Back in June, 2017, Sotirios ‘Sam’ Panopoulos passed away in London, Ontario, Canada. While you’ve likely never heard of Sam, you know him well through his iconic dish, the Hawaiian Pizza – That creation, loved or reviled, came from the mind of a 28 year old Greek immigrant to Canada. I’m here to declare, formally, that I love Hawaiian pizza – and maybe you should too.
Sam Panopoulos, The Man
Sam and a couple of brothers owned the Satellite restaurant in Chatham, Ontario, due east across Lake Saint Clair from Detroit. It was the early 60’s, so a place called the Satellite was very fashion forward, indeed. They served a mishmash of stuff, from burgers to Chinese food made by a Chinese chef. He later noted that it was the Chinese penchant for blending elements of the five major tastes in a dish that got him thinking about inventing a pizza – He’d enjoyed eating that in Italy and the US, and thought he might be able to come up with something original. He was right.
Truth? A lot of chain Hawaiian pizza sucks.
Today’s version of the Hawaiian pizza is not what Sam started with. His shining contribution was the pineapple – Canned Dole pineapple, which begat the Hawaiian thing. He later recalled that, in Canada at that time, “People only put on mushroom, bacon and pepperoni, that’s all. I had pineapple in the restaurant and I put some on, and I shared with some customers and they liked it. And we started serving it that way. For a long time, we were the only ones serving it.”
Sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and umami. Get the mix right, and things can be delightful. What Sam had done was add a tacitly sweet note to what was, as he noted, a pretty heavy mix. Yet pineapple did more than that – It added acid, which cut the fatty mix of cheese and meat, and offered a minor sour note as well. It may seem wrong, but I think it was brilliant, and the explosion of that now legendary combo on the world of pizza would seem to support that.
Now, the Hawaiian is almost always tomato sauce, mozzarella, ham, and pineapple. It is surprising to me that seemingly equal faction either love the combination or loath it. The President of Iceland recently denounced it, (albeit tongue in cheek), prompting Canadian PM Trudeau to quip, “I have a pineapple. I have a pizza. And I stand behind this delicious Southwestern Ontario creation.” Many chefs have vilified the thing, from Gordon Ramsay To Tony Bourdain, sometimes prompting outraged defenses in response from yet other chefs. Somewhere in print, the haters actually invoked Godwin’s Law, and declared that those who like Hawaiian pizza are ‘worse than hitler.’
What is it about pineapple on pizza that’s so polarizing? Purists cite Neapolitan roots and flatly state that pineapple has no place there – I imagine these folks have kittens over quite a few other ingredients as well. Sweet notes in a pizza certainly aren’t taboo – Hell, that’s what tomatoes do, for cryin’ out loud – and pineapple has been eaten in Italy for a long, long time. In the states, it’s a top ten fruit, so it’s not broadly disliked here either. Google the first sentence of this paragraph and you get a whole raft of discussions and levels of intensity – It’s interesting, but all that stuff doesn’t necessarily answer the question.
The whole thing really seems to boil down to two arguments – either that pineapple just doesn’t belong on pizza, or that it just doesn’t taste good – To both, I call bullshit. If you like pineapple, and want to use it, do so. If you’re running a pizzeria that swears eternal fealty to all the arcane rules of the game, then by all means, don’t. If you don’t like the taste, no matter what, then don’t eat it – it’s that simple. But if you’re cooking at home, and you want to, then to paraphrase Alton Brown, by God, have pineapple.
As for the taste thing, fact is, this is often enough true. A poorly made pizza isn’t likely to taste good at all – but that’s easily remedied. Let’s face it, a notable chunk of commercial pizza from big name chains and the stuff at the grocery store is crap – They’re not generally made with love and care, and you get what you pay for. Change that, and it’s delicious.
Great Hawaiian pizza is all about balance of flavors
Tony Bourdain infamously had nothing good to say about Hawaiian pizza, (most of it highly profane, I might add). Yet he was forced to swallow his smartass comments when, in Rome, he ran into Gabriele Bonci of Pizzarium. Chef Bonci does pizza right – great dough, top notch ingredients, just a few things combined on each slice. Bourdain made the Hawaiian crack, and Bonci immediately said ‘No, is good,’ and made some. They both agreed it was good, but not great. Then Bonci disappeared for a few minutes and came back with a sauté of onion and hot peppers added, and bingo – Even Tony had to admit it rocked.
Homemade sauce makes the pizza
That harkens all the way back to what Sam Panopoulos said about first offering pineapple on pizza – It was added to whatever you liked. It’s all about balance, and what Sam gleaned from Chinese food was a well balanced thing. Love it or hate it, the fact that it flourishes decades after its inception says it’s true.
The secret to great Hawaiian pizza? Chiles!
So, if you’re not from the hater camp, try it done right. Fresh pineapple is always best, but truth? Canned will work fine if you blend and cook it well. You don’t need to use fancy ham, but you sure can if you want, or sub bacon, or whatever porky deliciousness you prefer. Make or buy great dough, sauce, and use as much fresh stuff as you’ve got for toppings. What you see in the images herein was made with fresh dough, tomatoes, onions, garlic, jalapeños, and basil out of our garden, and locally made smoked scamorza cheese. Use different chiles if you like, red onion, maybe a few capers for a bitter note – experiment, have fun, and surrender to Sam.
Great homemade Hawaiian pizza
One interesting side note – Sam died one year to the day before Bourdain took his own life in France.
Gazpacho is an old, old dish, but the version you probably know is all about New World ingredients.
This was posted back a few months, when we were having technical difficulties. Now that it’s stupid hot in most of the country, (and we’ve got the technical stuff fixed), I figure it’s a good time to repost.
Gazpacho is often considered a strictly summer dish, although it needn’t be so. A cold, veggie-based soup makes a great side for something heavy like smoked meats, a hot bean dish – anything for which a cool, tart sip would make a nice counterpoint or palate cleanser.
Gazpacho is wholly embraced as Spanish in origin, and may well be, although the roots likely go deeper than that. Rome overran Spain roughly 2,200 years ago, and brought with them, among other things, a gruel or mush made predominantly of bread and oil – and the Latin word ‘caspa,’ a reference to breadcrumbs, and the likely root of ‘gazpacho’. Like all great dishes there are now variants from all over the globe, but the Spanish and Portuguese versions are still the most well known.
The gazpacho you’re likely familiar is Andalusian in origin – that rich orange-red tomato based stuff, redolent of garlic, fresh veggies, and good olive oil. Fact is, this variant didn’t show up until very late in the development of the dish. For literally millennia, it was more likely a close mirror to the original (and relatively boring), Roman version. What made it what it is today is the garlic and almonds from Central Asia, olives from Greece, cucumbers from India, brought to España by the Romans and the Moors. Add tomatoes, tomatillos, avocados and chiles from Mexico and South America hauled home by Spanish and Portuguese conquerors, and that’s the magic that converted the mundane into the sublime.
There are many variations on the central gazpacho theme – Red, green, and white, smooth or chunky, mild or fiery, some more like salsa than soup, and all are delightful. Not all variants are purely veggie based – Everything from almonds to watermelon and green grapes may find their way into the mix. Fish or meat get in there too, as with Mexican gazpacho ceviche, or Portuguese versions loaded with local ham.
Traditionally, whatever is to go in the mix is rough chopped and tossed into a large vessel, then pounded with a mortar, strained, and deseeded. Nowadays, a blender or food processor is more often employed. The old ways are preferred by those who insist that a completely smooth and even consistency is contrary to the spirit of the dish and frankly, and I kind of agree – Enough so to approve of using modern methods, but leaving things a bit more on the rustic side, at any rate.
While the vast majority of gazpachos are served cold, that doesn’t mean that you can’t heat up the ingredients a bit – Roasting, grilling, or broiling veggies intensifies their flavors and deepens sweetness – That can be a thing to try with just an ingredient or two, or the lion’s share, as you please. Gazpacho is a perfect vehicle for home gardens, when you are looking at your yield and wondering what you can do with all that, as well as a great thing to do with stuff that has to get out of the fridge and go to work before it goes bad, (and if things are kind of on their last legs, roasting may be just the ticket.)
Here’s a few basics to get you going, then you should branch out and make them yours.
Gazpacho Andaluz – I’ve been making this version since the late ‘60s, when a Spanish friend of my mom’s showed me the ropes.
4-5 ripe Tomatoes.
1 Cucumber.
1 medium Bell Pepper, (Red, orange, or yellow, as you like, or that needs to get used)
1-3 cloves fresh Garlic.
2 thick slices Bread, (something with a dense crumb, dried out overnight)
1/3 cup extra virgin Olive Oil.
2 Tablespoons Cider Vinegar.
1 Cup Vegetable Stock
Fine grind kosher Salt, fresh ground Pepper, and ground Chile to taste.
If you want to roast, grill, or char your veggies, do that first, and then allow them to cool to room temperature.
Remove crusts from bread and toss into a bowl just big enough for the slices. Cover with the veggie stock and allow that to soak for 15 to 20 minutes.
Peel, core, seed and rough chop tomatoes, cucumber, pepper and garlic. Throw all those into a blender or processor and pulse just to get them incorporated.
Grab your bread and squeeze it into a ball as hard as you can.
Pour off the stock into a measuring cup, in case you need some further on in the process.
Crumble the bread back into the bowl, then add the oil and vinegar. Mix well to fully incorporate.
Slowly add the bread/oil/vinegar blend to the veggie mix while pulsing the blender or processor on low until you get the consistency you like – You want a nice, relatively thick soup that will coat a spoon, but you can leave that mix on the rustic side, or go all the way to a purée, as you wish.
If your mix is too thick, thin it out by pulsing in a little more stock.
You can go with the gazpacho as is, or, if you really want things smooth, pour it into a single mesh strainer and carefully force the soup through with your fingers.
Place soup in a glass bowl or container and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, and up to overnight.
When you’re ready to eat, taste the gazpacho and then season minimally with salt and pepper. Provide more of those, plus fine ground chiles, at the table.
Serve with additional garnishes that float your boat – Chopped dry cured chorizo, Jamon Iberico, hard-boiled egg, cilantro, diced tomato, cucumber, onion or shallot, chiles or sweet peppers, pico de gallo, celery leaf, chives, fresh mustard greens, any quick pickled veggie blend you like, sour cream or crema, are all wonderful.
Gazpacho Verde
4 large Tomatillos
4 Green Onions (Scallions)
1 Green Bell Pepper
1 English Hothouse Cucumber
2 Green Chiles (New Mexican, anaheim, jalapeño, or serrano – i.e. heat level as you prefer)
2 cloves fresh Garlic
1 Cup Greek Yogurt
1/2 Cup Avocado Oil
1/4 Cup Veggie Stock
1/4 Cup Cider Vinegar
2 thick slices Bread, (something with a dense crumb, dried out overnight)
1 fresh Lime
Fine ground Kosher Salt
Freshly ground Pepper
Ground Piment d’Espelette chile
If you want to roast, grill, or char your veggies, do that first, and then allow them to cool to room temperature.
Husk, stem, and quarter tomatillos.
Stem, seed and rough chop pepper and chiles.
smash, peel, trim, and mince garlic.
Trim and rough chop green onions.
Slice cuke in half, deseed, then rough chop.
Zest and juice lime.
Remove crusts from bread and tear into roughly 1” pieces.
In a large, non-reactive mixing bowl, add lime zest, 2 tablespoons juice, the vinegar, the yogurt, and the avocado oil. Whisk until fully incorporated.
Add the tomatillos, green onions, chiles, cuke, garlic, and bread to the mix and stir to thoroughly coat the bread.
Cover the bowl with a clean kitchen towel and refrigerate for at least 4 hours.
When you’re ready to eat, add the mix to a blender in workable batches and blend until smooth as you prefer – You want a nice, relatively thick soup that will coat a spoon, but you can leave that mix on the rustic side, or go all the way to a purée, as you wish.
Taste the soup and season lightly with salt and pepper. Provide more, and the ground chile, at the table.
Serve with additional garnishes that float your boat – Chopped dry cured chorizo, Jamon Iberico, hard-boiled egg, cilantro, diced tomato, cucumber, onion or shallot, chiles or sweet peppers, pico de gallo, celery leaf, chives, fresh mustard greens, any quick pickled veggie blend you like, sour cream or crema, are all wonderful.
Gazpacho Blanco
1 Cup blanched Marcona Almonds (Must be soaked overnight!)
1 Cup cold Water
1/4 Cup extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 thick slices Bread, (something with a dense crumb, dried out overnight)
1 Apple (Pink lady, honey crisp, crips pink are good options – You want a really juicy one)
1 clove fresh Garlic
1-2 teaspoons Sherry Vinegar
Fine ground kosher salt
Seedless Green Grapes to garnish
Place almonds in a mixing bowl and cover with at least 2” of fresh water. Allow them to soak overnight.
Pour almonds into a single mesh strainer.
Remove crusts from bread and tear into roughly 1” pieces.
Peel, trim, smash and mince garlic.
Peel, core, and chop apple.
Toss bread into a blender vessel and add the water, making sure the bread is covered. Allow that to soak for 15-20 minutes.
Add almonds, apple, and garlic to the blender vessel.
Pile the mix until thoroughly blended and smooth.
Taste and season lightly with salt and vinegar (add vinegar 1/2 teaspoon at a time).
Add the olive oil in a slow, smooth stream while blending the soup on low.
Taste and adjust seasoning as desired.
Chill for at least 2 hours prior to serving, and up to overnight.
Top with sliced green grapes, if you like, (you will).
Last week’s queso featured Mexican chorizo, and I found myself bummed out that I didn’t have room to expand on this truly delightful member of the international sausage family. Since it’s grilling season, and something new is far more exiting than the same old, same old, I think it’s high time we checked it out in depth. While it certainly has its roots in Spain, Mexican chorizo is unique – a perfect reflection of the big, bold flavors that define cocina Mexicana – So let’s dive in.
First off, the differences between Spanish and Mexican chorizo are broad, (and like the ongoing battle over ‘real’ manchego cheese, both sides pretty much disdain the other’s version). Spanish chorizo is a cured, chopped pork sausage with a lot of paprika therein, which gives it its trademark color. These are stuffed sausages in an edible casing, almost always smoked, which adds to its signature flavor profile. As paprika is offered in hot, sweet, and bitter, so is Spanish chorizo. Other variants include garlic and fresh herbs, or Spanish wine. Size varies based on where the stuff comes from. The lion’s share of Spanish chorizo is eaten as is, with bread and wine and cheese, or added to tapas plates. It is used in Spanish cooking as well, added to soups, and stews, and paella.
Loosely based on Spanish chorizo fresco, (the uncurled fresh version), Mexican chorizo has evolved into a wide range of fresh and cured sausages – Mostly fresh though. What started out as a purely pork powered thing now encompasses beef, game, poultry, and vegetarian/vegan options. Local varieties often reflect a specific historical or ethnic consideration of a given area – It’s fascinating and delicious stuff. Mexican chorizo is ground, not chopped, and the fuel for its (usually) signature red color are chiles of considerably higher octane than the Spanish stuff. Regardless of what the main protein is, pork fat is often added, along with generous slugs of vinegar, and other herbs and spices. These guys are almost always relatively short links, air dried for anywhere from a day to a week.
Since it’s uncured, Mexican chorizo needs to be cooked. It’s probably safe to say that, more often than not, the sausage is sliced open and removed from its casing before cooking, then used as a loose meat filling for tacos, eggs, tortas, soups, and stews. That said, plenty of this stuff is grilled and eaten as is, too, but since so much Mexican chorizo is eaten loose, you won’t always find these made with natural, or necessarily edible casings – That’s a thing to keep in mind and ask your local carniceria about – but for the record, most mass market chorizo found in grocery stores is sold loose, and it’s the really cheap stuff that comes in casings you can’t (and shouldn’t) eat.
In Mexico and savvy parts of los Estados Unidos, chorizo might show up at any time of day – breakfast, lunch, or dinner. For breakfast, chorizo con huevos is delicious, as is chorizo con papas – potatoes diced and fried with chorizo. For lunch, chorizo con frijoles refritos, (refried beans), is a popular spread for tortas – The sublime Mexican sandwich. For dinner, chorizo might be added to tacos, or whipped into queso as we did last week, and served on fresh corn tortillas.
So what about those varieties? For us up here in El Norte, the version we’re probably accustomed to is the chorizo most popular in the northern and central highlands, the altiplano. It’s that brick red, notably spicy stuff, with readily discernible notes of vinegar, chile heat, garlic, and herbs like cumin, Mexican oregano, and thyme. That said, almost everybody makes their own, and has their own recipe, so you know the drill – You should try some you like, ask about what’s in it, (because the good places and people will tell you), and develop your very own favorite.
Chorizo from the Yucatán is also a deep red, mostly from the addition of achiote paste – a sublime mix of annatto seed, cumin, chipotle, allspice, and nutmeg. It’s moistened with naranja agria, (sour orange), and sometimes banana vinegar, flaunting its Caribbean roots.
Chorizo Norteño is likely the most high octane version you’ll ever try, fueled with arbol, and/or birds eye chiles, both of which pack a serious wallop. It’s more about heat than herbal, and it’s often grilled whole and eaten that way.
Fresh chorizo seco
Chorizo Seco is usually offered as a drier version of whatever the locals make, with maybe a more pronounced vinegar note, (it’s the most often used preservative for cured sausages). It may come as anything from still quite fresh and cookable as a loose sausage, to something very dry and more like Spanish chorizo in consistency – either way, the soul of it will most definitely be Mexican. If you’ve got a local carniceria, ask, or look around and see if you see anything hanging to dry.
Chorizo Verde is something really special. It’s the signature food of Toluca, a valley and namesake city due west of Ciudad de Mexico, and widely lauded as the chorizo capital of Mexico. This stuff is simply heavenly, deriving its color and flavor from healthy doses of green chiles, tomatillos, cilantro, and garlic.
Longaniza is indeed chorizo, but it’s the cheap seats, made from offal rather than shoulder or butt. Its texture is closer to Spanish chorizo, and it too is sometimes aged. It tends to be very chile heavy, perhaps in an effort to balance out the offal funk.
Chistorra is interesting stuff – It’s a Basque speciality that migrated with expats to the area around Mexico City. It translates well to Mexico, because it includes extra pork fat and healthy doses of paprika and garlic.
Chorizo Obispo, (Bishop’s chorizo),was supposedly once made from brains, (and was even called rellena de sesos back then), though there’s no evidence I could find to support that claim – I suspect it was a ruse used to freak out squeamish kids. It’s a pork sausages reinforced with fat, and flavored with tomato and onion, chiles, garlic, and epazote.
Moronga is Mexico’s version of blood sausage, and if you like such things, it’s a good one. This too features tomato and onion, backed by mint, oregano, and garlic. There’s not that much blood in the good stuff – enough to color things appropriately, but not so much that the signature metallic flavor note dominates.
Although they’re not chorizo, per se, I have to mention salchidas, AKA frankfurters, because they are a forcemeat sausage, and they are really quite ubiquitous in Mexican home cooking these days. There’s nothing special about them, really – They’re found down south made from beef, pork, chicken and occasionally godknowswhat, just like up here. The interesting thing is that you’ll actually find them in recipes titled ‘authentic’ or ‘traditional,’ and as such, ya gotta respect that – And I really do respect a good hot dog, especially when it’s got chiles, onions, and a shot of hot sauce on board.
What I’ll say at this point is that you should get out there, try what’s available to you, determine what’s in it, decide what you like or don’t about that, and then tweak things to make them your own. We make chorizo here at the house from whatever cut we’re using, run through the grinder attachment for our Kitchenaid mixer, which does a fine job indeed. If you own the mixer, the grinder attachment is not expensive – $35 for a perfectly serviceable plastic unit, to $89 for a really nice, heavy duty stainless version, and all of those will include what you need to stuff casings, too. Casings can be found online, or from your local butcher or carniceria. If you eat meat, you want one of these frankly. If nothing else, you’ll make the price of the attachment up pretty quick with the ability to make some pretty fancy stuff at home – And it’s easy and fun to do.
Of course you can readily find fresh ground pork, beef, chicken, turkey, and sometimes even game locally, so if you’re not up for grinding your own, save time and just buy what you like. Considering that most Mexican chorizo doesn’t require curing, and is most often eaten loose, you won’t be missing a thing. If you’ve never gone up to your local grocery store meat counter to ask what they can and will do with what they sell, you should – These folks generally know their stuff, and truly dig working with people who love to cook – Something as simple as, ‘If I buy pork shoulder, can you grind that for me,’ will usually get an enthusiastic ‘you betcha’ response.
A note on acquiring pork fat – This can be easy or hard depending on where you live. The less shopping diversity around you, the harder it is to find. Ask your local meat counter, butcher, or carniceria if they sell it, as many happily will. Before you ask, no – you cannot sub lard for pork fat when making sausage – It will liquify and make your sausage a mushy mass of ickiness. In any event, if you buy pork with any frequency, and then trim your own when you’re prepping it, (which, by all the food gods, you better be doing), then save the fat and fatty trimmings. It’ll freeze just fine if properly packaged, and you can then grind or mince up what you need.
As I mentioned above, there are vegetarian and vegan version of chorizo, so there’s nothing holding you back from making your own versions of those as well. Adding whatever you like for a protein or protein sub can easily be done in a 1:1 ratio for starters. Fresh, firm tofu is amazingly delicious stuff, and makes fantastic sausages. Wild rice and beans seasoned as whatever chorizo you like is also sublime, as is something a bit more exotic, like pulled jackfruit. Firm roasted veggies, like cauliflower does a great job, too. If you’re into it, get into it.
Rather than provide a bunch of recipes, I’m going to offer just two – One red and one green – my go to’s for chorizo. For anything else, (and I mean anything, from virtually anywhere in the world), I’ll turn y’all on to one of my secret (not) sources for all things charcuterie – It’s a website called Wedliny Domowe, (The English language version is found at meatsandsausages.com), a labor of love by Polish sausage maker and wunderkind Miroslaw Gebarowski. There, you’ll find a vast resource of recipes and information that are accurate, thorough, lovingly researched and shared, and generally sized for folks like us. Look up any of the stuff I referenced above and you’ll be on your way. And remember, please –a recipe is a guideline at best. It’ll show you ingredients, proportions, and process, but you really do need to make that your own – Anybody who posts a recipe and gets upset if you tweak it isn’t really there to share, anyway…
Chorizo de Urban
NOTES –
1. This recipe requires overnight refrigeration to come to full fruition – Plan accordingly.
2. As usual, there are variances in some of the ingredients – Here, it’s chiles. While the recipe requires some to be correct, how much is quite up to your personal taste.
2 Lbs ground Pork (if you’re doing your own, I use shoulder or butt)
6 ounces ground Pork Fat
1 Cup Cider Vinegar
2-4 Tablespoons Chipotle Chile flake
2-4 Tablespoons dried Ancho Chile (whole dried or powder)
2-4 Tablespoons dried Guajillo Chile (whole dried or powder)
4-6 cloves fresh Garlic
1 Tablespoon Salt
1 Tablespoon Mexican Oregano
4 whole Cloves
1 teaspoon Lemon Thyme
1/2 teaspoon Marjoram
1/2 teaspoon Coriander Seed
1/2 teaspoon Cumin
1/2 teaspoon Allspice
1/2 teaspoon Black Pepper
2 whole Bay Leaves (I like Turkish)
If using whole dried chiles, place them and the dried chipotle flake in a non-reactive bowl and cover with at least 2” of boiling water.
Allow the chiles to steep until softened, 20-30 minutes. drain, stem, and skin soaked chiles and rough chop.
Whether or not you’re using whole or ground herbs and spices, combine them all in a spice grinder or molcajete y metate and grind to an even mix, (and yeah, you can throw the bay leaf in there too).
Peel and trim garlic cloves, and cut into quarters.
Add chiles, garlic, and vinegar to a blender vessel and process to a smooth mix.
In a large non-reactive bowl, combine ground pork, pork fat, herb and spice blend, and chile purée. Mix by hand to thoroughly combine all ingredients.
Tightly cover the bowl and refrigerate for up to 24 hours – This allows the flavors to marry and fully develop, and is critical to real deal chorizo.
Next day, your chorizo is ready to go. It can be frozen if packaged properly (no air, tightly wrapped), or processed into casing if you’re equipped/so desire.
I won’t elaborate on stuffing casings here, because frankly, we rarely do it with this chorizo. Check below in the chorizo verde recipe for instructions if you’re fired up to do it.
Urban Chorizo Verde
NOTES –
1. This recipe requires overnight refrigeration to come to full fruition – Plan accordingly.
2. As usual, there are variances in some of the ingredients – Here, it’s chiles. While the recipe requires some to be correct, how much is quite up to your personal taste.
2 Pounds ground Pork (Shoulder or Butt is my preference.)
6 Ounces ground Pork Fat
1/2 Pound fresh Tomatillos
1/2 Cup Cider Vinegar
2 fresh Poblano Chiles
2-4 fresh Serrano Chiles
2 Tablespoons Chipotle Chile flake
1 Tablespoon ground Guajillo Chile
1 Bunch fresh Cilantro (about 3 ounces)
3 fat cloves fresh Garlic
2 teaspoons Coriander Seed (whole or ground)
2 teaspoons Salt
1 teaspoon Cumin Seed (whole or ground)
1 teaspoon fresh ground black Pepper
Place Chipotle flake in a non-reactive bowl and cover with at least an inch of boiling water. Let them step for 15 minutes, until softened.
Remove husks from tomatillos and slice in half.
Peel and trim garlic, leave cloves whole.
Place tomatillos, whole chiles, and garlic on a baking sheet, on an upper middle oven rack.
Broil veggies until the chile skins are charred and tomatillos are bubbling.
Remove from oven and let cool enough to handle.
Stem and skin roasted chiles.
If you’re using whole spices, grind them to uniform powder.
Mince a lightly packed cup of cilantro.
Combine vinegar, chiles, drained chipotle flake, guajillo powder, garlic, cilantro, tomatillos and spices in a blender vessel and process until you get a smooth, thick paste.
In a large, non-reactive bowl, combine pork, pork fat, and the seasoning paste. Mix by hand to fully incorporate.
Cover tightly and refrigerate overnight or up to 24 hours.
Your verde is now ready to cook, freeze, or stuff.
To Stuff Fresh Sausage into Casings –
What casings you buy are up to you – Natural are a bit fussier than manmade. Some people don’t like the fact that natural casings are intestines, while others don’t like the fact that the other stuff is manmade. There are edible and inedible manmade casings – namely collagen, fibrous, and cellulose. For chorizo, I use and highly recommend the 30mm clear edible collagen casings, which I buy from Butcher and Packer online. They don’t require soaking, are easy to use, don’t smell, and have a very low footprint on your finished product. Enough to stuff 14 pounds of sausage will cost you five bucks. If you go to their website and search for that term, you’ll find them, along with all the other varieties and decent explanations of the pros and cons of each.
You’ll need only a portion of casing – 3 feet or so will be plenty. Measure off a length of casing, cut it, and tie a double knot in the end.
You want your sausage very cold before you stuff – Doing this operation heats up the ingredients somewhat, and we need to counter that as much as possible – Don’t pull the meat out until you’re truly ready to rock.
Set up a work station – Mixer, bowl of sausage, clean catch surface – something to hold finished product, like a clean sheet pan. Best case scenario is to work with a helper, who can keep the sausage flowing while you focus on filling the casing.
When you’re ready to go, carefully slide all but a couple inches of casing over the sausage stuffer nozzle.
Fill the reservoir on the grinder/stuffer attachment with sausage.
Turn the mixer on to a low setting, 2 at the most – If you’re flying solo, use one hand for the tamper, to press the mix down into the attachment, and keep your other hand on the casing, right at the tip of the nozzle.
As the casing starts to fill, let it do so as fully as possible, but not to the pint of stretching the casing at all. The collagen casings are not as flexible as natural, and if you overfill them, they will certainly burst when cooked.
Keep adding sausage and filling casing, working slowly but steadily.
When you’ve filled all you’ve got, lay the coil of sausage on your clean work surface. Chorizo should be about 5” or so in length, so measure that out, and twist the casing at that point.
Measure another 5” and twist in the opposite direction, and so on, until you’re done.
Use dried corn husk (you can get that from a good Latin grocery), or butchers twine, tie a knot at each twist, and cut the ends short.
Use a clean toothpick to randomly prick the casings down the whole length, which will let any trapped air escape.
Ideally, you’d like to hang your chorizo in a clean, cool place for a day, but that’s not always easy in this modern world. We do a jury rigged set up in our fridge which works just fine – Make sure you have a drip tray under your chorizo, as some vinegar will make its way out during the shirt drying process.
Now your links are ready to go – You can grill, or freeze as you please. If you’ve got a vacuum sealer, this is a great job for that – Air is the enemy when freezing chorizo. Refrigerated, it’s good for 2-3 days, but don’t push uncured fresh sausage any farther than that.
There’s an old assumption that French sauces are all heavy handed and overbearing, but nothing could be farther from the truth. There are a bunch of variants, many of them light and delightfully complimentary. One of my absolute favorites comes from Grenoble, the city tucked up into the edge of the French Alps. Sauce Grenobloise is a delight, and it’s great for so much more than fish.
Grenoble is perhaps most food famous for gratin dauphinois, that decadent potato dish, and frankly, that makes sense – The Rhône-Alpes region of France favors such hearty delights, without a doubt. It’s interesting to me that sauce grenobloise hails therefrom. Yes, it’s a butter sauce, but it’s simple and light-handed, complimenting a dish while staying in the background, as a good sauce should, oui? Ah bon – and it’s pronounced, grehnoh-blewahs-ah, by the way.
Grenobloise, (a play on sauce Meunière), is comprised of butter, lemon, parsley, capers, and some croutons. Almost always paired with fish, it imparts a subtle richness and a truly delightful tang – But its charms are wasted if limited to only piscine pairings – Grenobloise will compliment a wide range of foods and dishes, and is a perfect vehicle for raising leftovers to new heights.
First off, some great target fish pairings, oui? Personally, I favor firm fleshed white fish, like halibut, tuna, and cod, but salmon, flounder, sole, rockfish, bass, trout, catfish and panfish will also shine. Lobster, crab, clams, and mussels are also great pairings.
We eat very, very little fish because of the delicate condition of our oceans and fisheries, so we’re more likely to pair grenobloise with chicken, pork, or lamb, and it’s sublime on freshly scrambled eggs. Let us not forget the non-animal based proteins – fresh, firm tofu and beans are great. There’s also some wonderful pulse, grain, and cereal options, like lentils, beans, rice, and wild rice. And grenobloise is a delight with veggies like asparagus, spuds, artichokes, brussels sprouts, and lettuce salads.
Making grenobloise couldn’t be easier, albeit there are plenty of opportunities for tweaking the recipe. Ratios must be a bit fluid, as the power of parsley, lemons, and capers will vary. In the purest incarnation, the sauce is made solo, on the stove top, and added to whatever you wish. If on the other hand, you’re sautéing or pan frying something, making the sauce in that same pan when your other stuff is done isn’t a bad idea at all – It’ll lend some subtly married flavors to the finished dish.
Obviously, freshness and quality matter here. The better your ingredients, the better the sauce. It’s hard for most of us to get fresh butter, so this might be a great time for you take a swing at making your own – The results will reward you richly. Likewise, fresh green parsley from your garden is best – Most French recipes call for flatleaf, but if curly is what you’ve got and/or prefer, by all means use that.
Finally, if you’ve ever wondered what ‘nonpareil,’ or sometimes ‘Non Pareil’ on a jar of capers means, it means they’re way good. After they’re picked, capers are sorted by size, then brined or dried or salted. The smallest are the priciest, one that ‘has no equal,’ as the French put it – They’re the best for taste and texture, and that’s what you want.
Sauce Grenobloise
1/4 Cup fresh unsalted Butter
1 small fresh Lemon
2 Tablespoons Nonpareil Capers
2 Tablespoons fresh Parsley
1/2 Cup Croutons
If you don’t have croutons handy –
Preheat oven to 300° F and set a rack in the middle position.
Grab a nice, thick slice of densely crumbed bread, (whatever you like – Let’s not get fussy…)
Cut bread into roughly 1/2” squares.
Spread croutons on a baking sheet and bake until light golden and crunchy, about 4-7 minutes.
Remove from oven and set aside to cool.
For the Sauce –
Zest the lemon and cut it in half. Reserve half for the juice, and carefully slice out the flesh from the other half, removing pith and fibrous stuff. Dice the flesh.
Mince the parsley.
Drain the capers.
In a heavy sauté pan over medium heat, add the butter and melt. Again, if you sautéed or pan fried something, by all means use that pan to make the sauce in.
Whisk the butter steadily, and take care that it doesn’t burn. Cook until the butter is golden brown, about 3-5 minutes.
Add the lemon zest, juice and flesh, capers, and parsley. Whisk to incorporate and allow all that to heat through, about 1-2 minutes. NOTE: The butter may foam up when the citrus juice hits it, so be careful.
Remove sauce from heat.
Arrange croutons on whatever it is you’re saucing and apply sauce liberally.
Enjoy – and you’ll need a piece or two of fresh, crusty bread to sop up every last drop with.
A crisp, cold Pilsner, or Provençal rose wouldn’t hurt either.
Yet another entry in the ever expanding string of dishes I seem to mention frequently, but have yet to actually post a recipe for. This one comes from Doug in Iowa, (Des Moines, in fact). He writes, ‘I’ve enjoyed your bean recipes lately, but when I went looking for charro beans, I couldn’t find anything. Were they maybe named something else?’ No, Doug, they weren’t. And for something I oft tote as a necessary part of a homemade Mexican meal, you’d think they’d be here alright. Anyway, time to fix that one, so charro beans, here we come.
Now, for the record, a Charro is a Mexican cowboy – those guys dressed in gorgeous outfits who participate in the coleadero y charreada, a rodeo that developed from informal inter-ranch skills competitions. While more than one Mexican state claims the origin, it seems likely that Jalisco takes the prize – Charros, (and Charras), originated in the Salamanca province of Spain, and then settled there, back in the colonial days.
That bean dish that shares the moniker also came from the ranch lands. Like chili, charro beans are a stew, meant to be a hearty meal to fuel a cowboy or cowgirl for many hours of hard work. The most traditional bean used is a pinto, which is generally combined with pork, chiles, tomato, onion, and garlic. Charros are delicious, and so they naturally spread with the folks who love it, perhaps most notably to northern Mexico and Texas, and into Tex-Mex cuisine. Nowadays, versions can be found damn near anywhere there’s a decent Mexican or Tex-Mex restaurant.
Now, that said, charro beans were and are also meant to use up what you have that needs to be used, and/or, what you really love to combine – There are no hard and fast rules, despite what you may read elsewhere. Like all great signature dishes, there’s a ton of cooks who make them their own way, just as you should, so let’s break things down by primary elements.
First, the beans – You can and should use whatever you have and love, though they should be a variety that holds up well to low and slow cooking, (which is a lot of ‘em, thankfully.) I’ve made charros with white, black, brown, and red bean varieties, and they were all delicious. I strongly recommend making them with high quality, dry beans like Rancho Gordo, but if you’re in the mood and have a need for speed, they’ll make a can of beans far more than presentable pretty quickly.
If you’re not a meat eater, charros are a great dish, because you sure don’t need any for this to be a hearty and delicious meal. For those that do, it’s usually pork, and I’ve seen everything from bacon to pork shoulder, smoked ham hock, chorizo, and even hot dogs – Remember, it’s what you’ve got that needs using and what you love, and nada else.
Peppers of some kind are a must, but whether or not they’re hot is up to you. Sweet peppers are fine if that’s your jam, as are nuclear chiles. Most folks probably lean toward jalapeños as the standard, and for good reason – Field stripped, they’re relatively mild and tasty as all get out. Tossed into the mix whole, they have reasonable heat. Go with what you love.
Tomatoes are a must, and plum varieties like a Roma are most common. You can use canned if that’s what you’ve got, but if fresh ‘maters are in season, that’s where you aughta be.
Onions are also a must, and they need to be notable in the mix. That said, the variety is up to you. When fresh sweets like a Walla Walla are in season, that’s where I go. In general, you want fresh stuff – a really strong old onion can poison this dish pretty quickly.
Garlic is a must. Not so much that the dish screams its presence, but enough to give it that low, sweet funky note.
A little salt and fresh ground pepper, and fresh cilantro is the baseline seasoning for charros. There’s lots more you can use if you like – Mexican oregano, lemon thyme, and citrus juice and zest have been long time faves of mine, for good reason.
Now, as for beer, the answer is no, it’s not necessary. That’s a Tex-Mex specific trick that I personally don’t do. This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t, though – We put beer in chili or stew, and it’ll go just fine in charros. Personally, I go with the liquid the beans cooked in, bean stock, because, well, it’s a bean stew, right? Anything else is up to you – put whatever you like in there that makes it your signature version – To each their own.
As for cooking process, it’s best to go the traditional low and slow method. If you’re in a hurry and you have the goods, very decent charros can be whipped up in the time it takes to get other things ready for tacos, for instance. If what you have is canned beans, adding the required adjuncts, quickly diced, with enough chicken or veggie stock to get the right, soupy consistency, coupled with a 30 minute simmer, will be more than OK.
If you’re using dry beans, they need to be par cooked before you begin the charro cook. This is the stage I cook all my beans to – al dente, so that I can do stuff like charros, barbecue, or baked dishes without the beans turning to mush – That’s how I freeze them for pretty quick future use, too.
A lot of charro recipes tell you to simmer the beans in water, fry and sauté most of the other ingredients, and then assemble, heat through for a bit, and serve. For my taste, you get a far better dish with deeper flavors, if you simmer everything together for at least 30 minutes, and longer if you wish. Finally, you’ll see that I roast most of the constituents in my charros – This creates a notably richer dish.
Charro Beans de UrbanMonique
1 Pound par cooked, dry Pinto Beans (or any reasonable substitution)
Bean Stock to cover
Chicken or Veggie Stock to top off
6 strips smoky, Pepper Bacon
2 medium Sweet Onions
4 fresh Roma Tomatoes
2 fat cloves Garlic
2-4 Chiles (We like jalapeño or serrano)
1 small Lemon
6-8 stalks fresh Cilantro
1 teaspoon Mexican Oregano
Salt and freshly ground Pepper to taste
NOTES:
1. High quality beans like Rancho Gordo really and truly do not require anything added when initially boiled. You certainly can put stuff in there if you like – I often just toss in a couple bay leaves, and that’s plenty. If you want a more definitive base, a thick slice of onion cut in half, a few 1/2” rounds of carrot and celery, and those bay leaves, will do nicely.
2. You do not need to soak high quality beans before boiling them – You really don’t.
3. You will want a ready supply of boiling water to add to the beans as they cook, so either a tea pot, hot pot, or spare pan should be set up with at least a quart of water therein.
4. You can prep everything but beans as they are boiling if you like, or wait until they’re cooked to al dente – Your choice, and it won’t hurt a thing either way.
Pour beans into a colander and rinse thoroughly, inspecting for rocks and other detritus.
Transfer beans to a heavy sauce pan over high heat and add enough water to cover by at least 2” – and 3” is better.
When the beans begin to boil, set a timer for 10 minutes.
When your 10 minutes are up, reduce the heat to low and cover the pan. Hang out long enough to see where things settle, and adjust the heat to maintain a steady simmer.
Keep an eye on things as the beans cook, topping off the water to maintain at least 2” over the beans – This will change as they absorb water, so don’t leave them for long.
At 30 minutes into the simmer, give the beans a good stir and check one or two for doneness – They will not be close in all likelihood, but you’d much rather catch things on the upslope then down, eh?
When your beans are al dente – Still not soft enough to be ready to eat, but not far off, remove the pan from heat while you prep everything else.
Peal and trim onion and garlic, stem chiles, (and field strip the chiles, if you’re cutting the heat factor down – aka remove the white membrane – That’s where the heat lives).
Cut onion, tomatoes, and chiles in half.
Cut lemon in half, return half to fridge. Zest the working half.
Arrange onion, chiles, tomatoes, garlic, lemon, and bacon on a baking sheet, on an upper middle oven rack.
Set oven on broil and roast until bacon looks done and the veggies begin to blister and blacken.
Turn the veggies and the bacon once and continue roasting for another 3-5 minutes, until the bacon looks done on the turned side.
Remove from oven and allow everything to cool enough to handle.
Dice all the roasted veggies, and mince the garlic.
Rough chop cilantro.
Turn the heat under the beans back up to medium high.
Add roasted veggies and stir to incorporate.
Add chicken or veggies stock to cover beans by at least 2”.
Allow the beans to come back to a boil, then immediately reduce heat to maintain a bare simmer.
Add oregano, and stir to incorporate.
Simmer until the beans attain a thick soup consistency, around 30 minutes, and longer if you wish.
just prior to service, add the cilantro and the lemon zest, and squeeze in the juice from the roasted lemon half – stir to incorporate.
‘Wait,’ you think, ‘is he writing about beans again? This cat has a serious case of OCD.’ For the record, I do not – I have CDO, as I prefer my maladies in alphabetical order – and yes, I am writing about beans again. Why? Because alert follower Mia, who hails from Charlotte, North Carolina wrote, ‘Love the blog, and especially the bean posts, as I’m trying to eat less meat and go easier on the planet a little. But I’m not finding a post that really explains the basic cooking process you use.’ I waded through 10 posts with beans in the title and discovered that she’s absolutely correct. Time to fix that, and delve into the magic of pot beans.
Mia’s also right about the fact that we here in America need to dilute our animal flesh eating habits to some degree. I’ve said it before and will again – great beans are every bit as good as meat, when they’re prepared with love and imagination. Of course doing any of that requires the goods to be available fairly quickly, if we want to compete with a chub of kick ass local ground beef. That’s where Frijoles de la Olla, Mexico’s version of pot beans come in to play.
Fact is, great beans aren’t gonna come from a can. The reason canned beans get used far more than dried beans is obvious – The former is ready to eat far faster than the latter – But it needn’t be that way. If you’ve poked around here, you know we advocate cooking major proteins in large batches at the start of the week, so that you can enjoy good meals quickly throughout your busy week. Pot beans are just the ticket for many days worth of delicious stuff.
I chose the Mexican iteration of pot beans because they’re simple, tasty, and can easily be morphed into a myriad of other cuisines at your whim. That said, every bean eating country has a version and they’re all, more or less, designed to do the same thing – provide a big batch of cooked beans to work with for the next few days. In France, they might be flageolates with herbs de Provence. In Italy, it’s a white bean with garlic, olive oil, and maybe a little chile. In Spain, it might be fabada beans with tomato, cumin, and onion. Truth be told, any of those deserve further exploration.
How you cook them really is up to you, (although diehards of the various options will naturally insist that their way is best.) Take all that with a grain of salt and do what you like, but again, save some future time for exploration too. Stove top is relatively quick, does a great job, and is easy to keep an eye on – You can always do low and slow in the oven for other stuff down the line.
Which beans to use? I say try them all, and don’t be shy. Our last two excursion were Mexican enfrijoladas and a glorious clay pot of Boston baked, both of which were made with French beans – Mogette de Vendée and flageolates, respectively. Both were spectacular, my point being that you needn’t be too tied up with using the ‘proper’ variety – Explore and enjoy, because there are a bunch of heirloom bean varieties out there, and you really, truly owe it to yourself to go find them.
Then there’s the question of what to cook them in. A decent stock or soup pot will work just fine and give excellent results. I will say that it’s probably best to steer clear of pressure cookers and instant pots with beans, unless you really know the cooking characteristics of what you’re working with, and the vagaries of the appliance.
Depending on the bean, the cooking time can vary from an hour and change, to several hours. While the lion’s share of the process is pretty hands off, you do need to keep an eye on things, to make sure you don’t turn a pound of heirloom loveliness to mush, (And if you do, no sweat – that just means that you’ll be making bean dip, purée, or enfrijoladas instead of whatever you had in mind initially – and they’ll be delicious.)
Finally, to soak or not to soak? I very rarely do so, but if that’s what you’ve always done and are comfy with, then do it. Soaking will shorten the cooking time somewhat, and some folks believe it helps beans cook more evenly – In any event, it sure won’t hurt. Plan on soaking for at least an hour and up to 4 – Any more than that is likely too much for good quality, freshly dried beans.
Frijoles de la Olla – Basic Pot Beans
1 Pound of good quality dried Beans
1/2 medium Yellow Onion
2 cloves fresh Garlic
Pinch of Salt
A few twists of ground Pepper
Optional:
A few sprigs fresh Epazote or Cilantro
A couple of Bay Leaves, (I like Turkish)
Stem and peel onion and garlic. Both can just be quartered, (as in, quarter the half, so you’ve got a bunch of 1”+ pieces of onion, and quartered cloves of garlic.)
Spread your beans out on a clean baking sheet and check for rocks and other debris, (I’ve never found anything foreign in Rancho Gordo beans, but even they recommend you do this, so…)
Pour beans into a colander and rinse in cold water.
Add the beans to a cooking vessel big enough to allow for significant expansion as they absorb water – A 3 qt. sauce pan does great for a pound of beans.
Add the onion, garlic, three finger pinch of salt, and a few twists of pepper. If you’re using any or all the optional, they can go in now too, except epazote, which is a finishing herb added at the very end of the process.
Add enough clean, fresh water to cover the beans by about 3 inches.
Turn the burner on high and let ‘er rip.
Keep an eye on things, and when you get a vigorous boil, reduce the heat enough to maintain a boil but not get crazy, and set a timer for 15 minutes.
When your timer goes off, drop the heat to just maintain a bare simmer, and cover the pot.
Continue cooking until you’ve got the doneness you’re after. You will want to keep an eye on water level, and maintain 2” to 3” above the beans – Add hot water from a kettle when you top things off – Again, they’ll usually absorb more water as they cook.
What is done? Personally, I want mine fairly al dente, so that I’ve got room for further cooking in whatever dishes I’m going to make without getting mushy beans – Other folks want theirs soft at this initial cook – You do what you like.
Beans are a potential food safety hazard just like other proteins. They need to cool down from cooking temp to under 41° F in 4 hours or less. Employing an ice bath around your cooking pot is the quickest and easiest way to get there.
Bean broth is great stuff and shouldn’t be wasted. Use it in soups, stews, sauces and whatever bean dishes you’re making.
Beans can be stored in the fridge for 3 to 5 days safely, and can be frozen for up to 4 months with little degradation of flavor.
friEither way, put them in clean, airtight containers with most or all of the broth. We use glass storage containers with snap lids for both jobs – That lets you portion for about what you want for a meal easily, and allows for quick thawing and cooking when you need them.
UrbanMonique 