Venezuelan Entree
PEPITO SANDWICH
INGREDIENTS – STEAK
1 pound steaks, skirt, flank, or ribeye
½ tablespoon minced garlic
¾ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
INGREDIENTS – SANDWICHES
4 sandwiches rolls, hoagies
1 cup guasacaca (See previous recipe)
1 cup lettuce, shredded
⅓ cup carrots, shredded
⅓ cup Parmesan cheese
1 tomato
½ cup potato sticks
ketchup (optional)
mayonnaise (optional)
Serves 4. Takes 40 minutes.
PREPARATION – STEAK
Cut steak into strips ½” wide. Add steak strips, garlic, and salt to mixing bowl. Rub garlic and salt into steak strips. Add seasoned steak strips and vegetable oil to pan. Sauté at medium-high heat for 3 minutes or until strips brown. Stir frequently. Add Worcestershire sauce. Sauté for an additional 3 minutes. Stir frequently. Remove from heat.
PREPARATION – SANDWICHES
Split sandwich rolls in half. Spread guasacaca on all halves. Divide shredded lettuce and carrot evenly between the bottom roll halves. Top lettuce with carrot. Place steak strips on carrot. Sprinkle Parmesan cheese on carrot. Cut tomato into 8 slices. Put 2 tomato slices on each sandwich. Sprinkle potato sticks on tomato slices. Spread ketchup and mayonnaise, if desired, on bun tops. Assemble sandwich.
TIDBITS
1) Little Pepe was known throughout Venezuela for wearing sandals and being clumsy. One day, for reasons that are lost to history, Pepe carried all the ingredients to a post office. As he opened the door, Pepe dropped guasacaca on his left big toe and all the other ingredients on the right big toe. “Whoa,” said the postmaster, “the same food on your toes would look delicious between two sandwich rolls. And so the Pepe Toe sandwich was born. Soon, it shortened to the Pepito Sandwich.
Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.
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.
Paul De Lancey's Blog 