Pasteles de Yuca

Friends,

For virtually every Puerto-Rican family, holiday food always consists of pasteles. However, for those of you who are familiar with pasteles, you know that a lot of work goes into the preparation of this holiday meal. While pasteles are typically made with plantains, squash, yautia, and green bananas, an easier and less cumbersome recipe consists of making the pasteles out of yuca. What is more, there is no grating required.

Here is my take on pasteles de yuca.
1 Package of pork shoulder chops
1 Boullion cube
Adobo to taste
4 sprigs of Cilantro (about)
2 Garlic cloves
2 medium sweet peppers (ajies) - these are small sweet peppers found where the cilantro is.
Dried oregano to taste
1 Olives
2 1.5 oz packs of raisens
1 small can of garbanzo beans
1 tablespoon of tomato paste or 1 small can of tomato sauce
1 package of frozen grated yuca (found in the freezer section with other Spanish frozen foods)
1/2 of a medium sized acorn squash
3 medium sized potatoes
1/3 cup of achiote (annato seeds)
1 roll of Pasteles paper
1 roll of string for tying pasteles

Start by emptying your yuca mixture into a large bowl then peal your potatoes and put your squash and potatoes to boil together. You can actually leave the skin on the squash and remove it after it boils and cools off. When the potatoes and squash are boiled, place them in a bowl (not the yuca bowl) and mash. After they are well mashed, place them in the yuca bowl. Next, take the pork shoulder chops off the bone and reserve the bone. Once all of the meat is removed from the bones, boil the bones with the boullion cube. While that is boiling, take your meat and cut up into small pieces and season with adobo. In a mortar, place your cilantro, pealed garlic cloves, and two sweet peppers, season with a little oregano and pound away until your mixture forms a green paste. Season the meat with this grean paste. Put a little corn oil in a frying pan. enough to circle the bottom of the pan. Once the oil gets hot, place your seasoned meat in the pan and add your olives, raisens, and garbanzo beans. Cover your pan with a lid until the meat begins to brown. Once the meat begins to brown, add a tablespoon of tomato paste or a small can of tomato sauce. Cover and allow to cook. If meat begins to dry, add a little water to loosen up.

After your meat is cooked heat up about a half cup of corn oil and add the achiote. Allow the achiote to heat until your oil turns a bright orange. Do not let this burn.

Open your paper keeping all of the sheets together so that your mixtures do not seep through. Season your yuca mix with adobo and the pork stock that you prepared with the pork bones. Add a little bit of the achiote mixture and a little bit of your meat juices and mix well.

On a pasteles sheet, place a little bit (a little less than a tablespoon) onto the middle of your pasteles paper. The middle of your paper should have an orange blotch on it. In that orange blotch, place a large ricespoon serving of the yuca mixture, and in the middle of that, place a little of the meat mixture. Then take your paper and begin to wrap your pasteles. Have both ends of your paper meet, make a long thin fold, then fold over. You should have a long crease along the middle of your pastel. Fold over your two ends and set aside. Prepare another pastel, and when you have two of them ready, tie them together with your string like a gift package. Ill try to get a picture posted so you can see what this is supposed to look like. Those of you who are familiar with pasteles should not have a problem, but those of you who are not familiar with pasteles are not likely to know what I'm talking about.

After your pasteles are wrapped and tied, you can put them to boil in a pot of water. Be sure to add some salt to the water, and let the pasteles boil for about 1 hour. This recipe should render a little over a dozen pasteles. You can freeze the pasteles you don't plan to immediately eat and boil them when you're ready.

For me, this is Christmas. If you wish to make traditional pasteles, then instead of using yuca, take out your graters and grate 6 green plantains, 4 green bananas and 3 yautias in addition to the potatoes and squash instructions I stated above. All other instruction remain the same. The yuca pasteles are just as tasty and much less work.

Buen provecho!

Sancocho de Habichuelas / Bean stew

Well friends, fall is here and winter will soon be upon us. Without a doubt, the cold weather draws my appetite toward comfort food. One comfort food that warms the insides is a sancocho de habichuelas. This recipe was initially given to me by a dear friend named Elba. Though I can no longer remember Elba's last name, I promise you that this sancocho will be a memorable one. Throughout the years, I have worked at making this sancocho my own. Here's what you'll need:

• One small bag of roman beans
• 3 Chicken boullions
• One medium onion
• One pepper (preferably yellow, orange, or red)
• Three large cloves of garlic
• Adobo
• Five sweet peppers (ajies dulce)
• Dried oregano
• Corn Oil
• 1 tbs Tomato paste
• A bunch of Cilantro with stems (be generous with this)
• 4 sweet plantains (yellow, sweet but not over ripe)
• 2 green plantains
• 1 large wedge of squash (calabaza/auyama)
• A small pack of loose pork ribs (not a rack)
• One tbs sugar

Preparation:

• The evening you make the sancocho, put the beans in water
• The next day, drain the beans and fill a small-medium stock pot with water, but not to the top. Leave enough room for the remaining ingredients.
• Add a little corn oil (about 2 tbs), chicken boullions, beans, onions, pepper, adobo and a tablespoon of tomato paste
• In a mortar, place your garlic cloves and sweet peppers (ajies) and sprinkle with dried oregano and pound with the pestil unil a paste develops. Put half of this mixture in your pot of beans and reserve the other half for the ribs.
• Place your ribs into a bowl and season with adobo from the mortar mixture
• In a pan, fill with a little corn oil. Just enough to coat the bottom of the pan. Sprinkle a tablespoon of sugar in the pan and allow to caramelize. Once the sugar turns dark brown (it'll seem like it's burning), place your seasoned ribs in the pan and cover immediately. The ribs will sizzle, but when the sizzling simmers down, give the ribs a turn so that they absorb the caramelized coating.
• Clean your cilantro, and tie a string around it and place in pot of beans
• Once beans are soft and the ribs are cooked, place ribs inside the pot of beans. Reserve some of the left over sauce from the ribs pan.
• Cut your sweet plantains in thick round slices and place in your bean pot
• Cut your squash in squares and place in the bean pot
• Finely grate your green plantains and mix the grated plantains in the rib sauce and form round dumplings and place the dumplings into the bean pot.

Cook until the squash, plantains, and dumplings are done. The stew should be very thick by this time.

I know this sounds like a lot, but it's really uncomplicated, relative to other sancochos. I higly recommend this one. It's actually my favorite sancocho.

Enjoy.

Fried Chicken

Folks,

One of my favorite comfort foods is fried chicken. Here is my version of slamming fried chicken.

First, you have the option of retaining the skin or taking it off. I personally remove the skin. However, please note that if you wish to keep the skin then you have to make sure you clean it well by burning off any left over feathers and squeezing out any black heads and removing excess fat under the skin. Otherwise, just take off the skin and the excess fat. I personally opt for removing the skin and excess fat altogether. It's actually easier to clean this way and there is no compromise in flavor.

Anyway, this recipe is actually pretty easy. Here's what you'll need:

• About 1 cup of vegetable oil
• About 6 chicken parts (ideally any combination of legs, thighs, and breasts)
• Lawry's seasoned salt
• Black pepper
• Paprika
• 1 cup of all purpose flour
• 1 packet of Sazón with azafran

• Put vegetable oil in frying pan under medium heat. Make sure the frying pan is large enough to fit your 6 pieces of chicken comfortably, but not too large.
• Season chicken with seasoned salt, black pepper and paprika. In a separate bowl mix flour with Sazón.
• Coat chicken with flour and Sazón mixture. You can do this by placing the chicken into the mixture, covering the top of the bowl with a plate and shaking it until it is evenly coated.
• Once chicken is coated, sprinkle a tidbit of flour into vegetable oil. If it fizzles, then the oil is hot, which means you can start frying your chicken
• Allow chicken to fry well on one side before turning it. The chicken should be well fried on all sides and be a deep golden brown when it's done.

You can even apply this recipe to chicken wings. In fact, this recipe will definitely render SLAMMING wings.

Crab Cakes

Friends,

Here is a simple crab cake recipe I think you'll enjoy.

Here's what you'll need:

• About 1 pound of lump crab meat
• 1 diced medium onion
• About 1/3 cup of diced red pepper
• Black pepper to taste
• Celery seed to taste
• Cayenne pepper to taste
• Paprika to taste
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• 1 tablespoon of dijon mustard
• 1 cup of mayonnaise
• The juice of 1 lime
• 5-6 slices of white bread with the edges trimmed

Combine your crab meat, diced onion, diced red pepper, black pepper, celery seed, cayenne pepper, paprika, sugar, mustard, mayonnaise and lime juice in a bowl. Next take your white bread and tear it up into small pieces forming crumbs. This can also be done by putting the bread in a food processor or blender. Add your bread crumbs to the remainder of the ingredients in your bowl and mix well. Finally you can begin forming your crab cakes.

One way to go about shaping your crab cakes is to take a 1\3 sized measuring cup and pack the crab cake mixture inside of it then release the mixture so that it takes the shape of the cup. You can also spray the bottom of the cup with cooking spray to prevent the mixture from sticking.

You can fry your crab cakes in vegetable or canola oil. Allow your crab cakes to fry well on one side before flipping it over.

When you're done frying the crab cakes, place them on a paper towel and allow any excess grease to drain off.

Bread Pudding (Pudín)

One of my favorite desserts is bread pudding. While there are probably hundreds of bread pudding recipes, my hope is that you will not hesitate to try this one. It is usually a hit at family gatherings, and my hope is that it will be a hit with you as well. Enjoy!

• Preheat Oven to 350 degrees

Caramel

• 1 cup of sugar
• 1/2 cup of water

Bread Pudding

• One 20 oz loaf of sliced white bread
• Two 12 oz cans of evaporated milk
• One 15 oz can of coconut cream
• One 14 oz can of sweetened condensed milk
• 1/3 cup of dark rum
• Two 1.5 oz boxes of raisens
• Powdered cinnamon to taste

Caramel:

Begin by making the caramel. Pour the sugar and water into a sauce pan and cook under medium heat (undisturbed) until the mixture turns into a golden caramel and pour into a 9 x 13 inch pan.

Bread Pudding:

Begin by breaking up the bread slices as finely as you can then mix all of the remaining ingredients sprinkling your mixture with cinnamon.

Pour your pudding mixture into your caramelized pan. Then prepare a waterbath by taking another larger pan and pouring approximately 2 inches of water into it and place that pan into the oven first. Take the pan containing the pudding mixture and place that pan into the larger one in the oven and allow to bake for about 45 minutes or until you can stick a tookpick into it and it comes out clean.

When you remove the bread pudding from the oven, cut up into squares.

BBQ Ribs or Pork Chops

Folks,

It seems like everyone has a special recipe for ribs, but just in case you don't, here's my recipe. This is pretty useful if you don't have a grill or wood chips to smoke your ribs, yet still wickedly flavorful.

First, preheat your oven to 300 degrees, no higher. The idea is to cook your ribs low and slow.

If you choose the pork chops, I highly recommend you use the pork shoulder chops.

First prepare a rub with the following ingredients to taste:

• Brown sugar
• Seasoned salt
• Black Pepper
• Cayenne Pepper
• Paprika
• Dried or powdered mustard (Optional)

After preparing this rub, rub it into your meat and put your meat in a baking pan and into the oven and allow to cook for one hour without disturbing.

While your meat is beginning to cook, prepare your BBQ sauce by mixing the following ingredients together:

• A cup of vegetable oil
• A cup of white or apple cider vinegar
• A cup of white sugar
• 1/3 cup of soy sauce
• 2 cups of ketchup
• Hot sauce to taste
• 1/4 cup of any brand of BBQ sauce that has hickory
• Seasoned salt to taste
• Black pepper to taste
• Cayenne pepper to taste
• Paprika to taste
• Dried or powdered mustard to taste (optional)

Mix your wet ingredients well and taste to ensure that the flavors are balanced and/or to your liking.

After the meat has cooked for an hour, take a large cooking spoon (not a brush) and baste your ribs every 20-30 minutes until they are done. Depending on how much meat you're cooking, they should take between 3-4 hours to cook; but when they're done they should come off the bone.

Please trust me on this one. The ribs/pork chops will be delicious.

Fabulous Flan

Borrowed from my Advents and Journeys Blog.

The recipe is really easy. Just follow these steps.

Begin by making the caramel: In a small frying pan or sauce pan using medium heat, add 1/2 cup of sugar and 1/4 cup of water without stirring until the mixture begins to form a dark golden color. Once this mixture becomes golden, immediately remove from the heat and pour into a pyrex. The smaller the pyrex, the taller the flan. The bigger the pyrex, the flatter the flan. Use your judgment. I don't know the exact size of the pyrex I currently use (sorry). Refrigerate this mixture, allowing it to cool.

• Prepare the flan:
  Pre - heat oven to 350 degrees
  Fill a squared pan with about 2 inches of water. This pan should be large enough to accomodate your pyrex, and place into the oven. In a blender combine the following ingredients:
  1 twelve ounce can of evaporated milk
  1 can of condensed milk
  4 eggs
  1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
  

For a cheese flan just add an eight ounce package of cream cheese (I highly recommend this)

Remove the pyrex from the refrigerator and pour the flan mixture into the pyrex

Open the oven and place the pyrex into the square pan. There should at least be a 2 inch distance between your pyrex and this pan

Cooking time: approximately 1 hour (about 1 hour and 45 minutes for the cheese version).

Pastelón Dominicano

Thursday, July 06, 2006 - Borrowed from my Advents and Journey's Blog.

Growing up, my mother used to make a yummy pastelón with really ripe fried plantains, ground meat and eggs. While this was the pastelón I was introduced to early in life, I was completely blown away by my Dominican comadre's version of pastelón.

If you enjoy sweet plantains, then you are sure to love this recipe.Here's what you need:

1 Tbs of salt
9 ripe yellow plantains (just yellow ripe, not extremely ripe)
About 4 tbs of corn oil
About a pound of ground beef
Sofrito (ground cilantro, sweet peppers, garlic cloves, onion, green pepper)
Adobo seasoning
1/2 cup of water
1 Tbs of Tomato paste
1 pound of sliced mozzerella cheese

First:
Take a large pot (large enough to fit the 9 plantains), fill it with water and add the salt
Peel the plantains, cut them in half, and slice in the middle. (One plantain should render 4 slices.)
Once the water comes to a boil, add the plantains

Second:
Put the oil in a medium to large frying pan.
Put the ground meat in a bowl and season with adobo and sofrito.
Place the ground meat mixture in the frying pan, stirring the whole time, while the meat browns under low heat. This allows the meat to separate and not clump together.

Once the meat turns brown, add water, stir in the tomato paste, and cover the pan until the meat is thoroughly cooked. You'll know when it's cooked, because the the meat will develop a thick sauce.

Third:
Once your plantains are cooked, remove them from the pot without draining the water.

As you remove the plantains mash them with a potato masher, adding some of the boiled water to ensure that they come out smooth

Once the plantains are mashed, line the baking pan with a layer of the mashed plantains. The next layer will be your ground meat, and the following layer will be your sliced mozzarella. You then seal this with another layer of mashed plantain, and top with your slices of mozzarella cheese.

Final Step:
Place your casserole in a 350 degree oven for about 35 minutes. You'll know when this is done, because the cheese will begin to bubble...yum.

Enjoy,
Alma

Easy Turnovers

Everyone,

Here's an easy turnover recipe that I tried out during the holidays.

Ingredients:

A package small of Goya turnover pastry discs.
A package of cream cheese
1 tablespoon of butter
Powdered sugar
One package or can of guava paste (or fruit paste of choice)
1/3 cup of Granulated sugar
1 tablespoon ground Cinnamon
Vegetable oil (for frying)

Instructions:

• Cut the discs in half
• Mix about 1/2 cup of powdered sugar and the butter into your cream cheese. Mix it well.
• Place about 1 teaspoon of cream cheese and a teaspoon of guava paste into pastry half then fold over and crimp with fork. Continue this process. The package brings 10 pastry discs, but since you cut it in half, you should end up with twenty little pastries.
• Fry the pastries in the vegetable oil
• Combine the cinnamon and granulated sugar together and pour over the fried pastries.
• Dust the pastries with the powdered sugar. Make sure both sides are covered.

Enjoy!

Spinach Flan

Here's a simple recipe for a spinach flan that's really easy and delicious!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Ingredients:

1 box of frozen Spinach
1/4 cup of butter
1 8oz container of Heavy cream
4 eggs
1 medium wedge of fontina cheese

Preparation:

• Heat your spinach in a sauce pan with butter
• Pour 8 oz container of heavy cream into a blender and mix until the cream is looks fluffy
• Add eggs into blender with the heavy cream one at a time and blend after each addition
• Add spinach mixture to mixture in blender and blend
• Grate fontina cheese and add to mixture in blender
• Spray ramekens with cooking spray and pour blender contents into ramikens. Ramekens should not be more than 3/4 full. If you fill all the way to the top, the contents can flow out.
• Place ramekens in a water bath then place in oven. The water bath should be a pan that is large enough to fit all of the ramekens prepared and the water in the pan should not exceed 2 inches.