[quote=mand;234153]
Quote:
Originally Posted by waggoner41
Hey, more and more! I don't think I've ever heard of the cuadrado (the word means "cooked"?) but the platano verde / maduro sound like the impression I've got.
About time I got over there to experience them properly.  ... world travel is almost as unlikely as world domination in my future ... However I've done a lot of impossible things this last twelve months, so who knows. |
I apologize for taking so long to get back to you. I keep many irons in the fire and had to attend to other items.
In Costa Rica:
From the left are:
Ripe plantain and green plantain.
Platano Maduro (ripe plantain) Musa × paradisiaca is fried or baked with sugar, cinnamon, cheese, sour cream (cream) and butter, delicious!
Platano Verde, (green plantain) is minced, in ceviche or tostones (fried plantains).
Cavendish (Banano Enano in Costa Rica) is yellow, eaten uncooked, alone or with other fruits or cereal (English banana). Ripe bananas from an entire bunch are peeled and boiled slowly for hours to make a thick syrup which is called "honey".
Cuadrado (cuadrado means square), are other varieties that are eaten cooked (boiled or fried) and usually green. When mature and yellow they can be eaten out of hand but are not as sweet as the commercial bananas. The local variety in my area is referred to as “guineo cuadrado” or “square guinea” in English. They grow like weeds here, growing everywhere, and we take advantage.
Dwarf Cavendish that we call, interchangeably Banano Niño or Lady Finger although I am unsure if they are the variety known to all here. These are sweeter than the store bought bananas eaten out of hand.
I was introduced to a new variety that I had not seen before this week. It was brought from the province of Guanacaste. I do not know the name yet but it is similar to the cuadrado but does not have the pronounced angles of the cuadrado.
There may be as many as 50 varieties of banana that grow in Costa Rica, both seeded and unseeded. I will never see the vast majority of them.
As long as your interest holds there are many web sites that can overwhelm you with information. One such is on
Purdue University web site, another is
How to Grow a Banana Tree in a Temperate Zone or
Banana Trees in a Temperate Climate.
Go here to find a
Plant Hardiness Zone Map of the British Isles