Tag: Savoury

Around the world in 80 bakes, no.57: Arepas from Venezuela

Around the world in 80 bakes, no.57: Arepas from Venezuela

Arepas are thick circular cakes made of cornmeal. They’re ubiquitous in Venezuela and Colombia and have been around in the area for at least 3,000 years. They’re served with myriad fillings, either as part of a main meal or as a snack – they’re a popular street food item.

The final parts of the arepa-making process – making the dough, forming the cakes, frying them and  (optionally) finishing them in the oven – are straightforward enough for a non-native home cook. The beginning part – grinding the corn and the “nixtimalisation” process of boiling it up with lime – are best left to the professionals unless you’re really, really dedicated. The resulting ground meal is called masarepa and the most readily available brand in the UK (and, I suspect, elsewhere) is called Harina PAN. It comes in several varieties: I chose the plain white one, although I’ve also bought a packet of the yellow version for experiments yet to come.

I took my recipe for the arepas themselves from a post on healthiersteps.com: as well as your choice of masa, available variations include the addition of dairy products. All of butter, milk or quesito (white soft cheese) show up in recipes.

To go with the arepas, I could have picked dozens of different filling. I ended up, completely arbitrarily, by simplifying a recipe for vegan barbacoa (which is kind of a contradiction in terms, but I get the idea of emulating the smokiness of barbacoa while staying plant-based, and it turned out really delicious). As a side dish, I made an avocado, cherry tomato and crumbled white cheese salad, which I found in a recipe for Colombian arepas which I haven’t replicated here, but which is warmly recommended since it complemented the rest of the dish really well.

The vegan barbacoa filling

  • 250g dried green or brown lentils
  • Oil for frying (I used sunflower oil)
  • 1 onion
  • 3 cloves garlic
  • 3 large carrots
  • 2 tbs brown sugar
  • Salt and black pepper to taste
  • 1½ tsp ground smoked paprika
  • 2 tsp ground cumin
  • ¼ tsp ground cloves
  • 1½ tsp dried oregano
  • 2 dried bay leaves
  • 60g chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (see below)
  • Juice of one lime

Chipotle peppers in adobo sauce come in cans: I used around a quarter of a 220g can. It’s a strong flavour and you really need to calibrate how spicy you want the dish. Starting with zero knowledge, I think I got lucky: this amount was perfect for the people round the table who like their food spicy but not excessively so, and just about OK (but right on the edge) for those who don’t like their chili much. 

  1. Boil lentils in a saucepan in plenty of water until cooked (this took me around 45 minutes). You could, of course, use pre-cooked tinned lentils if you prefer. Drain and set aside.
  2. Chop the onion and garlic very finely. Grate the carrots – if you have a food processor with a grater attachment, use it.
  3. In a heavy pan with a lid, fry the onion and garlic on medium heat until transparent.
  4. Add the carrot and fry for a few more minutes.
  5. Chop the chipotle peppers finely – this isn’t in the original recipe, so I didn’t do it. Let’s just say that biting into a whole chipotle pepper was, er, an intense experience.
  6. Add the lentils and all the remaining ingredients. Mix well and fry for a little longer.
  7. Cover the pan and put onto the lowest heat you have for 40 minutes to an hour. Keep topping up the mixture with a little water to ensure that it doesn’t dry out.

The arepas

  • 300g masarepa (from Harina PAN or equivalent, see photo)
  • 10g salt
  • 500 ml warm water
  • Coconut oil for frying
  1. Mix the masarepa, salt and water and form into a ball of dough. Leave to rest for five minutes or so.
  2. Form the dough into a cylinder and cut into circular cakes, around 2cm thick. I made eight cakes, which were a bit too small; the original recipe was for six.
  3. Heat oil in a skillet and fry your arepas on medium heat until golden brown on both sides – turn each arepa over when it’s completely browned on the first side. The recipe said five minutes a side, but it took me around 15 minutes total. 
  4. Optionally, put the arepas in a 180℃ oven for a few minutes to make sure they’re absolutely cooked through. Perhaps because I used a relatively gentle heat, I didn’t need to do this step.
  5. To serve, slice each arepa in half horizontally, fill and replace the lid. But don’t expect anyone to eat them with their hands!
Around the world in 80 bakes, no.10: Scottish oatcakes

Around the world in 80 bakes, no.10: Scottish oatcakes

I eat between meals. Because I’m type 2 diabetic, I need things that I can snack on that are neither overly sweet (we’ll draw a discreet veil over the cake recipes in this series of posts) nor overly salty (I can eat bags of peanuts for days, but this is a terrible idea also). Scottish oatcakes contain little or no sugar, don’t have to be overly salty and are really delicious, either on their own or with a bit of cheese: in short, they are the perfect snack. And they turn out to be one of the easiest things on the planet to bake.

This recipe is only slightly modified from the recipe by BBC good food contributor “zetallgerman”: I’ve changed a few things and added some details, but it’s basically their recipe and hats off to them, because it works like a charm.

I’ve given quite a lot of detail on rolling and cutting here, because this is a really good beginner’s bake – I beg forgiveness from experienced bakers for whom this is all obvious.

Ingredients

  • 225g oats (ordinary porridge oats if you can; jumbo oats need to be blitzed first)
  • 60g wholemeal spelt flour (ordinary wholemeal wheat flour is fine: my lockdown larder has spelt flour and it works very well)
  • ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda or baking powder
  • ½ tsp salt (zetallgerman says 1 tsp: I prefer ½ to ¾)
  • ½ tsp sugar (optional, as far as I’m concerned)
  • 60g unsalted butter (or use salted and reduce the amount of added salt)
  • 70ml warm water, plus 10ml or so more for the next round

Method

  1. Preheat oven to 190℃ fan
  2. Get a baking tray ready. If it isn’t non-stick, line it with baking paper. You’ll also need something with which to cut the oatcakes into circles: I use a fairly solid mug whose diameter is 9cm, so I just fit 12 oatcakes into my 30cm x 40cm tray.
  3. If your butter came out of the fridge, soften. My favourite way is to cut it into small cubes and leave it in a warm place in the kitchen: five minutes in spring sunshine is plenty.
  4. Mix the oats, flour, baking soda or powder, salt and sugar until everything’s reasonably evenly distributed.
  5. Add the butter and mix thoroughly, pinching with your fingers until all the butter is absorbed. If you can, do this with one hand to keep the other one clean. Pastry and biscuit recipes always say “to the consistency of breadcrumbs”: personally, I’ve never succeeded in achieving anything looking remotely like a breadcrumb, but it doesn’t seem to matter. 
  6. Add 70ml of warm water and combine everything together into a dough. The amount of water is a bit variable: if your dough fragments horribly when you try to roll it, add a few drops more, remix and try again.
  7. On a floured board, roll your dough out to 4-5mm thickness. Cut a circle (I use a mug) and transfer to your baking sheet (I have to first put the mug over my hand and then thump it for the oatcake to come out). Repeat: if all is well, you should be able to get six oatcakes.
  8. Now gather together the off-cut dough and put it back in your bowl, add a few drops more water and recombine. You can now roll out the dough again and repeat. Hopefully, you’ll manage another four oatcakes this time.
  9. At this stage, I normally have enough dough for two oatcakes. I divide it in half and roll them out individually
  10. Bake for 20 minutes. As well as the usual oven variability, the exact time is a matter of taste: longer = crispier but gives more danger of a burnt taste

That’s it folks – a really low effort bake which has given me reliable results every time!

The usual in-process shots: