The many wonders of a banana

One thing you have to love about Ecuadorian culture is the certificates. If you are going to have a workshop and you really want people to come, tell them you will make them a certificate and they will be there. If you are inviting a local to a conference and you want to assure that ya mismo attendance, tell them a certificate will be given at the end, and they will be there on that bus with you.
When you apply for any professional job here you have to present your folder, carpeta, and the most important part of that is how many certificates you´ve accumulated. It doesn’t actually matter who gave the certificate or what it is in, it´s just the fact that you are ¨certified.¨
I am proud to say I have a new certificate to add to my resume. I am officially certified by the local provincial government in gourmet banana cooking. Yup, I passed a strenuous three day gastronomy course in the 100s of ways you can cook a banana. I even have to promote the uses of banana in the community.
You may wonder how many thing you can really make with a banana, well according to this certificate the possibilities are endless. I can teach at least a 100 recipes, everything from cocktails to cakes to ice cream to main dishes.
The banana just in case you´re wondering has vitamins b1, b6, c, e, iron, copper, iodine, sodium, and potassium. It is also proven to be the easy fruit to digest, just in case you´re ever sick or for kids. And you don’t even have to wait until the banana is mature (yellow banana), you can do lots with the green ones too. El Oro (where my site is) is called the banana capital of the world so lots of chances to eat bananas and plantains.

Here are some recipes to try out:

Banana Cocktail
1 tsp of vanilla essence, 1 jar of condensed milk, 1 yellow banana, 2 cups of ice, 1 glass of rum, 2 naranjillas o 1 glass of passionfruit juice
Put everything in the blender and enjoy!

Banana Ice Cream
1 cup of orange juice (freshly squeezed), 3 yellow bananas, 1 tbsp of sugar, 1 pinch of salt, 1 cup of milk cream
Blend for one minute all the ingredients except milk cream. Put milk cream in a pot and beat until it stiffs. Mix the milk cream with other ingredients. Put the mixture in an iron pot and cover it with aluminum paper and freeze it.

Sauté Bananas
3 tbsp of butter and 4 yellow bananas
Cut the bananas right by the middle. Put them on a pan with butter at medium heat. Fry until they are soft and leave on turned off burner rotating until lightly toasted. Sprinkle salt and serve.

Chocolate covered Bananas (best alternative to ice cream you will ever find!)
Yellow bananas, ice cream wood sticks, cocoa powder, and vegetal butter
Cut bananas in half and Put bananas in fridge for one day. Dissolve cocoa with butter by steaming it and stir from time to time. Get bananas out of fridge and cover with the chocolate. Put in freezer for a while.

Banana Meatballs (I know not Italian, but hey it really is good)
3 green bananas, 1 egg, achiote, salt, any spices you want to add, cooking oil, and ground beef, shrimp, tuna can, or chicken.
Fry the bananas, add achiote, then beat the egg, salt and spices and finally the meat or seafood you are adding. Make into small ball shapes like meatballs, and fry with enough oil on a large pan. Makes 30 meatballs.

Green Banana Patacones
5 green bananas, 1 cup of grated cheese
Cut bananas vertically, like into half dollar size. Fry the bananas in frying pan, rotating until lightly fried. Remove and use the bottle of a glass bottle or something in your kitchen, to small them a little. Put a little cheese in the middle part and serve hot. Really good!

Jelley
Once you know how easy they are to make, you´ll never want to buy them in the store again.
The other volunteer in my site and I played around with some jelly making the other weekend. I just made some new jellies this weekend, and I think I´m perfecting this new skill, it´s time for a certificate in jelly making.
Basically you can make the jelly with any fruit you want, but if it is not an acidy fruit you may need to add a drop of lime juice or passion fruit juice.
The first one we tried out was pineapple with bananas. You cut one pineapple and one banana into really small pieces and you can lightly blend it, you don’t want it to be like soup, but just a little better chopped. Put these fruits in a pot with a little sugar and put on low heat. Let cook stirring continuously for about 20-30 minutes. You want to cook it until all the natural water from the fruit has absorbed. Then let it sit until it cooks and package.
The other jelly we´ve tried out is mangos with strawberry. Cut two mangos and four strawberries into small pieces, or lightly blend to make it into small pieces. And put a drop of an acidy fruit, like passion fruit or lime juice, and sugar. Stir in a pot for 30 minutes or until water is absorbed. And you know have homemade jelly!