Lentejas Poblanas con Plátano Macho

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy 4-quart pot for the lentils
• •Wide clay cazuela or Dutch oven for the stew
• •Cast iron comal for charring tomatoes and toasting the chile
• •High-powered blender
• •Wide skillet for frying the plátano macho and piña

Instructions

1. 1

   Start the lentils

   Place the rinsed lentils in a heavy pot with the cold water, the whole onion half, the halved head of garlic, the bay leaves, and the thyme. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Skim the gray foam that rises in the first ten minutes. Cook uncovered at a lazy bubble for 25 to 30 minutes, until the lentils are tender but still hold their shape. Do not salt them yet. Salt early makes the skins tough.

   Use lentejas castellanas, the small brown ones. Red lentils dissolve and French green lentils stay too firm. The brown lentil is what this stew is built on.
2. 2

   Render the tocino

   While the lentils cook, set a heavy cazuela or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the tocino lardons with one tablespoon of the lard to help them start. Cook for eight to ten minutes, stirring now and then, until the fat renders out and the lardons turn deep gold at the edges. Lift the lardons out with a slotted spoon and set them aside. Leave the rendered fat in the pot. That fat is the foundation of the sauce.

3. 3

   Char the tomatoes and toast the chile

   Heat a dry comal over medium-high. Lay the whole tomatoes on the comal and turn them every few minutes until the skins blister and blacken in patches, about 10 minutes. They should be soft and weeping juice. Toast the chile ancho on the same comal for 20 seconds per side, just until it puffs and smells like the inside of a chile vendor's stall. Burned chile is bitter chile, so watch it closely. Drop the toasted ancho into a small bowl of hot tap water and let it soften for 15 minutes.

4. 4

   Blend the tomato base

   Transfer the charred tomatoes, skins and all, to a blender. Add the soaked chile ancho, the chopped garlic, the cinnamon stick broken in half, the cloves, and the black pepper. Blend on high until completely smooth. The puree should be a deep brick red, fragrant with sweet spice. This is the colonial signature of Puebla, where the Spanish trade in clove and cinnamon married into the indigenous tomato and chile.

5. 5

   Fry the salsa

   Return the cazuela with the rendered tocino fat to medium-high heat. Add the chopped onion and cook for three minutes until translucent. Pour the tomato puree in all at once. It will sputter. Step back. Cook for 10 to 12 minutes, stirring often, until the salsa darkens, thickens, and the fat begins to separate at the edges. La manteca es el sabor. Skip this step and the stew will taste raw.

6. 6

   Fry the plátano macho and piña

   In a wide skillet, heat the remaining two tablespoons of lard over medium-high. When it shimmers, add the plátano macho slices in a single layer. Fry for two to three minutes per side until the slices are dark gold and the sugars caramelize into a crust. Lift them out and drain on a plate. In the same fat, fry the pineapple wedges for one minute per side, just until the edges char and the juices release. The fruit must be cooked separately, never simmered with the lentils, or they will dissolve into mush.

   The plátano macho has to be very ripe. The skin should be more black than yellow. Green or yellow plantain is starchy and will not give you the sweetness this dish depends on. If your market only has yellow ones, leave them on the counter for three more days. No me vengas con atajos.
7. 7

   Build the stew

   Lift the lentils with a slotted spoon and add them to the cazuela with the fried salsa, along with about three cups of their cooking liquid. Discard the whole onion, garlic head, bay leaves, and thyme. Stir in the reserved tocino lardons, the vinegar, and the piloncillo. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook uncovered for 15 minutes so the flavors marry. Now taste for salt and add it. The stew should taste deep and slightly sweet, with the chile and clove humming in the background.

8. 8

   Fold in the fruit and serve

   Five minutes before serving, gently fold in the fried plátano macho and the charred piña. Warm them through without stirring hard, or the plátano will fall apart. Pull the cinnamon stick if you can find it. Ladle into clay cuencos and serve with warm corn tortillas and lime halves at the table. Así se hace y punto.

Chef Tips

• •Buy real Mexican canela, the soft, brittle stick of Ceylon cinnamon, not the hard cassia bark sold as cinnamon in most American supermarkets. Cassia is too harsh and the flavor of the stew will be wrong. Pregúntale a las señoras del mercado, they will point you to the right one.
• •The plátano macho is non-negotiable. Not banana, not unripe plantain. You want the kind with skin that looks like it should be thrown away. That blackness is the sugar that caramelizes in the lard.
• •Piloncillo is the cone of unrefined cane sugar sold in every Mexican market. It has minerality and depth that brown sugar approximates poorly. Use brown sugar if you must, but a substitution is a compromise, not an upgrade.
• •This dish appears on tables in Puebla during Lent and at Easter, when meat is dialed back and the lentil and bean stews carry the meal. The tocino is small, more seasoning than centerpiece. For a fully vigilia version, leave the tocino out and double the lard. The fruit and the spice carry the dish either way.

Advance Preparation

• •The lentils and the tomato base can be made one day ahead and refrigerated separately. Combine and finish on serving day.
• •Fry the plátano macho and the piña the day you serve. They lose their texture if cooked ahead and stored, and the whole point of the dish is the contrast between the soft fruit and the dense lentil base.
• •The finished stew keeps refrigerated for three days and tastes better on the second day. The fruit will soften further; that is acceptable, not ideal.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 400g)