Sometimes it's better to be behind a trend, especially when it's something to do with food. Let other people do the tasting and wait for you and your taste buds to catch up! Other times, well, don't walk for it, run!  Case in point. While walking through Grand Central Market recently, I passed  Murray's cheese's new charcuterie department. Amongst the salsicce, I saw nduja. Yes nduja, that Calabrian soft salami that is the rage in the salumi circles.

According to the folks at Murray's, this particular version of nduja (above) is from Boccalone and pronounced "en doo ya." A waiter at work who is from Calabria shrugged when I mentioned this delicacy from his native land. Apparently it's less a specialty in southern Italy than a regular staple. Regardless, a shout out to these guys who make such fine pig products. 

This recent walk around Grand Central Market reminded me of my visit to San Francisco's  Ferry Market, a place I visited while attending bread school. I still remember my baguettes with their fierce fennel pollen flavored salami, a perfect casse croûte for my walks to class. Hoooha! 

Nduja is made with the head of the pork minus the cheeks, which are saved to make guanciale. A distant  cousin to the French Andouille, the nduja is packed in the lower intestine of its own tripe lining. My first tasting done, I find this spreadable salami heady spicy and ready for some more tasting!

Nudja has that sort mystical aura, difficult to find and legendary among some foodies. Unless you're Calabrian or have visited that part of the "Toe " of Italy, or come upon this delicacy by sheer luck. You might think it were spam (gone funky), or even musty looking botargo. No, it's just a for the strong-hearted, a salami that spreads a fiery new dimension, especially compared to the standard hard salami that most of us know. Nudge, nudge.. go get some!

In Ecuador breakfast options seem almost unlimited; the fruits, the cheeses, things from the sea, it's as if the bounty is endless. One of my favorite things to start when I just arrive is a ceviçhe - whether it's
"mixto" (mixed), shrimp, or pulpo (octopus). If you're lucky you can get an oyster or even spondylus depending on the season.

Every province, town or city has its typical dish, each prepared or served with a unique twist. Like the unusual but flavorful and filled encebollado de albacora, an Ecuadorian fish recipe with ingredients supposedly introduced by the conquistadores, including onions and limes. In addition, you see local ingredients like chilies, tomatoes, yucca, and aji Peruano, which, incidentally, research says is actually not aji from Peru. Either way, it makes for a great marriage and a cure all for hangovers.

Most recently in Puerto Lopez I tried what we have on our breakfast menu, "desayuno Manabita." This can either consist of braised fish or beef, and cooked in a pot of onions, peppers,tomatoes, and achiote. It's supposed to be served with some rice and the show stopper, a bolon y (with) queso (cheese). 

You can also ask for a helping of sal prieta or even mani (peanut butter) added into the bolon, but most often it's just mixed with cheese, though I like some cilantro in it too.

Then there are my other favorites from the Andean foothills. Take tigrillo, a specialty from the  Provincia del Oro, the region of my wife's family. Made from boiled and mashed plantains, mixed with cooked red and green onions with an egg and cheese, it's mixed in the pan and cooked.

It's a cousin to lots of mashed plantain dishes, like mangu or mofongo. According to my brother-in-law, it  comes from another area, specifically the city of Loja. He told me that Provincia del Oro and Loja share several dishes, including a very interesting soup made with young green banana's called repe and tamales  tostados,(next photo, below) each province showing off their local variations.

Times a wasting! Not having had a decent piece of bread in weeks, I thought the best way to quench my craving was to start baking. I had three levains in the fridge. The liquid and solid levains took a single feeding to awaken, perhaps because I had fed them quite often before leaving for Ecuador.  Anyway, the first bake was a multigrain loaf we did at SFBI, made with a pre-ferment and some yeast. But this time I made it all natural levain.

Multigrain bread(adapted from SFBI)

Soaker:

30g flax seeds

30g sesame seeds

30g sunflower seeds

30g oats,( I used Bob's Red mill 5 grain rolled cereal)

75g water

Soak for at least two hours

Levain:

80g flour

45g water

10g starter

Final dough:

215g AP flour

85g   Whole wheat

35g   Rye

240g water

195g soaker

135g levain

10g salt

Mix flour and water, autolyse for 30 to 60 minutes. Add in levain and mix at first speed for about 3 minutes. Mix in salt at second speed mix to medium or improved consistency, (window pane), add in soaker until incorporated at second speed.

1-11/2 hour bulk ferment with one fold if needed.

divide into 1lb or 454 g pieces, pre-shape into balls and rest at least 30 minutes.

Shape, whatever suits you, I made batards, since my attempt at school was less then spectacular!

1-2 hours rise in banneton or couche.

Bake about 35-40 minutes with steam at 450 F

These are quite moist and I allowed them to sit in the oven an extra 10-15 minutes with the oven off and the door slightly ajar.

Having followed the amazing home baker, Hans Joakim on his blog at the fresh loaf, I picked one of the many formulas he shared. Not having baked for awhile, I did make some errors in measuring the ingredients for this rye starter-based pain au levain. It still seemed to hold its form and taste. I will give it a proper go again and probably a lot more of this repertoire from this fine baker!

Finally, there's a loaf based on Jim Lahey's "no knead dough", something I'm revisiting, wondering if I can really make this loaf with just a levain rather then yeast. Umm.... verdict  is still out as the loaf or blob is still in my oven...maybe I will give that another look over and try again? (or not?).

Well two out of three isn't that bad.

Will be submitted to Susan @ Wild yeast yeast spotting!

Old wives tales are many, my excuse for falling for a coconut water drinking fad. In Ecuador it seems coconuts grow on trees....

During my recent trip to Ecuador, every afternoon just clearing the last breakfast tables from my wife's new restaurant venture, she would get a clear plastic glass of what I thought was water in one hand. In the other, she'd pick up a mysterious looking fleshy white and brown mottled thing in a plastic bag. When I asked her what it was, she told me agua de coco ' or coconut water.

According to my wife, it's said to help clean the kidneys. Googling,I found that it supposedly also helps strengthen the immune system. It is low in fat, no carbs, etc. Reading about it, I think of those 19th century medicine shows or 20th century New Age miracle cures.  Whatever, I started to like it, finding it refreshing. Soon I was ordering a daily cup.

Somehow I grabbed the coco water seller's attention. And to be sort of polite and semi-interested, I snapped a few shots of the fellow, his cart barely full of coconuts. Business must be good?

The next day I managed some head shots, props provided by my wife; a polo shirt and panama hat. She's so silly! And as if he didn't get enough attention, I bumped into him on the beach where the fishermen were unloading the catch. "Amigo!" he said, and smoothly pulled up his machete, posing through a fully stocked coconut patch and smiled....

Our cook, Sonia, told me later he was vanquisher of hearts a sort of mujeriero, a machete wielding Casanova, breaking coconuts and releasing nectar. You get the point, or maybe you don't. Anyway, I will miss his fresh coco water, as it is, I am now left to buy those cartons they sell at all the supermarkets for five times the price, it just ain't the same animal!

If you haven't already guessed by now, I have developed a penchant for musa, aka banana. From the green and starchy plantain to the familiar yellow sweet banana and all the varieties in between, you can't deny that this fruit is just great!

Sometimes a person likes a greener banana, or when slightly spotted and concentrated with sugars. But what do you do with bananas that are going south and your freezer is already full of banana bread? Here... banana jam, aka dulce de guineo.

While visiting Ecuador, I encountered a dark brown to almost molasses black looking stuff being served for continental breakfast to our customers. I asked my wife what they were serving, and she told me it was a local jam made from bananas, a great substitute if your out of guava or piña jam. Ecuador is fruit central!

One day we noticed an abundance of bananas that weren't the most prime specimens. We decided to try banana jam. The recipe was quite easy, just about 30 banana's, cinnamon sticks, cloves, water and panela. The hard part is someone has to stir this stuff till thick and sticky, a few hours. Between our cooks we had a fine product that makes for a different twist then the usual berry marmalade's were so used to.

Dulce de guineo

30 Ripe bananas

Water to cover

1/2 a wheel of panela, approximately a half pound, (find in your local latin market)

10 cloves

4 sticks of cinnamon

( * Although the spices were added directly, I suggest a sachet so you can remove it later, nothing like chewing on a stick of cinnamon or catching a fiery clove in your gums!)

In a large pot put all the ingredients together and just cover with water, bring to boil and skim. Over a medium to low flame cook down till thick and the water evaporates. Stir, every 5 minutes or so, so the jam won't stick or scorch the pan. Keep stirring till done, when it resembles a thick tar like paste.

Visiting Ecuador, I have been craving a piece of decent bread. All I have found here are pillows of soft white dough, yeasted, slightly sweet, shaped into odd looking but familiar pseudo-crescent rolls. Other than that there's some yellowish colored bread, or even some neon pink glazed sweet breads carted on window paned boxes mounted on bicycles with parasols with the peddlers literally pedaling their goods.

Out of sheer bread withdrawal, I decided to attempt something that could be recognized as handmade, with some taste of wheat and perhaps some additional flavor profile. Say, wheat tortillas. I didn’t have sourdough in mind, and for that matter didn't even have any yeast. Instead I relied soley on flour, water, salt and the flavor enhancer (and really fantastic ingredient) manteca de cerdo. Otherwise known as lard! The other thing I lacked was a rolling pin, so relied on Dan Lepard's innovative method of a wine bottle.Yes, they do make wine here, but that is another story. I started the dough using the ratio technique. Without Michael Ruhlman’s ratio book in hand, I used only my sense and experience to guide me; as the only scale we have available is huge and is used to weigh fish and vegetables. Rudimentary skill was at its most primeval stages.I rubbed the lard into the dough, added salt and eyeballed the water to the feel of how the dough was coming along, as I hadn’t previously used flour here.

Even with the humidity, the dough was perfect. I made up some tortillas which puffed up and tasted great. Whether plain or with cheese, tomatoes and chilies for an ad hoc  quesadilla, it worked, to the amazement of the cooks who had never had this style of tortilla. One of the cooks asked me if I knew how to make empanadas and if this dough would work. Having never considered the idea of tortilla dough being multi-purpose, I supposed that it could, and why not try? So I made little golf ball sized dough, patted them out flat with my hand, and proceeded to fill them with shrimp. Then we made some cheese with herbs. Our medium of cooking was in lard, fried things are good, especially in lard.

 

Roll into a circle for Tortillas, about 8 inches round. To cook tortillas use a round cast iron skillet or a flat Teflon pan and cook over medium high heat on both sides till puffy and blistered, about 1 minute for each side.

As my last post pointed out, I'm taking my summer break in Puerto Lopez, Ecuador, made famous by Anthony Bourdain, but also home to a new restaurant started by my own familia. Namely my wife and her brother. I'm here to help open it. From one kitchen into another, or out of the frying pan and into the fire.

Actually, it’s winter here now, a somewhat wet and overcast season where the temperature is a cool but comfortable 70 to sometimes humid 80 degrees. This sleepy fishing village is filled with people from all over the world, but particularly travelers from the interior of the Andean highlands. 

Ecuador is like other nations, with distinct cultural and geographic rivalries, which can often cause some name-calling. People from the interior Andean region call the coastal inhabitants "costeños" or "monos" (monkeys), partly because of the local diet of plantains and bananas (guineos). Quite funny since the coastal people call the Andean visitors "serranos", highlanders who eat grains and potatoes. Ironically they all come to try 
dishes derived from plantains, most typical of these dishes being the glorious and filling bolon.  Sort of like our own favorites, they come with different additions, including cheese, peanut butter, or Chicharrón. Beyond that there are sub-variations. During this  latest visit a new condiment I was introduced to something known as "sal prieta," a mixture of roasted peanuts, salt and corn ground and mixed in with various spices.

This week I have had my fill of eating plantains, but still can’t seem to get enough of all the guises and flavorful ways to prepare them. Here are some of my favorite styles and my take on an old favorite, plantain and cheese empanada.

A trio of plantain, by Chef Bernardo Zambrano of the Sheraton Hotel in Guayaquil.

Bolon de verde con queso y Chicharrón, Toston de verde con sal prieta, maduro asado con queso.

(plaintain with cheese, pork crackling, flattened and fried with crushed,peanut, corn and salt spice mix. Ripe plantain grilled and stuffed with cheese.

How they make bolon in Manabí

4 peeled and boiled empanadas

4 raw grated empanadas

salt to taste

 About 1 1/2 cups of cheese, queso fresco or any semi soft cheese grated.

4-5 cups oil (frying oil, canola or if your lucky lard, tastes better!)

Peel the eight plantains, boil four till soft and your able to crush them with a back of a spoon. Grate the other four plantains into a bowl. If your able to use a food processor and pulse both the raw and cooked plantain together till you have a dough, you may add some of the cooking water to loosen the dough if too stiff. Divide into walnut shaped pieces, and between a sheet of oiled plastic wrap press down to make a round circle. Place a tablespoon of grated cheese in the center. Take one side of the dough and cover the other half sealing the edge of the empanada.

Deep fry in a pan till golden brown, drain on paper towel and serve hot.

A  few days ago I woke up in the middle of my working vacation in Puerto Lopez, Ecuador....That morning reminded me of a scene from the exorcist; my bed was shaking and there were thumping sounds. My first thought that it was the hotel guests above who were in the midst of some tantric love making. But when I looked up and noticed no cries of ecstasy, I was confused.

What was certain were tremors from the earth. Just checked the news, on a very slow internet connection. Apparently, Ecuador was confronted with a 6.9 quake. I had feared all through the night from the sound of the  waves crashing very hard against the shore. I Thought for sure that we would have a tsunami, never mind an earthquake!

Just relaxing now with a cup of coffee, finished up my bolon with mani....let see what else happens...woops the restaurant is filling up and I have to serve up some breakfast!

Manabi Ecuador.