Month: August 2015

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Chimol is El Salvador’s “fresh salsa.” Mexico’s “pico de gallo.” Chimol, fresh salsa, pico de gallo, whatever you wanna call it, it’s still amazing. Go ahead and make it, your friends and family will think you’re “oh so cultured” and well travelled. It’s perfect with everything… at least in my family we think it goes with everything. It’s what we eat our empanada’s with.

Ingredients:

  • 8 roma tomatoes
  • 1 bunch green onions
  • 1 bunch cilantro
  • 3-4 lemons
  • salt to taste
  • Finely chop all the ingredients, mix in a large bowl, add the juice of lemons and salt to taste, and you’re all done.

There, you’ve travelled to El Salvador and made one of their staple foods. Congrats, you now have the approval of Salvadoreans, which is kind of  big  deal. There are some tips and tricks to ensuring that any Latina grandmother will approve though. I’ll tell let you in on them if you agree to at least try this. And don’t start with “can I leave out the cilantro?” The answer is NO. You may not.

Tip #1. Make sure you FINELY chop the tomatoes, green onions and cilantro. You don’t want big chunks of tomato or onion, that’s just unrefined, and “ain’t nobody got time for that!” (That still works, thank you Sweet Brown.)

Tip #2. I gave you a guesstimate of lemons…. you may need more, you may need less. It all depends on how juicy your lemons are.

Tip #3. Taste as you go. If you wanna be a legit Latina in the kitchen, add some salt, add some lemon juice, dance to some gypsy kings or Julio Iglesias and then taste it. Its better to start with not enough salt and lemon than to have too much, you can always add more, but it’s a lot harder to take some away. And by “a lot harder’ I mean nearly impossible.

I had to make a huge batch for when my grandma was up and we made empanada’s, so the pictures below show a heck of a lot more ingredients. I chopped 30 tomatoes that day, along with 4 bunches of green onions and cilantro. You can congratulate me later.

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Please attempt this. Eat it with tortilla chips, eat it with your nachos. Or if you REALLY, really wanna impress us, make empanada’s along with this, eat one of the best meals you’ll ever eat made by your own two hands, and then take the next 3 months off, cuz you’ll be beat. Enjoy!

My grandma came to visit us a few weeks ago. We call her Nana, and she’s one of my favourite people. She doesn’t speak any english, she’s funnier than most people I know, and she means business. She’s tougher than most grandma’s too. She survived a war, she put her children through school, plus nieces and nephews, all as a single mom. I’ll tell you guys her story another time. Today it’s about Nana’s Empanada’s. She’s made these for us every time she has come to visit us for the last 15 years.

Empanada’s are a LOT of work. But they just might be one of the best things you put in your mouth…. EVER. I’m mostly writing this recipe out so I can have record of it, and when I’m feeling brave and have a lot of time to spare, I can make these again:)

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Ingredients

  • For the filling:
  • 28 chicken drumsticks
  • 12-14 garlic cloves, divided
  • 2 large onions, divided
  • 6 celery sticks, diced
  • 1 small bunch, cilantro, divided
  • 2 green pepper, cut in small pieces
  • 4 tomatoes
  • 12 potatoes
  • oil for lightly frying

In a large stock pot, add all of your drumsticks, 6 whole garlic cloves, celery, 1 roughly chopped onion in big pieces, and a few strands of cilantro (does not need to be chopped). Fill pot with water to cover everything. Cook on medium heat until chicken is cooked through.

Meanwhile, in another large pot, bring peeled potatoes to a boil until cooked. While potatoes are cooking, remove the chicken from the broth and set aside to cool slightly, making sure to KEEP the broth!! Once cooled, pull the chicken into small pieces, set aside. Finely chop the 6 garlic cloves, along with the other onion, green pepper, tomatoes, and the remaining cilantro. In a large pot heat the oil over medium low heat. Once hot, add your remaining finely chopped garlic, frying until fragrant. Then, add your green peppers, and next your onion, and stir together until well combined. Remove from heat and add your tomatoes, shredded chicken, and cilantro. Mix well, set aside. Mash your potatoes, but not smooth. Making sure there are still some lumps and chunks. add this to your chicken mixture, mix well making sure everything is evenly distributed.

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Ingredients for the dough:

  • Broth from chicken
  • 3 tablespoons sugar
  • salt to taste
  • 1 5lb bag of yellow cornmeal flour
  • oil for deep frying

On a clean surface, make a volcano with cornmeal. In the whole of the volcano slowly add some of the broth. With your hands, gently start to add the cornmeal to the centre, making sure not to have your volcano over flow. Keep adding broth until all your dough has been mixed well, you may need to add some water to the broth if you see you’re starting to run low. The texture should be that of almost play dough, just not as smooth. It should be soft and pliable, but not too sticky.

Once you have reached the desired texture, start making roughly 3″ balls, where you will squish down in the handy dandy little tool you see in the picture below (You can get it any Latin/Mexican store). Once you’ve squished a ball, fill it with the filling, fold in half like a perogy, and seal the edges. Deep fry for about 4-5 mins on medium heat, making sure the inside is cooking. Flip over half way through. Serve with chimol, also known as pico de gallo in Mexico, but you need to start calling it chimol to represent us Salvadoreans:) If you attempted these…. Pat yourself on the back and eat all of them to yourself, thats too much dang work to share!!

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These mean a lot to me… it’s hard to explain. I feel that if I am able to make these on my own, I will in some way have a part of grandma with me always, and I can carry on her tradition. I’m Latina, and my grandmother doesn’t speak any english, and this, in some weird way brings me pride. She’s my little old lady who has my heart. Food somehow has a funny way of bringing people together, doesn’t it? She’s made these for so many friends of mine, and despite the language barrier, one thing has always been understood. Nana has the best empanada’s around, and that brings me joy. Thanks for stopping by 🙂