Ranchos - Manchamanteles, a Pinedo recipe

My first recipe for the Ranchos era is Manchamantel, "stains the tablecloth".  Ms. Pinedo's book lists two recipes, this one and one that uses chicken, pineapple, and peaches (both on page 157).  (See details about her book here.)

A translation of the second recipe is at the bottom of this post.

I used Dan Strehl's translation from page 108 of Encarnación's Kitchen which he titles "Manchamanteles, The Stew that Stains the Tablecloth":

ISBN 0-520-23651-3

Manchamanteles  -- The Stew That Stains the Tablecloth

Take some ripe tomatoes and remove the seeds.  Grind them with soaked, toasted dry chiles, cinnamon, and pepper.  After they are ground, fry in lard, mix with warm water, and add chickens or pork, cooked sausages, olives, vinegar, salt, a lump of sugar, yams, or peanuts.

My Redaction

2 ounces dried California type chiles

2 pounds, 9 ounces Roma tomatoes

1 scant teaspoon peppercorns

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

4 ounces beef chorizo

1 pound, 6 ounces braised boneless pork

1 pound, 2 ounces yam

1/2 cup chopped peanuts, roasted and lightly salted

1 tablespoon sugar

1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup chopped black olives

And the chiles.  See below.

My Notes

The tomatoes, chiles, pepper, and cinnamon form the sauce in which all the other ingredients simmer to make the stew.  My challenge was learning how to handle the chiles.

You can read the details of how I chose my chiles here.

And the details of how I prepared them for this sauce are found here.

While the chiles soaked, I prepared the rest of the ingredients.

I removed the stems and seeds of the tomatoes and cut them into big pieces.  Then I processed them in the blender to make four cups of puree.

Once the chiles were ready, I put them into the blender along with some of the tomato puree and the cinnamon and pepper.  I blended them until the mixture was smooth.  I poured some of it out and added in the rest of the tomato puree so it was all well mixed.  The taste was of raw tomato with a mild chile bite.  I could taste the spices but they weren't overwhelming.  

The sauce went into my Dutch oven that was heated and had about 1 tablespoon olive oil in it (I was out of lard).

I decided that "frying it in lard" really meant to heat the sauce and cook it a little before the other ingredients went in.  I brought it to bubbling over medium heat and then let it simmer over a lower heat for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

The braised pork chunk was cut into bite-sized cubes, the yam was peeled and diced, the chorizo was cooked in the skillet and then drained of its fat.  The whole olives were sliced and the peanuts were coarsely chopped.  

Once the sauce was ready, all the other ingredients were added and the mixture was stirred.  It looked too thick so I added a little hot water so it stirred easily.

I adjusted the heat to low, covered the pot, and let it simmer for about an hour, which is what it took to make the yam cubes soft.  Occasionally I stirred it.

The Verdict

I served it with a garnish of chopped peanuts and with warm flour tortillas on the side.

My guest taster and I were a little wary because neither of us are experienced hot chile eaters.  We both knew - intellectually - that I had chosen mild chiles but the chorizo certainly had a kick.  

So we took experimental bites and were pleasantly surprised at the flavor.  The chile heat was mild enough for us but it was there.  The pepper and especially the cinnamon were good background support flavors.  The chunks of ingredients -- pork, yams, olives, and peanuts -- were tender and had absorbed enough of the sauce flavors to be interesting.  The yams came across as slightly sweet.  The raw tomato taste was gone and the spices and other flavors had blended into a nice balance.

The sauce itself had a light sweetness to it, which we enjoyed.  We both decided it needed more vinegar, although we liked it as it was, too.  We ended up putting some aged balsamic vinegar on top and that was wonderful.  I think I would increase the apple cider vinegar to 2 tablespoons and perhaps put the second tablespoon in just before serving it.

The flour tortillas were a good accompaniment and actually the historically correct choice.  Ms. Pinedo lived in Northern California where it was easier to grow wheat than corn.  We each tore off pieces of the tortilla and spooned the stew onto it.  

Success!  I was pleased I handled processing the chiles well and that I didn't blast out our taste buds with too much heat.  If you want more heat, you could use the entire 9 ounce roll of chorizo or you could choose hotter dried chiles, like a pasilla ancho or more.  I bought some pasilla anchos for more experimenting.

For the record, my table did not have a tablecloth, so it was not stained.   

We had the leftovers the next day and found it was even better.  No more vinegar was needed; all the flavors had melded and balanced.  It was excellent.

Here is the translation of the second recipe, "Manchamanteles de gallina":

Chicken Stain the Tablecloth

A wide chili is deveined and toasted, then cooked, soaked, and ground with garlic, cumin and tomatoes. This is half fried in little lard and then mixed with cooked onions, pineapple, sweet potato, peaches and chopped peanuts.

(I assume you would add pieces of chicken with the onions and etc.)