Okay, as soon as I read this month's theme was South America I had to post something. I have many ideas and I think I'll be posting them too, as soon as I make them, but I posted a recipe for a South American dish on a blog I had last year and I am sharing it here now.
This dish is called Pastel de choclo and it's tipically baked in clay pots, but it can also be made in other pots, or in a deep tray. It is made of grounded meat, onions, olives,hard boiled eggs and mashed corn mixed with some basil. It is one of my favourite dishes. It has sugar on top, which is supossed to brown on the oven, but for some reason my oven never caramelized it, so mine were really pale.
Here we go with the recipe!
Ingredients:
Filling (called "pino"):
3 small onions, diced
1 garlic clove, diced
black pepper, cumin, salt and dried red pepper to taste (can be left out)
500 gr grounded meat (I used 2 cups of hydrated textured soy protein. If you are using it, add 1 to 2 cups of water, since the juices from meat are missing, and the filling is meant to have some liquid)
32 Olives
4 hard boiled eggs
3 tbsp oil
Mazamorra:
2 kg corn, processed to get a paste.
6 tbsp sugar
salt to taste
4 tbsp chopped fresh basil (I usually process it with the corn, but you can chop it if you want it to be more notorious).
Extra sugar for sprinkle on top
Preparation:
Filling:
1. Heat the oil in a deep pan. Add onions and cook until they get soft.
2. Add balck pepper, cumin, red pepper and garlic.
3. Add grounded meat and keep on the heat until it's cooked (it will take less time if it's textured soy protein, and don't forget to add the water).
Mazamorra:
1. Mix everything in a deep pan and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, for 10 minutes.
Ensambling:
1. Preheat the oven at max. temperature.
2. Put about 3/4 of the filling in the pots.
3. Put half a hard boiled egg, sliced, and 4 olives in each pot (or as much as you want).
4. Cover the filling with mazamorra.
5. Sprinkle each pastel with about 2 tbsp of sugar.
6. Put into the oven until they are golden brown on top.
This recipe will give you about 8 big servings.