananas are usually smaller than the ones found in North America (they're kind of cute, actually). Meanwhile, plátanos are divided into two types: the bland verdes used to make tostones (slices fried and squished then fried again) and mofongo (just mashed, fried, and mixed with spices and usually bacon), and sweet amarillos.

It's kind of interesting how there is no precise word for banana across the Spanish-speaking world, which the blog above explains. Kind of silly, I suppose, but worth knowing about.

3 comments:

Petchie75 said...

Wow, thanks for the inside info about the bananans and plantains ;-) I like your blog a lot and I will continue reading it to learn more about the island which I, for the moment call home! And thanks for your comment on my blog!

Speaking Boricua said...

Awesome! Thank you!
By the way, how and why did you come to PR? How long have you been there? And what part are you living in?

Sorry if it seems intrusive, but there are very few Swedes there (of which you are probably painfully aware!). So I'm just kind of wondering how you ended up there!

Petchie75 said...

Sorry, I just realised that I never answered your questions under this post - I also wrote about bananas again today ;-)
I came to PR in November last year as my husband was transferred here by his job. We are probably staying until end of February 2009 and we live in Condado, San Juan! You might have already figured out the answers to all these questions by now...
There are a few Swedes around, I have only met one so far, but there's also a Swedish woman who has a café on the main plaza in Caguas! And I have heard that there's a Swedish man living in the Old San Juan (think that I have seen his car though - a Saab with a Swedish flag sticker!)