I can't say how impressed I am with all the responses we got after the arepas video was posted yesterday! While it seems I got close, it was clear from the comments that I needed to make a few crucial changes. So, i made another small batch.
I used more water, so the dough was softer and didn't crack when I formed the arepas. I also didn't fry them, but cooked them on a dry (well, very super-lightly oiled) griddle. From the comments it was obvious this was a key, and after one taste I could tell why. It had a better crust and texture. Thanks to everyone who shared their knowledge!
Arepas Update 2.1
I just discovered these are killer grilled on leftover charcoal! Smoky, chewy, crispy goodness.
I still can't believe I've only just recently discovered arepas. I live in San Francisco, blocks away from one of the largest Latin-American neighborhoods in the country, yet somehow I'd never tasted an arepa?
All those wasted years I could have been eating this amazingly simple, yet brilliant concoction. Thank goodness one of the stops on a recent field trip to NYC was a hole-in-the-wall called Caracas Arepas Bar. It was at this east village eatery where I fell in love with a stuffed white corn cake.
Halfway through my first arepa, one stuffed with black beans, beef, plantains and salty cheese, I vowed to learn how to make these at home. Upon my return to San Francisco, I headed straight to the Mission, where the first Latin grocery store I checked had what I needed, harina P.A.N., a kind of boiled white corn meal vital to this recipe.
As you'll see in the video, if you can find this product, the rest is extremely simple. You make a dough with some salt and warm water, and then you fry patties until golden brown. The resulting corn cake, once split open and stuffed, is a tour de force of textual pleasure.
Sure the ingredients in a BLT all taste great, but it’s the perfect blend of textures that makes it a charter member of the sandwich hall of fame. Same goes for arepas. The golden brown outside gets crispy and crunchy, yet the inside stays soft, moist, and somewhat chewy.
It's a truly magnificent delivery system for any number of your favorite fillings. I went with some spicy pork and avocado, but you can also see a version I made a few days later, stuffed with caramelized plantains and salty goat feta. To die for.
Anyway, I hope you watch the video and decide that arepas need to be part of your life also. Here are some links to help you with what I promise will be a delicious journey. I hear you can get the P.A.N. corn meal at any Latin-American foods market, but it's also easy to find and order online. Here is an Ebay page with all sorts of options.
For ideas on what to stuff into these beauties, here's a link to the official Caracas Arepas Bar website. If you check out their downloadable menu, you can see what they use in theirs and go from there. I really hope you give these a try. Enjoy!
Note: at the time of this posting, I still hadn’t learned what P.A.N. stands for. If you know, please share. Thanks! Update: P.A.N. stands for National Alimentary Product.
Ingredients: (Note: I only made half a batch. These ingredients are for a full batch, which will give you about 8 arepas.)
2 1/2 cups tepid water 1 teaspoon salt about 2 cups of P.A.N. white corn meal (By the way, don't ask me if you can use other corn meals or flours, because I don't know!)
For even more information on making arepas, check out this great post from my friend Shauna's blog,Gluten-Free Girl and the Chef.
This recipe doesn't pretend to be anything it's not - this is simply a super-fast casserole that shares a few similarities to chicken enchiladas. If you are Mexican, and were/are lucky enough to enjoy authentic enchiladas, this will not remind you of Mom's - or even Dad's.
But having issued the standard ethnic recipe disclaimer, I'll say, these aren't bad. As long as you choose a high-quality green sauce and a decently cooked rotisserie chicken, you should end up with a nice, easy, fast dinner.
Please buy some good cheeses and grate them yourself. You'll see me using a pre-grated Mexican cheese blend, which was me not wanting to waste a product sample I had received for a review (the verdict? Grate your own cheese!)
This low-quality video was posted on YouTube a long time ago, but for whatever reason was never posted here. In fact, I don't even have a decent photo of the final dish, which is why you see this crappy screen shot here. Enjoy!
Ingredients: 1 rotisserie chicken 8 oz Monterey Jack cheese 8 oz cheddar cheese 1 tsp cumin 1 tsp salt 3 cups green enchilada sauce 10 corn tortillas 2 tbsp hot sauce Photo (c) Flickr user Sung Sook
As promised, here is my basic version of chilaquiles, a classic Mexican mixture of fried tortillas, cheese, and salsa verde, often made with eggs to produce one of the world's great breakfasts. Like all the great breakfasts of the world, it has been long touted as a superior hangover cure.
It's ability to revive the body, mind, and soul from the ravages of alcohol poisoning is reportedly second only to the famous Mexican soup, menudo. Since mendo takes much longer to make, and traditionally contains, among other things, brains, cheeks, tails, hooves, and other organs, I tend to prefer the chilaquiles as my remedy.
According to the extensive research I did regarding the name, and by that I mean the three minutes I spent on Wikipedia, the word "chilaquiles" is derived from the Nahuatl word chil-a-quilitl, which means "herbs or greens in chile broth."
I can't say how that particular recipe eventually became what you'll see here, but thankfully it did - I can't imagine a bowl of stewed greens in a chili broth would work as well after a late night out at Senor Diablo's Casa de Las Margaritas Grandes. Enjoy!
Ingredients for curing 2 hangovers: 5 eggs 3 corn tortillas 1/2 cup cheese 1/2 cup salsa verde vegetable oil salt and cayenne pepper to taste
Check Out These Other Great South-of-the-Border Video Recipes:
My all-time favorite fast food in the whole world is a Taco al Pastor. I live right next to the "Mission," which is San Francisco's Mexican neighborhood, and there are literally three or four taquerÃas per block selling this amazing treat.
It's a huge stack of thinly sliced pork, marinated in chili, pineapple juice, and other secret ingredients, piled up on a vertical spit and cooked rotisserie-style. The tender, aromatic meat is then sliced off and served on tortillas, usually with onions, cilantro, and a little hot sauce. It's too good to describe.
This pork recipe is NOT a true al pastor (fyi: shepherd-style), but simply a nice, easy marinade using some of the same ingredients to fairly delicious results. The main ingredient is the pineapple juice, which not only gives the meat a great flavor, but also has enzymes that makes it very tender.
Of course, I decided to use some pork tenderloin I had, which sort of defeats the purpose, but this marinade really pays dividends when using the much cheaper, and more traditional pork shoulder.
One of the key spices is cinnamon, which is no surprise since the origins of this recipe trace back to Lebanese immigrants living in Mexico City, where they were clearly showing off their shawarma-rich heritage. Lamb shawarma is a similar preparation, and you can watch me do a faux-version of that here.
This is one of those recipe that I just happened to have the camera on as I cooked. I didn't measure things, I forgot to film the cinnamon addition, and never even added cumin, another traditional spice. Nevertheless, it was wonderfully tender and tasty, and I'm happy to share it with you, flaws and all. Enjoy!
Note:Vimeo is still having sound issues, sorry.
Ingredients: 2 pork tenderloin 6 oz pineapple juice 4 cloves garlic 1 tsp chipotle 2 dried chiles Pasilla, seeds discarded 3 dried chiles Guajillo, seeds discarded cayenne to taste cumin, optional 1 tsp cinnamon 1 tbsp white vinegar salt to taste vegetable oil for grilling
Aunt Mary's was a popular brunch restaurant here in San Francisco that served a wonderfully homey array of Mexican and Salvadorian dishes. Michele and I used to go every Sunday for a late breakfast (that's what brunch used to be called). She would always get the Huevos Rancheros, and my usual was the Pollo en Crema, which is the subject of today's video recipe.
Sometimes it's fun to cook a recipe that ignores the standard techniques that usually rule the production of my food. This recipe is a simple boiled chicken - no browning, no deglazing, no reducing, and no layering of flavors. As you'll see, you just toss all the ingredients into a pot and simmer it until tender and delicious.
My standard ethic recipe disclaimer applies; I'm not, nor have I ever been, Salvadorian. This is what I used to get at a restaurant that claimed to serve Salvadorian food, and they called it Pollo en Crema. I'm sure those of you in the know will point out if, and how, this varies from the "real" authentic recipe, but what I can tell everyone is that this simple pot of chicken is great food. Enjoy!
Ingredients: 1 big chicken 1 onion 2 red bell pepper 2 jalapeno 2 Roma tomatoes 2 cloves garlic 1 tsp oregano 1 bay leaf cayenne 2 cups chicken broth 2 cups water 1 cup sour cream, or Mexican crema salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste fresh chopped cilantro
Gee, if I knew the reviews of RR's cooking skills were going to be so great I wouldn't have featured him! As you know, I work alone, but I guess I can share the spotlight for one more day. Here is something called Puerco Pibil, which I've never made, or know anything about, so I'll let Chef Rodriguez take it from here. Enjoy!
During culinary school I worked at a Mexican restaurant in Saranac Lake, NY, called Casa Del Sol. Which, as we used to joke, means "Casa of Sol." My favorite dish was the Chile Verde. Large chucks of pork shoulder simmered slowly in an exotic green sauce of tomatillos and chilies. The tomatillos we used were caned - and I was fascinated by the mysterious tomatillo graphics that decorated the label - but it wasn't until I arrived in California that I saw the real thing.
What an odd vegetable, or is it a fruit? As you will see in video, it sort of looks like a green tomato, which it isn't. It has this strange, veiny, paper covering, like a giant green gooseberry - and the flavor is even more perplexing. It's sort of tart, kind of sour, with hints of citrus and green apple. I sound like one of those wine geeks (no offense). Paired with sweet onions, and savory chicken, this recipe a great way to experience tomatillos for the first time. The real way to spell this recipe is "Chile" verde, not "Chili" verde. But, both spellings are used, and since this particular recipe is more about the chicken simmered in spicy sauce, than the green peppers, I used the Americanized "Chili." Enjoy!
Ingredients: 1 chicken, cut up in 6 pieces 8 tomatillos 2 jalapenos 6 cloves garlic 1/2 bunch cilantro 3 cups chicken stock 1 onion 2 tbsp cumin 2 tsp oregano 1 bay leaf 1 1/2 lb potatoes salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste yogurt or sour cream
Dulce de leche means "milk candy," and it's basically a thick caramel-like syrup made from slowly cooking milk and sugar. It is extremely popular throughout Latin America, and pound for pound, it's the world's most popular caramel confection.
Legend has it that a maid was making "lechada," a traditional boiled milk and sugar drink, and she forgot all about it. A few hours later she returned to find the pot bubbling with a thick caramel-colored syrup…dulce de leche was born. I'm sorry, but there is nothing worse than a boring "how this recipe was invented legend." Here's my version.
In 1836, an Argentinean dairy caught fire when it was hit with a bolt of lightning, during a terrible thunderstorm. The night watchman, Juan Manuel de Rosas, ran next door to the general store, "Walmartes" to grab a sack of salt, which in those days was commonly used to smother and put out fires. He accidentally grabbed a bag of sugar and began throwing handfuls everywhere. But, he was too late and the fire ended up burning down half the dairy. He panicked, stole a horse, and road out of town, never to be seen again (although rumors circulated that he moved to Peru and opened a shoe store).
When the firemen entered the building they found several pots of sugar-dusted milk that had slowly cooked near the fire. As the pots where being moved to start the clean-up, some of the mixture splashed on someone's hand, was licked off, and dulce de leche was born. Now that's a legend! I hope you try this simple and amazing sauce. Enjoy!
I can't say how impressed I am with all the responses we got after the arepas video was posted yesterday! While it seems I got close, it was clear from the comments that I needed to make a few crucial changes. So, i made another small batch.
