Papua New Guinean Entree
MUMU
INGREDIENTS
8 ounces carrots or 2 medium
8 ounces sweet potatoes or 1 large
8 ounces banana or 1½ medium
8 ounces papaya or ½ medium
4 ounces spinach
12 ounces pork
6 ounces peas or similar green vegetable
12 ounces chicken
1 or 2 banana leaves or cabbage leaves* (enough to cover pot)
20 ounces coconut cream total (5 times at ¼ cup) or 2 14-ounces cans coconut milk.
Makes 6 bowls. Takes 2 hours.
SPECIAL UTENSIL
outdoor grill
grill-safe pot and lid
PREPARATION – COCONUT CREAM (If you can’t find it in stores.)
Chill coconut milk cans in refrigerator for 24 hours. Open cans and scoop out the thick cream on the top. Keep 20 ounces, or 2½ cups, of coconut cream. Use the rest of the coconut cream and the liquid in the bottom of the cans to make coconut-based smoothies
PREPARATION – ONCE YOU HAVE COCONUT CREAM.
Wash and peel carrots, sweet potatoes, banana, and papaya. Remove papaya seeds. Chop carrots, sweet potatoes, pork, bananas, papaya, peas, and chicken into 1″ cubes.
This dish is made with 5 layers. Spread ingredients evenly for each layer. Top each layer with ¼ cup of coconut cream. Make the first layer by adding carrot and sweet potato to pot. Make the second layer by adding pork. Make the third layer by adding banana and papaya. Make the fourth layer by adding chicken. Make the fifth layer by adding peas and spinach. Top everything with banana leaves.
Cover pot and place on grill. Never stir ingredients. Grill on medium heat for 15 minutes or until you see juices bubble. Reduce heat on grill to low and simmer for 1-to-1½ hours or until everything is done to your liking. Okay, okay, you’ll to take a fork and peek and the doneness of the various layers, but no stirring.
TIDBITS
1) The stability of the entire world is threatened by an emerging superpower, Papua New Guinea. Hah, you say. Where is Papua New Guinea? North of Australia. What does it produce? Rain and mud, according to Allied soldiers fighting there in World II. What could such a country do? Buy a lot of SPAM or … conquer the Pacific Ocean.
How? I’m glad you asked. Culinary historians know the best mud for beauty care comes from Papua New Guinea, or PNG. The demand for this mud in American and European spas grows fantastically every year. Soon, PNG will be awash with the world’s money. PNG can then allocate its new billions to buy used aircraft carriers, fighter planes, bombers, tanks, and landing craft listed irresponsibly on eBay.
2) This is where the nightmare starts PNG has a population of 4,600,000. (I counted them twice last Tuesday.) Even if the country puts just 10% of its people in the military, it will have a striking force of 460,000. Who has the population, the might to stop them? Not neighboring Nauru with its tiny population of 11,000 and maybe soldiers.
3) Emboldened by this easy conquest, Tuvalu, Palau, Marshall Islands, Kiribati, and Tonga, with their combined population of 260,000 will fall like leaves in a Wisconsin autumn. This disaster will have worldwide ramifications. Does anyone doubt the Palauan contingent keeping the peace in The Land of Oz will remain under such dire circumstances? No, they will go home to fight a war of liberation. The whole idea of UN peace-keeping forces will unravel. Minor skirmishes will become full fledged regional wars. So it goes.
4) Soon, Micronesia and Vanuatu will topple. I don’t know much about them so let’s move onto the Solomon Islands and Fiji–biggish but still smaller than PNG. We cannot let these two nations fall. We cannot let PNG monopolize the best snorkeling sites in the world. Have you snorkeled at Key Largo? Well, let me tell you, the snorkeling at Fiji is much better. And by the way, conquest of these countries would enable PNG to block all airborne and seaborne trade across the Pacific. The snorkeling industry and the world economy would collapse.
5) What can Americans do? Simple. Use local mud! Cut off the funds for PNG’s drive for conquest. Insist on backyard mud whenever your toddler makes you a mud pie. Be sure to ask for good ol’ American mud when getting a mud treatment at your spa. It’s good for your face. It’s good for the world.
6) Use the blank space at the bottom of this page to make a mud drawing. Do other cookbooks let you do this? No, I don’t think so.
– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef
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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