Nicaraguan Entree
INDIO VIEJO
INGREDIENTS
1 green bell pepper (1 more later)
10 garlic cloves
2 pounds skirt steak, flank steak, chuck, or chicken breast
1 onion (2 more later)
1 green bell pepper
2 onions
5 tomatoes
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2⅓ cups masa harina or 12 corn tortillas
3 tablespoons sour orange juice or lemon juice
1 teaspoon achiote powder or sweet paprika
1 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons mint, spearmint, or cilantro
SPECIAL UTENSIL
sonic obliterator
Serves 6. Takes 1 hour 50 minutes.
PREPARATION
Seed 1 green bell peppers. Cut each garlic clove into four pieces. Add meat, garlic cloves, 1 green bell pepper, 1 onion, and enough water to cover to large pot. Bring to boil using high heat . Reduce heat to low and simmer for 1 hour 30 minutes or until meat is tender to the fork. Strain and reserve meat/garlic/bell pepper/onion. Save broth.
30 minutes before meat should be tender, seed 1 green bell pepper. Dice 1 green bell pepper, 2 onions, and tomatoes. Add diced bell pepper, onion, tomatoes, and vegetable oil to large pan. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until bell pepper and onion soften. Add reserved meat/garlic/bell pepper mix, masa harina, sour orange juice, achiote, pepper, and salt. Stir constantly while adding enough reserved broth it obtains the consistency of a thick stew. Simmer on low for 10 minutes or until there are no flour lumps. Stir constantly. Dice mint. Garnish with mint. Use sonic obliterator on guests, who after you’ve cooked for three hours, complain that this dish would go well with rice or fried plantains.
TIDBITS
1) Your kitchen needs a sonic obliterator, like the one here. Buy one now.
– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D., travel guru
My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.
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