| Arroz a la cubana | |
| Country: | Unknown, possibly Spain |
| Course: | Main course |
| Served: | Hot |
| Main Ingredient: | Rice, fried egg, tomato sauce |
Arroz a la cubana (pronounced as /es/) ("Cuban-style rice") or arroz cubano is a rice dish popular in Spain, the Philippines, and parts of Latin America. Its defining ingredients are rice and a fried egg. A fried banana (plantain or other cooking bananas) and tomato sauce (sofrito) are so frequently used that they are often considered defining ingredients too.[1]
Despite the name, the dish does not exist in Cuban cuisine and its origins are not definitively known.[2] It may possibly originate from a Spanish misinterpretation of common Cuban meals of eating rice with stews and a fried egg when Cuba was still a Spanish colony.[3] [4]
In Spain, a typical dish of arroz a la cubana consists of a serving of white rice with tomato sauce (sofrito) and a fried egg. While the most traditional recipe includes a fried plantain (plátano), it is also common to find the recipe using sausages and bacon.
See also: Silog. In the Philippines, arroz a la cubana has been eaten in the Philippines since Spanish colonial times.[5] Like in other versions, it comes with white rice, fried egg, and some ripe fried cardava or saba banana, sliced length-wise.[6]
It differs significantly from the Spanish and Latin American versions in that instead of a sofrito, it always includes ground meat (giniling, usually beef) in tomato sauce.[6] This component is typically cooked picadillo-style, with minced potatoes, carrots, raisins, peas, onions, garlic, and other ingredients in a tomato-based sauce seasoned with patis (fish sauce), soy sauce, and sometimes chilis.[7] [8] [9] [10]
A regional variant of arroz a la cubana is arroz de Calamba from Calamba, Laguna. It differs in that it is served with strips of smoked fish (tinapa).[11]
In Peru, it is common for the dish to consist of white rice, fried plantain, a fried hot-dog wiener, and a fried egg over the white rice.[12]