Trying PUERTO RICAN FOOD for the First Time!

you see that there.

That right there is amofongo.

A mofongo which is a popular Puerto Rican dish and this is the firsttime I'm trying a mofongo here at this Porto Rican restaurant called Mofongosin North Hollywood.

A lot of you guys, some of you don't know whatmofongo is.

I don't really know either.

this is the first time I'm trying it soI'm giving you guys a sneak peek into one of the most popular Puerto Ricanfoods.

Very delicious very popular in Puerto Rico and I'm about to try itright now and to show you guys what this is all about.

hey there this is Steve from rock stareater coming to you with another rockin episode.

I'm always so happy that you'rejoining me for my food adventures all around town and today I am in NorthHollywood about to try something that I've never had before.

It's veryinteresting.

I'm gonna be trying some Puerto Rican food today.

Puerto Rican food which I've never had before in my entire life.

I decided to bea little adventurous today and to see what Puerto Rican food is like and likeI said, I'm here in North Hollywood in like the more of like the northern partof North Hollywood that's really where not too much of the action is at.

At thisrestaurant called mofongo switch is a very interesting one because apparentlythis is the only Porto Rican restaurant that's like a sit-down with afull-on menu.

I mean there's some Puerto Rican foods here and there that's morekind of like food stands, but mofongos is is the only restaurant as of this videothat has like a full-on Puerto Rican food menu.

So this is going to definitelybe an interesting spot to check out.

So I'm gonna be going into the restaurantnow and I'm gonna be trying some of that food and of course this restaurantspecializes in mofongo which is a popular Puerto Rican dish which is oneof the things I'm definitely going to get.

So I'm going to show you guys whatPuerto Rican food looks like if you're not familiar with it and to show youwhat a mofongo looks like here in Los Angeles.

If you like what I'm doing hereon this channel then please subscribe to Rockstar eater so you can get all theseawesome food episodes on a weekly basis, and of course stick all the way to thisend to the end of this episode so that you can see all this amazing PuertoRican food that I'm about to show you right now.

this is so awesome, I like the way thatthey designed this restaurant.

It's like all these like masks and musicalinstruments like hanging on the walls and celebrity photos and Puerto Ricanflags all around and this it's pretty cool.

And just to give you a little bitof a background about this restaurant, I heard it was established in about 2009so it's been a little bit over 10 years right now.

so it's not terribly old but it is like I said the only brick-and-mortarrestaurant that serves a full-on Puerto Rican menu here in Los Angeleswhich makes it very special and from what I heard from the staff it isactually very authentic Puerto Rican food.

So that's what I'm gonna be tryingtoday.

Some authentic Puerto Rican food and how could you go any other way.

Imean just give me the authentic stuff because I want to show you guyswhat authentic Puerto Rican food looks like here in Los Angeles.

Yeah so I'mback here in the kitchen of a Puerto Rican restaurant and I'm gonna show youguys some of the action that happens back here and making like a mofongoand all that exciting Porto Rican stuff that I ordered from the menu.

So let'stake a look and see what they got going on here.

He is gonna start making themofongo, put it in that oil, gonna deep-fry.

This is so cool guys becausethis is the first time I've ever seen them fry plantains in a restaurant.

Inever really knew how they were made but today because of this Puerto Ricanrestaurant, I see for the first time how they fry and make these plantains and inthis episode like I said, it's gonna be used to make them the mofongo, the main dishof this restaurant.

So he has to mash some of the garlic and the salt in order tomake that mofongo, so this is the mixture Pork rinds.

Oh very nice.

and then you mix it all together.

Wowthen the banana goes in there.

Wow that is so interesting okay so that'show they would smash all that plantain as well as all the oils and youknow garlic and spices in order to make the mofongo.

all right so that's the chicken stewthat they're going to put on top of the mofongo and then it should be good togo.

Whoa nice.

All right appetizers.

This is so excitingand what do we got here.

So the first one I got is the relleno de papa, whichis their beef potato balls.

These beef potato balls that I'm trying for thefirst time.

I've had a Cuban version of it at like Porto's bakery but I've neverhad a puerto rican version of it.

wow this is quite a sight isn't it? Oh oh man that is so good man.

It's like a mashed potato ball.

So outside it's crispy but insidehas all the potato as well as this like ground beef which is so so delicious.

holy smokes I'm off to a good start.

Thisis so good okay.

So the next one that I'm gonna try is the alcapurria, and thisis the beef fritters which is made of cassava which is kind of like a rootthat's very similar to sweet potato that's very popular in a lot of you knowlike South American as well Central American cuisine.

And I'm very excited totry this one.

I have a feeling it's gonna be crispy, it's gonna be soft, everythingthat I love about food.

oh man yeah.

This is definitely a mustget, the alcapurrias especially here at mofongo restaurant.

It is so so good, seriously I think I can eat this for my whole meal.

I mean like forget abouteverything else why not just stick with this right.

I also decided to get some oftheir rice as well because I wanted to see what this popular traditional PuertoRican dish tastes like which is their arroz con gandules which is basicallywhat they call a pigeon pea rice and it uses like a special kind of beans mixedin with this rice.

I'm gonna break up, this beautiful like dome shape.

I alwaysfeel so bad doing that, but you know I got to eat it.

though it's very nice taste yeah I wantto try some more of that pigeon pea Oh yeah it's very nice all around.

You know what it tastes like? It kind oftastes a little bit like that orange Mexican rice, but then with likethese peas in here and then there's some olives as well.

It gives it a very niceslight sourness to it, but overall it's very savory.

I like it.

So before I dig into this, I want to just explain to you a little bit about what amofongo is.

It's basically fried plantains that are mashed up along withgarlic and olive oil and salt and some other mixtures and then you can put yourchoice of whatever you want like inside.

today I decided to go with the chickenstew but it also comes with other choices of proteins like seafood, pork, like the soft pork as well as crispy pork, and chicken of course.

So you can gowith just about anything and Puerto Ricans, theyhave their preference on what kind of meat that they like to eat, so it's kindof difficult for me to narrow it down.

but this one was recommended to me bythe staff here at this restaurant so I decided let's try the chicken one, thechicken stew today.

Wow this is an amazing dish.

My first time ever tryingthis.

What I want to do is get some chicken right now, some of this chicken.

oh boy it's like very flavorful like very soft chicken meat, has that stew likeflavor with these spices that are inside.

All right do you knowwhat I'm gonna do is also try some of these plantains that are fried, that's onthe side.

oh wow that's so good.

So so awesome.

It's like fresh soft and melt in your mouth.

Seriously I think I could eatplantains like all day long if I had to.

it's a perfect accompaniment to thiswhole entire dish.

So that's a full meal that I just had and probably sure you guys know that it's a lot of food that I got, but I'm not stoppingquite just yet because I have to go through my dessert and this is theirtembleque, which is their popular coconut dessert.

It's kind of like a coconut pudding or something like that orcoconut pie, but I'm about to find out right now.

That is amazing you know whatthat tastes like? It has a strong coconut flavor and it's almost like eating apina colada but in a creamy form.

That's what it tastes like.

It's very soft, it'svery melt in your mouth, has a very like flan kind of likea cream texture to it.

I would say more like a creamy texture.

If you're a coconut person you're definitely gonna love this.

This is like anexplosion of that coconut flavor in your mouth.

So what are my impressionsof the food.

You know I honestly think that Puerto Rican food isit's very similar to like Cuban food and to some degree Brazilian food.

I see alot of overlaps of like the ingredients and even like some of the spices.

This ismy kind of food, so I really enjoy it and if you guys are searching out for someawesome Puerto Rican food then this is the place you got to go if you're in LosAngeles, Mofongos restaurant because like I said, it's a sit-down restaurant, they have like a full-on menu and that's exactly what you want if you're goingout and having a very good experience.

and also the food is pretty authentic aswell and it's extremely tasty, so definitely if you don't know what elseto get from a Puerto Rican restaurant whether you come here or some otherPuerto Rican restaurants, then go with what I got because these are some of themost popular things that you get on the menu.

And just eating here you know eventhough I've never been to Puerto Rico before, it just has that feeling whereyou're just transported to like one of those tropical islands whether it'slike Puerto Rico or Cuba or you know like somewhere out by the ocean and justeating all the stuff like while you're on vacation or something.

That's exactlythe way I felt when I was eating this food.

So anyways I hope you've enjoyedthis episode of Rockstar eater.

If you enjoy what I'm doing here on the showthen please give me a thumbs up and also comment on the section below if there'sanything you would like to add regarding my food experience.

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so anyways I got to finish out my sodaright here, my Malta soda, but I hope to see you in the next video.

So I hope youhave a rockin day today, you'll try some of those rocket Porto Rican foodsometime soon and I'll see you in the next video.