Prep Time: 1 hour
Cook Time: 1 hour 27 minutes
Total Time: 2 hours 27 minutes
Servings: 8

Guineitos con Mollejas en Escabeche is a delightful Puerto Rican dish featuring tender chicken gizzards and green bananas, all soaked in a zesty pickling sauce. Mollejas en escabeche is a beloved staple on Puerto Rican tables. While it’s often enjoyed during the holidays and special celebrations, this delicious recipe is one we love to savor all year long.

Guineitos con mollejas en escabeche is a delightful Puerto Rican dish featuring tender chicken gizzards paired with green cooking bananas, all drenched in a tangy vinegar and oil sauce. I love to load my recipe with plenty of aromatics, but the standout flavors are creamy from the guineos, meaty from the gizzards, and a nice acidity from the escabeche sauce.
Pronounced ghee-nay-EE-toes cohn moh-YEH-hahs ehn ehs-cah-beh-CHAY, this dish is typically enjoyed as a main course, though it can also shine as a side or appetizer. The term guineitos verdes is the diminutive of guineo verde, which is what Puerto Ricans call a green cooking banana. Just a heads up—don’t mix up green cooking bananas with the yellow Cavendish bananas you might use in banana bread. While they belong to the same family, guineos are unripe and not sweet at all. So, this boiled green banana dish leans more towards the savory side.

Ingredients:

For the Guineitos con Mollejas:

• 680 grams chicken gizzards trimmed (see post), cut into 1/2-inch pieces, and rinsed
• 15 grams kosher salt
• 2 liters cold water for cooking the mollejas
• 6 green cooking bananas peeled and sliced covered with 500 ml of cold water

• 250 ml extra virgin olive oil
• 1 large (2 cups) red onion thinly sliced
• 8 grams kosher salt plus more to taste
• 90 grams sofrito
• 5 cloves garlic thinly sliced
• 125 ml white wine vinegar
• 65 ml lime juice (from 2 medium limes)
• 1 small (1 cup) red bell pepper sliced
• 45 grams manzanilla olives
• 8 grams capers
• 2 large bay leaves
• 1 teaspoon black peppercorns
• 1 teaspoon whole allspice berries
• 1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano leaves

To Serve:

• steamed white rice
• ripe avocado slices

Directions:

Simmer the Mollejas:

• Add the trimmed chicken gizzards (mollejas) to a 8-quart caldero along with the salt.
• Pour the cold water over the gizzards. Make sure it's covered at least 4 inches by the water. Bring the water up to a boil over medium-high heat.
• Once the liquid comes to a boil, decrease the temperature to medium-low.
• Cover the pot and simmer the gizzards for 45 minutes.
• After the gizzards have simmered for 45 minutes, or they're just tender to your preference, pour the bananas into the along with the water they were soaking in.
• Increase the temperature to medium-high and bring the liquid in the pot up to a boil. Once the water begins to boil, reduce the heat to medium-low and cover the pot.
• Simmer the bananas for 12-15 minutes, or until the guineos are fork-tender. 
• Pour the guineos con mollejas into a colander and rinse them with cool water.
• Allow them to drain in place while you prepare the escabeche sauce. 

Make the Escabeche Sauce:

• Rinse out the pot and return it to the stove.
• Add the oil to the pot and begin heating it over medium-high heat.
• Once the oil begins to shimmer in the pot, add the onion. Sprinkle the kosher salt evenly over the onions. Use a wooden spoon to stir the salt and the onions to combine.
• Sauté the onions for 5 minutes, frequently stirring to keep them from sticking to the bottom of the pot.
• Next, add the sofrito and garlic to the pot. Sauté these for 1-2 minutes or until the garlic looks glossy, stirring frequently.
• Add the white wine vinegar and lime juice to the pot, along with the red bell pepper, olives, capers, bay leaves, peppercorns, allspice berries, and oregano to the pot.
• Stir to combine and bring this up to a rapid simmer.
• Cover the pot once the liquid comes to a simmer and reduce the temperature to low.
• Cook the escabeche for 10 minutes stirring once or twice.  

Return the Guineitos and Mollejas To the Pot:

• After 10 minutes, return the guineitos and mollejas to the pot and use a spoon to gently fold them into the escabeche sauce.
• Cover the pot and turn the stove off. Leave the pot on the stove and allow the guineitos and mollejas to warm through for 5-10 minutes before serving.
• Serve the guineitos con mollejas en escabeche as a main dish with steamed white rice and slices of ripe avocado.
• You can also serve it on its own as an appetizer.

Tips & Notes:

• If you leave your mollejas in bigger pieces, increase the simmering time. Larger pieces can take up to 2 hours to tenderize, which is why I recommend cutting the gizzards into bite-size pieces. 
• Mollejas are ready to move forward in the recipe if they have just a small amount of chew to them like calamari or steak. If the gizzards still have a bit more chew that's okay because they will continue cooking for 12-15 minutes while you cook the bananas. 
• If your guineos are really green, they may be hard to peel. To loosen the peel, soak them for 10 minutes in hot tap water after cutting off the ends and cutting a slit down the back and front of the banana. 
• Add your whole peppercorns and allspice berries to a tea strainer or a cheesecloth satchet. Remove them just before stirring in the bananas and gizzards. This will make eating the guineitos con mollejas easier. 

Pressure Cooker Method:

• Trim and rinse the gizzards as recommended.
• Add them to a pressure cooker pot with just one cup of water and 1 tablespoon of salt.
• Seal the pressure cooker according to the manufacturer's instructions, then bring the pressure cooker up to "high pressure." Set the time to cook for 25 minutes.
• Allow the pressure cooker to depressurize naturally for 15 minutes before draining and rinsing and proceeding with the recipe as instructed.

Swaps and Substitutions:

• Green cooking bananas are not the same as yellow Cavendish bananas or plantains. Ask your produce manager for ungassed bananas.
• You can replace the guineos with 2 large green plantains that are peeled, cut in half, then sliced into 1/2-inch thick pieces.
• All poultry have a gizzard, so you can make this recipe with gizzards from any bird you'd like.
• To replace the gizzards for chicken:
• Skip the boiling step and, instead, bake or sauté 1 1/2-pounds (680 grams) of diced boneless, skinless chicken thighs, to an internal temperature of 165°F (74°C).
• Dice the meat and fold it into the escabeche sauce with the boiled guineos. 
• Replace the white wine vinegar and/or the lime juice with white distilled vinegar. This will make the escabeche more harsh.

Storage and Reheating Instructions:

• Transfer leftover guineitos to a food storage container and refrigerate them for up to 3 days. 
• Eat them cold or warm them slightly (or completely) in the microwave when you're ready to eat them. 
• Consume whatever you reheat in the same day. Don't return reheated mollejas to the fridge. 
• Freezing Instructions (Not Recommended):
• Cool the guineitos and mollejas completely.
• Transfer them to a freezer-safe container.
• Freeze them for up to 2 months.
• Thaw them completely in the fridge when you're ready for them, then enjoy or reheat as recommended above.

Nutrition:

Calories: 540kcal, Carbohydrates: 45g, Protein: 18g, Fat: 34g, Saturated Fat: 5g, Polyunsaturated Fat: 4g, Monounsaturated Fat: 23g, Trans Fat: 1g, Cholesterol: 230mg, Sodium: 1386mg, Potassium: 867mg, Fiber: 4g, Sugar: 20g, Vitamin A: 1696IU, Vitamin C: 33mg, Calcium: 46mg, Iron: 4mg