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This recipe inspired me to try making tostones for the first time – perfect instructions and so delicious. Also love the slaw dressing and all of the other flavors together.
alaina
💯💯💯💯💯
The end. And thanks for coming mmkkay baiyyyy!
Kidding. I should – WILL – stop obsessively eating this beautiful bowl of fried plantains, black beans, seasoned rice, and garlic cilantro lime slaw for at least two seconds so I can share the spicy, creamy, burrito bowl wealth with you in its internet form.
I’m not even trying to say that you should fall in love with it as hard and fast as I did, or that every person who reads this blog will like to smother their food in a garlic cilantro lime slaw and that leftover creamy sauce – I’m just letting you know that, for me, this combination is EVERYTHING.
These Spicy Plantain Burrito Bowls are comfortably sitting in the Top Recipe of the Year place in my food blogger mind. I make a lot of recipes every year – some really super good, some bad, some legitimately frighteningly bad. But all that sort of fades away when I have this bowl in front of my face. Seriously, it’s the best thing I’ve eaten all year. Don’t give me a lot of time to think about that because I might be visited by a Ghost of Recipes Past and be forced to withdraw that bold statement. No, just let me have a strong, unshakeable statement for once in my Minnesota life.
Alright. I’m going to come clean about the story behind this recipe in list format ready go.
- Part 1: Bjork and I went to California not too long ago. Okay ummmm it was a while ago. Maybe I’m slow. I ate delicious food and, in an effort to collect food-inspiring memorabilia, I snagged a menu from a vegan restaurant called Sage (♡) knowing that its fantastic recipe descriptions would inspire me to near-vegan greatness. There were strong feelings involved because I am a wannabe vegan. And SAGE.
- Part 2: I found the Sage menu when cleaning out my desk, like, ten years later. But inspiring food is still inspiring food, so I opened up the menu and circled 90% of the dishes that sounded re-create-able. Starting recipe: Brazilian Burritos. The Brazilian Burritos involved mole sauce. Do you guys know/make/eat mole sauce? I thought I did, but then I made it and poured it all over my burritos, and found out that, in fact, I do NOT like mole sauce. Either that, or I got a little heavy handed with the chocolate. <– 99% likely. I rarely have a fail so bad that it finds its way into the garbage, but alas. You can’t win them all. So long, mo-lay.
- Part 3: I just couldn’t leave the Brazilian Burrito theme alone, so once the house stopped smelling like an overly chocolatey mole sauce fail zone, I decided to try again. This time with a **tried and true** sauce that you may remember from these shrimp tacos. Also: arranged in an actual container from Chipotle because it’s not ever going to be a REAL burrito bowl without one.
- Part 4: A few hundred fried plantains and a gallon of sauce later, I found myself swooning over this bowl-o-love that features them golden crispy plan-taters, black beans, crispy-creamy cilantro lime slaw, and seasoned rice. And just like that, Spicy Plantain Burrito Bowls were born.
*casually flips hair over shoulder*
In full disclosure, I’m talking to you about Plantain Burrito Bowls today from the steamy locale of New Orleans, Louisiana!
I am sort of loving the humidity, which is exactly the sort of naive we-don’t-live-here statement I used to hate coming from people when we lived in the Philippines, but here I am, being that girl, pretending like I love humidity for a hot second. I don’t know – it gives me bad hair excuses. It requires the wearing of a cute summer dress. It just feels good.
Also feeling good to me are the oysters and fried shrimp that are resting nicely in my belly. Except not the oysters – I chickened out last minute. 🙈 And then my food snob spirit was crushed by my real self.
Besides oysters (unless you are the person who can convince me that putting a weird, slimy, grey-ish, goobly-goop shellfish alien creature in my mouth is going to be a likable experience), what else do we need to be eating in NOLA?
Hurry up plz – we have, like, two minutes before we go home.
Now. SPICY PLANTAIN BURRITO BOWLS FOR EVERYONE!
Source notes: This recipe was previously titled “Spicy Brazilian Burrito Bowls” but was updated in August 2021 to better reflect and respect the cultural origins from which this dish came from. While this burrito bowl was inspired by a delicious Brazilian-inspired restaurant meal I had, it is not a traditional Brazilian dish. Just a delicious fusion of fried plantains, spicy sauce, rice, beans, and all the fixings!
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Spicy Plantain Burrito Bowls
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: 6 bowls 1x
Description
Spicy Plantain Burrito Bowls recipe featuring seasoned rice and beans, garlic cilantro lime slaw, and crispy fried plantains. So good // almost vegan.
Ingredients
For the Rice:
- 1 1/2 cups white long grain rice, uncooked
- 2 1/2 cups water
- 1 1/2 cups salsa (mild, medium, or hot! you decide)
- 3 tablespoons tomato paste
- 2 tablespoons oil or butter
For the Black Beans:
- 2 14 ounce can black beans, rinsed and drained
- 2 teaspoons EACH chili powder and cumin
For the Garlic Cilantro Slaw:
- 1/4 cup EACH oil and water
- 1/2 cup chopped green onions
- 1/2 cup cilantro leaves
- 2–3 cloves garlic (less if you’re sensitive to garlicky things)
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- juice of 2 limes
- 1/2 cup light sour cream or plain Greek yogurt
- 4 cups shredded cabbage (I just used a bagged slaw mix)
For the Plantains:
- vegetable oil for frying
- 4 green plantains
Instructions
- Rice: Place the ingredients in a rice cooker and cook until done.
- Black Beans: Heat the black beans with the spices in a small saucepan until warmed through, adding a little water or oil as necessary. Keep heat on low to keep warm.
- Slaw: Pulse the oil, water, green onions, cilantro, garlic, salt, lime juice, and Greek yogurt in a food processor until mostly smooth. Toss the cabbage with enough sauce to coat – reserve the remaining sauce.
- Plantains: Peel the plantains and chop them into chunks about 1 inch wide. Pour enough oil into a heavy skillet so the plantains will be partially covered in oil. Preheat over medium high heat. Add the plantains, fry for a few minutes (you should see bubbles – if not, turn up the heat), flip and fry for a few more minutes, and transfer to a paper towel lined plate. Smash them with the back of a wooden spoon until they break open slightly. Put back in the oil and fry for another 2-3 minutes until golden brown. Transfer to a paper towel lined plate; sprinkle with salt. They should be crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, like French fries. 😀
- Assembly: Serve a scoop of rice, beans, and slaw into the bowls. Add the plantains on top with a few cilantro leaves. Drizzle with extra sauce. DEVOUR.
Notes
These make for great leftovers! The plantains won’t be as crispy, but IMO they’re still good heated up a day or two later. 🙂
The slaw is the one element that should not be tossed together until you’re ready to serve. If making ahead, just save everything separately in the fridge and toss the slaw together just before serving.
To make this vegan, sub the Greek yogurt in the sauce with a vegan alternative or just use a little more oil to make it more like a dressing.
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Cook Time: 30 mins
- Category: Dinner
- Cuisine: Brazilian-Inspired
Keywords: plantain recipe, burrito bowls, spicy bowl recipe
WOW the plantains and cilantro sauce really make this! Overall this was easy to make – my rice was really liquidy so I had to run it through my rice cooker twice. Everything goes so well together – I halved the recipe which made enough for 3 lunches. I did add some avocado to the cilantro sauce since I had a ripe one to use up which makes it a little thicker.
This is such a killer combination. I’ve made it several times. I would make it more often, but the process of frying the plantains is always a deterrent. Today I roasted them. Brilliant! So much faster and less effort, and my house doesn’t smell like frying…maybe healthier too!
This was incredibly good! So much so that I ate too much and felt bad after lol. That riiiiiice. My only mod was to swap the fresh garlic in the slaw to 1/4 tsp of powdered, to lessen the intensity. This also made 5 sizable portions (should have been six…)
I just made these tonight and LOVED THEM. All the flavors work great together, and it was pretty easy. I’ll definitely be making them again.
Looks good- just curious why you call them brazilian. I’ve never seen cilantro , cumin, or spice in a brazilian dish. E sou brasileira.
Bit of a late review here, but I had to say how much I enjoyed this! I also wanted to share a few notes.
-I get a little overwhelmed with preparing so many different elements at the same time, so next time I will make the rice and slaw the day before.
-I couldn’t find green plantains, so I used yellow ones and it still tasted great. They were a little sweet, but not too sweet.
-I live in Mexico so I added a big dollop of crema on top and an extra squeeze of lime. I don’t think there’s a great equivalent to crema in the US, but if I was there I’d probably add extra greek yogurt on top.
Also.. I was just looking through the other comments and it seems like if Brazilians are offended by the name, wouldn’t it be the responsible thing to do to just… change it? Couldn’t you just call them “plantain burrito bowls”? When people are saying something is offensive or perpetuates stereotypes, the best thing to do is listen, even if it wasn’t your intent. Your disclaimer at the bottom of the post does not seem to have made anyone feel better.
How did you combine the rice with the tomato paste and salsa. When you are cooking it?
Yep! Just throw it all of the rice ingredients in the rice cooker. 😉
I just made it and eat it and can tell you that it was super delicious and satisfying.. I made some modifications of coarse because I had some avocado ranch dressing which I used with an added extra lime and lots of cilantro- instead of making the dressing. What a great dish! I am not Brazilian so therefore I do not need to weigh in on this debate on the name and what people eat etc. etc. people-Just go make it it’s good.
As Brazilian I’m extremely insulted by the misguided use of my country’s name in this recipe. Burritos is not a Brazilian food!! The only time Brazilians eat any type of bread is at breakfast, and we eat the National French bread. We do not cook beans with spices, our rice is eaten white without any coloring or spice condiment and we certainly don’t use yogurt with beans and rice. You might want to rename this recipe Mexican, because it certainly is not Brazilian. Next time do some research before you misguide your readers. This is extremely offensive.
I made the slaw with tahini instead of sour cream/yogurt and it was So Good!! Thanks for the recipe 😃
YUM! Glad you enjoyed the bowls, Julia!
Great recipe! Honestly, I didn’t think I was going to like the slaw going into it, but it goes really well with everything else in the dish. Beans were simple & yummy, and the plantains were AMAZING. Personally, I would maybe put a little less tomato paste in the rice bc it was sort of overpowering to me. But I would definitely make again! Add avocado!
Can these be frozen? How would I do that so the rice & wrap don’t get mushy?
Whipping up this recipe now and excited to try it! Question, what if you don’t have a rice cooker????
I made these tonight and they v were fantastic. I used both ripe black plantains and unripe green ones. So good! Will make again!
This recipe inspired me to try making tostones for the first time – perfect instructions and so delicious. Also love the slaw dressing and all of the other flavors together.
This is SOO DUBM! First of all, burritos is NOT a brazilian food, NEVER! not even close. I did not read the whole recipe but you mention MOLE, this is NOT brazilian. THIS IS MEXICAN. We don’t eat this food in brazil. Dont fool yourself!
I made this and used yellow saffron rice instead, and paired it with some grilled chicken. So yummy! I think next time I’ll add some chilies to the sauce to spice it up a bit.
I also think I would use more ripe plantanos. It would make them sweeter.
It looks good, but FYI, Brasilians don’t eat spicy food or plantains. So, yeah…
Made this tonight. SOOOOOO AMAZINGLY DELICIOUS!!!!
This looks delicious. Similar to something I recently had at a Mexican restaurant back home. An old classmate and I met up for lunch and had a burrito bowl, and 2 margaritas each! That was a fun lunch.
Not a bad recipe, but in Brazil we do not eat burritos, unless we ate at a TexMex restaurant.
Lindsay this is fantastic! I found this while on vacation on pinterest and couldnt wait to get home to try it! Im doing WW and revised it a bit to make it friendlier in smart points ( fat free sour cream) i also added a bit of fish sauce (1/4 cup and 1 Tbls light agave) and BAM! What a gorgeous tasting bowl of goodness! Thank you for your love of good food and sharing this with all of us!!
Glad you enjoyed it, Lisa! 🙂
I forgot to put in that I also added a bit of seasoned rice vinegar with the addition of fish sauce and light agave. Oh and I don’t care what country this recipe is from because it’s just totally AMAZING! But I do like the name you chose! Works for me just fine????
WOW!!! Just when I think I’m totally out of ideas for vegeterian dishes, your recipes always save the day! I’m grateful for such a delightful blog, and for your kindness of sharing it with everyone. Thanks!!!
Wow! This recipe was so good! I made a couple changes: brown rice because I didn’t have white, less water and less tomato paste (don’t care for the flavor), double the cilantro (I love cilantro), and only one lime (because even one was a little sour for me). It turned out delicious, every flavor worked together amazingly. Definitely don’t skip the slaw, it’s wonderful on top. Really really good, I appreciate the recipe.
Thanks for the comment, Annette! 🙂
First of all there is no such thing as burritos in Brazil. Second salsa and sour cream done exist in Brazil and third Brazilians hate spice, almost nothing is spicy. Get your countries right before stamping a name on