Puerto Rican Vegetables: A Complete Nutrition Guide
Written by Isabel Vasquez RD, LDN
As a Puerto Rican and Dominican dietitian, I’m a big advocate of the nutritional value of my cultural foods. Although not many people think of Puerto Rican food as the epitome of health, it is actually full of nutrition.
Part of that is because we include a lot of veggies in our dishes! Just because we don’t tend to have a specific section of the plate dedicated to veggies, doesn’t mean they aren’t present in our meals.
Puerto Rican dishes tend to have veggies mixed in with other foods. One example is sancocho—a stew that’s often full of veggies like carrots, yuca, and potatoes. We also use veggies like onions and garlic in the majority of our cultural dishes!
Keep reading to learn about the nutritional value and uses of 16 Puerto Rican vegetables.
Avocado
Avocados are actually fruit, but they’re often eaten like veggies, so we had to include them on this list. They’ve been enjoyed in Puerto Rico for centuries with foods like rice and beans, plantains, eggs, and meat.
The avocados eaten in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean are different from the Mexican kind most often sold in the US. They’re bigger, lighter in color, and less creamy.
Avocados are jam-packed with nutrition. Research shows that eating avocados can improve the health of your gut microbiome, reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease, and improve cognitive health.
This is largely because they’re a good source of fiber, heart-healthy fats, potassium, antioxidants, and more, per the USDA.
Batata
Batata is a kind of sweet potato popular in Puerto Rico. It has white flesh similar to Japanese sweet potatoes.
Batata is one of a few root vegetables collectively known as “viandas” in Puerto Rico. It can be prepared boiled, roasted, fried, or mashed. It’s often served as a side dish or stuffed with meat and rice.
Although there isn’t much research on batata specifically, a 2022 study in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found that root vegetables can improve metabolic health through improving glucose levels, lipid profiles, and blood pressure.
The study found that they can also improve gut health by acting as prebiotics (food for the healthy bacteria in your gut) and reduce inflammation because of their antioxidants.
Beans
Puerto Rican food simply isn’t complete without beans. Although you may think of beans as a protein, they can count towards both your protein and vegetable intake, per the USDA.
Beans are part of what makes Latine food so nutritious. They provide protein without any saturated fat, which can support healthy cholesterol levels, per the American Heart Association.
They’re also full of fiber, iron, and potassium, per the USDA. A 2021 study in Nutrients found that beans can also promote metabolic and gut health, reduce inflammation, and even promote immune health.
Read our blog on the health benefits of beans for more info.
Carrots
Carrots are a staple part of sancocho, a Puerto Rican stew. These bright orange veggies owe their color to beta-carotene—an antioxidant that gets converted to vitamin A in the body.
In turn, they support your immune system, heart, lungs, and eyes, per the American Heart Association. Carrots are also full of fiber, B vitamins, vitamin K, and potassium.
Eggplant
Eggplant is used to make a Puerto Rican side dish called berenjena guisada (stewed eggplant). The dish is full of flavor thanks to ingredients like tomato paste, vinegar, garlic, cilantro, and bay leaves.
Eggplant is another food that’s technically a fruit but traditionally prepared like a veggie.
It’s full of antioxidants including phenolic acids and anthocyanins. The anthocyanins are actually what gives eggplant’s peel its bright purple color. These components can help promote metabolic health, reduce inflammation, and prevent cell damage, per a 2021 study in the journal Plants.
Garlic
Garlic—whether mashed, powdered, minced, or whole—is used in almost every Puerto Rican dish. It gives Puerto Rican food much of its distinct flavor.
Garlic is often overlooked as a veggie, which is a shame because it contributes nutrition to Puerto Rican dishes.
Some research, like this 2020 study in Antioxidants, shows that garlic may help protect against cancer, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, and diabetes. It has antioxidants that can help fight inflammation and lower blood lipids.
Green Bananas
Green bananas are another Puerto Rican fruit that’s typically prepared more like a veggie. They’re another starchy veggie that falls into the category of “viandas”.
They’re softer and smaller than plantains, although overall they are pretty similar.
Green bananas are often boiled and eaten with sliced cooked onions. The popular dish “guineos en escabeche” features boiled green bananas that are pickled in a mixture of vinegar, garlic, olives, and spices.
Nutritionally, they’re an especially good source of a type of fiber called resistant starch. A 2019 study in Nutrients found that green bananas can improve digestive health, insulin sensitivity, blood lipid markers, and inflammatory markers.
Ñame
Ñame is another type of root veggie. It’s often boiled and eaten with other root or starchy veggies like yautia and yuca.
Like most other root veggies, ñame is a good source of fiber and resistant starch. As the name suggests, resistant starch resists digestion in the small intestine.
This leads to the production of short-chain fatty acids that can help improve cholesterol, blood sugars, and gut health, per a 2022 study in the Journal of Functional Foods.
Onions
Onions go hand in hand with garlic in Puerto Rican cuisine. They give Puerto Rican food its distinct flavor yet they’re often overlooked as veggies.
Onions contain a specific type of fiber called inulin that acts as a prebiotic, feeding the good bacteria in your gut. It can also help lower blood sugars, prevent inflammation, reduce colon cancer risk, and prevent constipation, per a 2023 study in the journal Food & Function.
They’re also a good source of vitamin C, which promotes immune health and iron absorption from plant foods like beans, per the NIH.
Peppers
Peppers are another common Puerto Rican vegetable. Bell peppers and aji dulce are the most common peppers used in Puerto Rican cuisine.
Aji dulce is one ingredient in sofrito—an herb and veggie puree used as the base for many Puerto Rican dishes.
Just 1 cup of chopped sweet peppers has over 10% of the daily value (DV) of fiber, and over 20% of the DV of vitamin C, per the USDA.
Plantains
Plantains (or plátanos as they’re called in Spanish) are another common starchy veggie in Puerto Rican cuisine.
You can find them fried, baked, and mashed. One of the most famous Puerto Rican dishes is mofongo—mashed fried plantains typically flavored with salt, garlic, lime, and pork.
Their specific nutritional value varies based on how you prepare them, but in general plantains are full of nutrition.
They’re a great source of fiber, vitamin C, vitamin B6, folate, and potassium, per the USDA. In turn, they can support immune health, gut health, brain health, heart health, red blood cell formation, and blood pressure management.
Potatoes
Potatoes are commonly used in Puerto Rican sancocho. They’re also used to make potato salad and papas rellenas (stuffed potatoes).
Although you may think of them as a food to avoid because of their carbs, that is not the case. They’re full of fiber, resistant starch, vitamin C, and potassium, per a 2013 study in Advances in Nutrition.
This makes them beneficial for gut health, immune health, blood pressure, and more.
Pumpkin
Pumpkin is also known as calabaza in Puerto Rico. However, calabaza may also refer to other types of squash used in Puerto Rican cuisine.
It’s often cut and included in stewed beans. It’s also used to make cazuela—a custardy dessert.
The orange color of pumpkin signals its beta-carotene content. This is an antioxidant also found in carrots that can get converted to vitamin A in the body. It can promote immune and eye health, per a 2024 study in Food Science & Nutrition.
Tomatoes
Tomatoes are one of the most common ingredients in Puerto Rican cuisine. Not just fresh tomatoes, but tomato sauce or paste as well.
Although tomatoes are technically a fruit, they’re nutritionally similar to vegetables because they’re low in carbohydrates. This makes them a good option for people with diabetes.
Even though tomato sauce or paste doesn’t have as much fiber as whole tomatoes, it’s still a great source of the antioxidant lycopene.
This antioxidant has been shown to help mitigate oxidative stress linked with health issues like inflammation, diabetes, heart disease, and more, per a 2024 study in the Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism.
Yautia
Yautia is yet another root veggie that falls under the “viandas” category of Puerto Rican veggies. It’s also known as malanga, although some sources say these are slightly different veggies.
That said, like other root veggies, it’s full of resistant starch to support your gut and metabolic health.
Although there isn’t much research on the health benefits of yautia specifically, a 2019 study in the Journal of Functional Foods found that mice who were fed malanga had a significantly more diverse gut microbiome than those who were fed potatoes—an indicator of good gut health.
Yuca
Yuca is a fibrous root vegetable that’s often boiled and pickled just like guineos en escabeche. It has a distinct texture that’s grainy and thick. It’s one of my personal favorite Puerto Rican vegetables!
Yuca is a great source of fiber, potassium, vitamin C, and copper, per the USDA. In turn, it can promote iron absorption, gut health, heart health, and more.
Read our blog all about yuca for more information.
Final Thoughts
Despite most people assuming Puerto Rican food lacks veggies, our cultural dishes are actually full of them. Garlic and onion give flavor to many dishes, while root veggies and beans provide satiety with their carbs, fiber, and protein.
All in all, our Latin American cultural cuisines are worth celebrating! They’re full of nutrition, even if that includes veggies that aren’t commonly promoted in the US.
For education on how to ADD nutrition to your favorite Latine cultural dishes, make peace with food, and focus on your health without dieting, join our nutrition library for just $27/month.
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