Banana chips

Don't confuse these chips with the sweet, dried banana chips readily available in supermakets. These are crispy, savoury chips made from green bananas or plantains. This dish comes from Kerela in South India and is called upperi. Traditionally, nendra kai bananas are used and they are cooked in coconut oil, but you can use any oil suitable for deep frying. There is a sweet variation, called sharkara upperi, where the fried chips are coated in a sugary syrup made from jaggery, but I much prefer the savoury version.To get the chips nice and crispy, slice them really thin and deep fry them slowly over a moderately low heat.

Banana chips
Twitter
Facebook

Ingredients

    • 6 green bananas or 3 plantains

    • 1 tsp salt

    • 1 tsp turmeric powder

    • Oil for deep frying

Method

    1. Peel* the bananas or plantains.

    2. Rinse and dry and slice thinly. Use a mandolin slicer if you have one.

    3. Mix the salt and turmeric with about 1/4 cup of water.

    4. Heat oil. Put a large strainer over a heat proof container to drain the chips once they are cooked.

    5. When the oil is hot, turn heat to moderately low and add the first batch of chips, sliding them into the hot oil one at a time so they don't stick together. Do not overcrowd. Use a slotted spoon and move the chips around.

    6. Add a teaspoon of the salt and turmeric solution. Caution: Adding water to hot oil is dangerous, so take care when doing this and be gentle. The oil will splutter momentarily.

    7. Cook the chips (stirring and moving them around) until they are golden and crisp. Remove with slotted spoon and place the chips in a strainer. Transfer the chips to a large bowl just before the next batch of chips is ready to come out of the oil.

    8. Continue frying the bananas in batches. You may want to dilute your salt and turmeric solution with a a little more water half way through the batches as the oil gets saltier with each batch you fry.

    9. Allow to cool completely before storing in an air tight container. Will keep for a few weeks - if it lasts that long!

* The skin on green bananas are quite tough and you can't peel strips off by hand like you do ripe bananas. To peel green bananas, use a small sharp knife to cut off the stem and about a centimetre off the tip Then slice off strips of the skin (about 2mm thick) going down the length of the banana. The sap from green bananas stain very badly and are near impossible to remove, so be careful not to get any on your clothes.