Borinquen Restaurant: Home of the Jibarito

Close your eyes and think of a sandwich. Now imagine taking the bread off of that sandwich and replacing it with some deep fried delicious. The marketing folks over at KFC have basically guaranteed that the image sliding around in your head is the logic defying entity hailed as The Double Down. KFC went there. With the kind of amoral curiosity possessed by Dr. Frankenstein, KFC took a modest bacon and cheese sandwich and replaced the bread with sliced of fried chicken. Until Tuesday I was having nightmares about the thing. Until Tuesday, I thought I would be stuck forever with dreams of flaccid fried chicken engulfing some limp piece of bacon oozing cheese onto my table. Thankfully, on Tuesday, I discovered a hero, a new breadless sandwich that led to far sweeter dreams. I discovered the Jibarito.

As it turns out, the Jibarito is a simple concept. Combine meat, cheese, tomato, lettuce, and mayo and slap it between two slices of flattened fried plantain. This elegant concoction supposedly got its start in Puerto Rico, but it really took off right here in Chicago in the late nineties. The sandwiches are available all over the city now, but if you want to go to the epicenter of the trend, head to Borinquen Restaurant over in Humboldt Park.

Don’t saunter into Borinquen expecting amenities like stellar service or candelabra. This place strays deep into hole in the wall territory. As you enter, you’ll pass through an antechamber that includes the takeout counter and the Kitchen. Eventually you’ll be seated in a large windowless room in the back. The place is supposedly bustling on the weekends and at lunch time, but when I went, it was pretty empty.  Still, on my trip, a large Puerto Rican family seemed to be enjoying a get together.

I tried both steak and pork Jibaritos. The experience is hard to describe. Perhaps the first thing you should know is that they are messy. As I picked mine up, I quickly began to question its structural integrity. With every bite, a small slice of lettuce would tumble onto my plate hinting at imminent disintegration. In my hands the sandwich struggled in a state of flux between existence and non-existence, constantly trying to eschew its sandwichhood for a more natural state. And yet, entropy did not win. The flavor of the cheap meat and cheese coalesced with each other and fused with the salty sweet counterpoint from the crunch plantains. Somehow the makers of the Jibarito take simple, even base ingredients, and transmute them into pure delicious. It is a work of culinary alchemy. As I swallowed my last bite, I was left with a yearning for more, but I know that I will never be able to relive the experience of my first Jibarito.

Information:

Name: Borinquen Restaurant
Price: Less than $10 for a full meal
Address: 1720 North California Ave
Phone: (773) 227-6038