The Foodie's Travel Guide to Popular Puerto Rican Dishes

Not your average potatoes, rellenos de papa consist of mashed potato croquettes stuffed with picadillo (ground beef or pork seasoned with sofrito, a sauce made from peppers, onions, and garlic). Crispy on the outside, soft on the inside, they’re a popular appetizer in Puerto Rico — but you just might want to make them a meal — especially when onion and cheese make their way into these savory potato balls.

If you’ve ever enjoyed shepherd’s pie, you’ll surely want to sink your teeth into this Puerto Rican street snack.

Similar to savory turnovers, empanadillas feature a crispy, golden-brown crust filled with a mouthwatering mix of potatoes and ground beef, and hopefully, a whole lot of cheese too, seasoned with sofrito and achiote, an earthy, sweet spice with hints of nuttiness. Popular fillings also include shrimp and lobster, but the possibilities are endless. A golden, crunchy shell gives way to the steaming hot, hearty filling that simply melts in your mouth.

You can even order a popular pizza version that’s filled with melted mozzarella, tomato sauce, and cheese. You’ll never look at pizza the same way again. Empanadillas are just a smaller version of empanadas — but don’t worry; that doesn’t mean you have to share.

You may have heard of arroz con pollo, but you haven’t truly experienced Puerto Rican cuisine until you’ve tried arroz con gandules, rice with pigeon peas. They say this meal is a Christmas Eve staple on the island, but that doesn’t mean you can’t sample this mouthwatering rice dish year-round. Light and fluffy rice, savory bacon drippings, salted pork, sofrito, and pigeon peas cooked in the same pot will send you to culinary heaven.

Arroz con gandules might make you think of the rice and peas you ate growing up, but pigeon peas are a totally different experience — they’re small, dense legumes that are nutty in taste with a crispy crunch. Combined with medium-grain rice for the perfect fluffy texture, you’ll be piling seconds onto your plate in no time.

Not to be confused with tamales, pasteles are traditionally made using green banana leaves stuffed with stewed pork meat, chicken, or salted cod. Sometimes yuca or other root vegetables are added to enhance the flavor of this local speciality. These tasty bites come together with masa, a corn dough that is pressed into the banana leaf.

Once the filling of choice is spooned into the center, the leaf is folded, tied with string, and covered in parchment paper before being boiled, unwrapped, and served. The resulting meal is soft and doughy with a rich flavor profile of hints of banana, salted meat, and of course, sofrito or achiote.

If you’re a plantain lover, you’re sure to enjoy amarillos, ripe plantains sliced into pieces and fried in oil until the outside is almost blackened, while the inside remains soft and sweet.

The trick to nailing this sweet, soft, and crunchy treat is choosing plantains that are nice and ripe, mostly brown and black on the outside. Add a little hint of flavor by sprinkling salt over them before serving. Amarillos are a staple snack or appetizer, but that you might as well make a meal out of them!

Keep the plantains coming! Mofongo is Puerto Rican comfort food at its finest, traditionally made with deep-fried green plantains mashed with salt-cured pork, garlic, and butter. Not a pork fan? The meat and spice variations in this dish are endless, and some stuff mofongo with stewed chicken, octopus, crab meat, or stewed vegetables.

When you find it on a menu, it can either be served as a side or a full entree, and is often topped with shrimp. Each bite is hearty, rich, and filling, but we bet you’ll still manage to lick your plate clean.

A true delicacy for meat lovers, lechón asado is a culinary feat like none other. First, a whole pig gets marinated in adobo, a zesty mix of oregano, black pepper, garlic, vinegar, and water. Then, the whole thing gets slowly roasted over coals for several hours until the skin is crispy and the meat is juicy and flavorful. This labor of love is well worth the reward: delicious, tender, fall-off-the-bone pork. Many restaurants in Puerto Rico use locally sourced pork, especially in Guavate. If you’re really searching for a unique foodie experience, don’t miss out on lechón asado.