About Paquito

Pasteles are a traditional Puerto Rican recipe, and a cherished holiday dish among the Puerto Rican people. They are so beloved that a National Festival of Puerto Rican Pasteles is held every November in the city of Orocovis. The masa, or the dough, is typically made of grated green banana, yautia, green plantain, and calabazas. This dough is filled with a meat stew, typically containing some combination of pork, ham, achiote oil, onion, cilantro, tomato sauce, garbanzo beans, olives, and pimentos.  The dough and meat filling are wrapped up in a banana leaf and tied with string, then cooked in boiling water.  Alternatively, they can be frozen at this point for later use.  When cooked, the banana leaf is unwrapped and the delicious cooked dough filled with meat is eaten. They are usually served with a side of other holiday dishes, such as arros con gandules, or rice with pigeon peas. The ingredients of pasteles bring together a diverse range of ingredients with origins from around the world, but the roots of this recipe are reflected.

The complex process of making pasteles is an important holiday tradition. Because the process is so labor-intensive, some families today order the pasteles from caterers or buy them from a neighbor who is dedicated to the tradition. However, the families that do make pasteles themselves gather in the kitchen and form an assembly line. Each person has a job that has to be done hundreds of times to make a large quantity of pasteles. According to Roberto Múcaro Borrero, a Puerto Rican who is in touch with his culture’s traditions, “Even today, making pasteles is still a family affair, for example, your Mom might grate the yucca or guineo, while an aunt will prepare the masa, grandma could be seasoning the meat to perfection, and a cousin can literally wrap the whole process up nicely.”^[4] In Puerto Rico, the Christmas celebrations extend from Thanksgiving to January 6, Three Kings Day^[5], so when a family gathers together to make this dish, they sometimes prepare hundreds of pasteles to last through the holiday season.

The family recipe for pasteles is passed from mother to daughter in a tradition that has lasted hundreds of years. Pasteles were an important part of Puerto Rican culture hundreds of years ago and continue to contribute to Puerto Rican tradition today.