Guatemalan Dessert Favorites

Molletes

Guatemalans seem to make the very best use of any ingredient, and that includes using unlikely things to make into desserts. Take Plantains. They are used green as a "vegetable" side dish; medium-ripe, simply cooked, they are perfect as a side with black beans; really ripe and fried are great on their own for dessert and then comes magic. They are used sweet as Plantains in Mole Sauce for an amazing flavor sensation. Or used for Rellenitos de Platano, those amazing little fried ovals of pureed plantain with a surprise inside!

This magic is also done with homely yucca root, or squash (not too surprising as we do have Pumpkin Pie). And then bread. Bread, you ask? Well, I do love bread pudding, so I guess it's no surprise that I have always loved a dessert they call Molletes en Dulce. Molletes (pronounced "moy-YET-ez") are a particular type of bread from the Guatemalan "sweet bread/roll" panoply. An enriched bread, with a little sugar, shortening and eggs, these are delicious all on their own, smeared with a little butter and eaten with coffee or with black beans, or however/whenever you choose. And then as inevitably will happen, if they are somehow left over, rather than let them go stale and thrown out, they are turned into dessert. 

Pan Frances or French Bread

Now, a caveat. In all the 12 years I spent in Guatemala, I never, ever had Molletes en Dulce made with actual Molletes! Instead, and likely because it was more common for the "Pan Frances (their French Breads) to be left over than the Molletes, the cook made this same recipe but using the portions of Pan Frances instead. It was delicious, and a favorite dessert. Just not made with Molletes. Confusing to me at the time. 

Since in the U.S. we do not have this kind of Pan Frances, with its individually marked portions, I have made similar use of a narrow loaf of French bread, cutting it into chunks of like size, about 2 x 2 x 3-inches, approximately. Hollow out a core of the bread and fill with thick cream and raisins and proceed. It works. It's really good. But when I made Molletes last November, I decided at long last to make Molletes en Dulce. WITH Molletes!

Molletes en Dulce

Molletes en Dulce

Serves 6

1¾ cups sugar
2½ cups water
1 (4-inch) piece true cinnamon
6 molletes or other breads, about 1 to 2 ounces each, slightly dried
½ cup Mexican cream, or sour cream
18 raisins
2 eggs, separated
1 tablespoon flour
1 - 2 tablespoons oil or shortening for frying
slivered almonds, to adorn

In a large, wide pot, bring the first 3 ingredients to boil, lower to simmer and cook gently for about 20 to 30 minutes.

If actually using molletes, take out a piece from the top of each, creating a little

Cutt center from Mollete

lid, and widen the hole inside the bread. Divide cream between the wells, insert 3 raisins in each and then set the lid back on. If using French bread chunks, cut a slice into the bread, widening the hole as needed to insert the cream. Set 3 raisins into the cream.

Whip the egg whites until stiff. Separately, whip the egg yolks until they are pale yellow and drip down in ribbons from the beater or whisk. Fold the yolks into the whites, and then fold in about a tablespoon of flour to give body to the mixture.

Dip each filled piece of bread into the beaten egg mixture, till completely covered, and then fry these on all sides in the shortening in a large frying pan, turning to get the egg done on all sides. When completely fried, and thus sealed, set them gently into the simmering syrup. Gently simmer the molletes in the syrup for 20 - 30 minutes or longer. Serve adorned with almonds.

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Another use for leftover "sweet (enriched) breads" was called Boca de Reina, or Bocado de Reina. While I never once saw this dessert made anywhere but in a pastry shop, it was still one I completely fell in love with. The name means something like "A Queen's Bite or a Queen's Snack." A snack fit for a Queen would be another way to term this dessert. In the 1970s, when I was in Guatemala, my husband took me to this one pastry shop occasionally for a little sweet bite and often this was my choice. At that time, in that pastry shop, this dessert was a piece of cake that was amazingly good. Moist and tender, subtly flavored. I couldn't put a finger on what might be in it. I asked, and was told it was a cake made from leftover breads, made into crumbs. 

I returned to the U.S. once and for all in the early 1980s. Never once did I have this dessert again, nor ever heard of it anywhere, and pretty soon it was completely gone from memory.

Until.

When my oldest daughter was turning 40, I created a "Cookbook/Memoir" of all things Guatemalan that I could recall. All my children were born there, though the youngest, 3 years old at the time, remembers nothing of it. The oldest, at 10, remembered well. I found photos online of places we'd been and foods she'd known, recipes I had made and some I hadn't but still held on to. It was great. And then my son was turning 40 a few years ago, and while what I made for my daughter was good at the time, I had a LOT of new ideas and recipes I recalled while researching others, many I had actually tried out since that first book came to be. And this Bocado de Reina came into my mind. I searched online for a recipe, at least an idea. The ONLY thing that comes up when searching Guatemalan recipes and Bocado de Reina is some kind of banana bread/pudding.

I can say with 100% certainty, the Bocado de Reina I ate at that pastry shop, did NOT have bananas in it. 

My memory said that it was a darkish color, but not dark like chocolate cake. The cake had a wonderful, moist crumb. It was served cut into a square and set on a muffin paper to display. As I said, the flavors were elusive. 

Okay, so the one thing I knew was that it was made (at that pastry shop) with crumbs of day-old bread. And if that was the "flour", then I would just have to add in other cake-like ingredients. But what gave it the dark color? I know that chocolate was also not a flavor that I can recall from that cake. Yet. . . I wondered if using a small amount of Guatemalan / Mexican chocolate tablets, such as Ibarra or Abuelita, pre-sweetened and with cinnamon in them, maybe I could get this cake to have more color, while t the same time without it actually tasting of chocolate. I had just been making some of the Guatemalan breads, testing them out to see what I could use for recipes in my son's version of the Guatemalan Cookbook / Memoir. I had some leftover Molletes and Rosquitas. I went to work. 

Bocado de Reina

At a remove of 32 years from the last possible time I might have eaten this cake, I made my own version. I cannot in any way say for certain that this tastes perfectly of the Bocado de Reina I ate long years ago in Guatemala, but it fit all my remembered criteria, and it truly tastes fabulous. While maybe not 100% Guatemalan, here is my Bocado de Reina:

Bocado de Reina

Bocado de Reina

Makes one 9 x 9 cake

1½ cups (12 ounces) heavy cream
1 cup (7.3 ounces) sugar
1/3 cup (1.7 ounces) sweetened Mexican or Guatemalan chocolate, finely grated
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon true cinnamon (Ceylon, or Mexican)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
¾ cup (3.5 ounces) raisins
3 cups (8.35 ounces) “day old” enriched bread, made into crumbs
¼ cup (1.16 ounces) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon (0.18 ounces) baking powder

Make bread crumbs from rich breads such as brioche, molletes, wafer cookies, animal crackers or a combination. They should not all be completely dried out. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8 x 8 or 9 x 9-inch baking dish; set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together the cream, sugar, chocolate, salt, cinnamon, vanilla and eggs. Add in the raisins and bread crumbs and allow to soak for a few minutes. Stir together the flour and baking powder and stir in. Pour the batter into the baking dish and bake for about 40 to 50 minutes, until a tester inserted in the center comes out almost clean. A few remaining crumbs are okay. Cool completely. Dust the top with confectioners’ sugar if desired. 


My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Elegantly Drunken Cake

When I lived in Guatemala, some 17 years ago now, one of my most favorite desserts was Borracho Cake. Funny, but no one I knew EVER made it. The only place I ate it was when my husband (at that time) took me to a bakery.

While I was down there, I learned everything I could about cooking and baking. I watched people prepare a thing, then went about recreating it on my own. Or I tried a recipe (of which there were very few) and then tweaked it to be as I wanted the flavors to taste. When there were no recipes and I loved something, such as Enchiladas, or this Borracho Cake, I set about finding a way to make it. 

Borracho Cake

What I knew about this cake, from eating it at the pastry shop, was that it had a sponge cake type base, this sponge cake was perfectly saturated with a syrup flavored with cinnamon and rum, and the topping was a cornstarch pudding decorated with raisins. I needed three recipes, then:

• Sponge cake
• Syrup
• Cornstarch pudding

Borracho

If you know nothing about Spanish, you might not know that "borracho" means drunk, or "drunkard," depending on how it is used in a sentence. The fact that there is a fair amount of rum in the syrup is the reason for its name. And it is soooo good.

Older Style Borracho Cake

I had only 7 cookbooks when I got married that first time, so my sum total of cooking instruction came from those 7 books. My 1966 copy of The Joy of Cooking had the most information, so I went there for ideas. I was no cook at all, when I first got married at just barely age 20. I watched my Mom at home, but never ventured into trying things on my own, outside of a box cake. So, on my own in a foreign country with no one to ask - well, this was long, long before cell phones, internet, or easy long distance calling, I had no place but my books to turn to for advice. In Guatemala, over the course of 12 years and 4 houses, we had a phone in only one of those houses. Phones were not terribly common. Calling my Mom for a quick consult was out of the question, even if we'd had a phone, as it was so costly.  So back to the Borracho...

The Joy of Cooking has a recipe for "sponge cake" that is a flexible recipe. There is a choice of 3 to 6 eggs, choice of flavorings, and so on. Over the years, I tried the recipe with 3, 4 5 or 6 eggs, and my favorite, hands down, was with just the three eggs. More and it just tastes "eggy."  

A Note on Sponge Cake

When watching "The Great British Baking Show," I saw them making a "Victoria Sponge." Watching this intrigued me, because it looked like a regular batter cake, to me. What's the difference, you say?

Well, what I have always known as a "sponge" cake is that is should be like a sponge; lots of nice little holes, light and fluffy. A sponge cake is leavened by beating air into eggs - first the yolks and the whites at the end before folding in. A true sponge cake uses no other leavening like baking powder. (My cake does cheat and uses a little baking powder, just to give it a boost.)

British type Sponge (aka Pound cake)           vs           American type Sponge

Watching The Great British Baking Show, they used both butter and leavening in their "sponge" cake. What???

Come to find out, the British call sponge cake "foam cake." Their "sponge" cake is more like a pound cake. I recently ran into all this when I wanted to make a sponge cake type base for an American shortcake type application with fresh fruit on top. The cake I made, cobbling what I wanted from various (apparently British) "sponge cake" recipes and using the method used by Mary Berry, where she adds some flour along with the eggs as they are added, so the mixture does not look "curdled." This supposedly allows the cake to rise higher. I have no direct experience of this...

What resulted was a beautiful cake - don't get me wrong. It's just that it was in no way the kind of sponge cake I had wanted for my recipe. However, the cake was made, and that was that. And so I continued.

This is when I thought I just had to give my old Joy of Cooking tried and true sponge cake a go. The thing I was doing is using a new pan I had yet to use. I'd had it for years without even giving it a test drive. (So to speak). That first "sponge cake" (read: "pound cake") came out just beautifully in that pan. So now, would the real sponge cake do the same? It did.

A New Cake Pan

Since I was testing cakes in the pan, and now had one pound cake made in it, with absolutely beautiful results, true, and now this lovely sponge cake that was also beautiful, I opted to use it for a new Borracho cake look. 

In Guatemala, at that pastry shop, the Borracho was served in lovely squares, resting in a muffin type paper, but sopping with syrup. This new idea of mine was made in a lovely round pan with fluted edge, that creates an indented top when turned out. It's not very deep, but it does the trick, and it was perfect to hold the Cornstarch Pudding.

Here is what I do to make Borracho Cake:

Borracho Cake

Borracho Cake

Serves 10 to 12

CAKE:
3 large egg yolks
1 cup (6.95 ounces / 197 grams) superfine sugar
¼ cup (60 ml) boiling water
1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla
½ teaspoon (2.5 ml) almond extract
2 tablespoons (0.6 ounces / 17 grams) cornstarch
1 cup (4.35 ounces / 124 grams) all-purpose flour
1½ teaspoons (0.2 ounces / 6 grams) baking powder
½ teaspoon (0.1 ounces / 2 grams) sale
3 large egg whites

SYRUP:
1 cup (235 ml) water
½ cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
1 (4-inch) stick true cinnamon
½ cup  (118 ml) white rum

CORNSTARCH PUDDING:
1½ cups (353 ml) milk
1 (4-inch) stick true cinnamon
2 tablespoons (17 grams) cornstarch
6 tablespoons (83 grams) granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon vanilla extract

Raisins, to decorate

Make the cake: Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a 10-inch cake pan and line the bottom with parchment. Grease the parchment. Set aside.

In a mixing bowl, whisk together the cornstarch, flour, baking powder and salt  and set aside.

In another mixing bowl, beat the egg yolks until very light in color, using a hand mixer or whisk. Beat in the sugar gradually; the mixture will become very thick. Beat in the hot water and continue beating until it cools slightly. Mix in the vanilla and almond extracts. Spoon about a third of the dry ingredients into the wet mixture and fold in. Repeat until all the dry ingredients are incorporated.

Separately, in a squeaky-clean bowl, with super clean whisk or beaters, beat the egg whites until stiff, but not dry-looking. Fold a third of the whites into the batter to loosen slightly, then add the remaining whites and gently fold in. Pour into the prepared cake pan and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until the cake tests done in the center. Remove from oven and let set for about 10 minutes, then turn the cake onto a rack to cool slightly.

Make the syrup: While the cake is baking, place the water, sugar and cinnamon stick in a saucepan and bring to boil. Simmer gently for about 10 minutes to allow the flavor of cinnamon to permeate the water. Remove from heat, remove and discard the cinnamon stick and add the rum. Once the cake has cooled slightly, set it onto a dish with a rim and begin ladling the syrup over the cake. Use all the syrup. Allow the cake to completely cool.

Make the Cornstarch Pudding: In a saucepan, combine the cornstarch and sugar, then pour in the milk, whisking to combine. Add the cinnamon stick and place over medium heat and whisk until the mixture boils and thickens, then reduce heat and simmer, whisking constantly, for about 5 more minutes. Remove from heat and add the vanilla. Remove the cinnamon stick and discard. Pour the pudding over the cake. If the cake has a well, as mine does, this can be done at once. If the cake has a flat top, cool the pudding slightly, placing a piece of plastic film directly on the surface of the pudding to prevent a skin forming, then spread the pudding on top. Decorate with raisins, as desired.



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Old Recipes and New

My paternal grandmother was a fantastic baker. Most of her food was exceptional. Her chicken or beef (or a mix) soup was the best, ever. It seems, in my memory, to be rare that we ever went to grandma's house and not smell her soup, simmering away on the stove. She always added saffron to her soup, which was one of the smells and tastes I grew up knowing. To this day, the smell of saffron takes me back to my childhood.

Grandma was from what is now Serbia, near Novi Sad. She came to the US in the early 1900's, very young, with at least one of her three children. I remember her most for her strudel, made with the dough stretched so thin you could read a paper through it. She would coax the dough using the tablecloth underneath it, to roll over the filling, usually apple or poppy seed, though I believe at times she made a cabbage or cheese strudel as well. This site has photos of someone making a strudel with Filo dough, but the method and look of it are the most like what I recall. I recall one time at age 8 watching the process. I wish with all my being I had ever been there when I was old enough to really learn from her. She made many other little pastries of different kinds too.


Grandma's Nut Torta and Icing

And then sometimes she would make a pie or a cake. I really cannot even recall what kind of pies she made, though I was with her when she made some one day. What I recall most of cakes was what she called Nut Torta. Most often this cake was made with black walnuts, which I never liked, and thus, I did not like this cake. (Walnuts or pecans can be substituted, and I am told she did use those on occasion, but I only recall the black walnuts). The torta was not a traditional cake, as it used no flour. It consisted mainly of ground nuts and eggs. Ten eggs, to be exact. The icing she made was also not a traditional icing as I know them today, but made in a two step process. First she made a milk and cornstarch pudding and cooled it. Next she would cream together shortening and sugar. Once the shortening and sugar were thoroughly combined, she added in the cornstarch pudding mixture. To me, this always made a most greasy feel in my mouth, and again, I just didn't care for it at all.

In the spirit of keeping recipes alive, and since my sister had this recipe in her files, I finally made this cake a few days back. Everything about it was just as I recalled, except I found I no longer really dislike black walnuts!

Grandma's Nut Torta and Icing

A bite of the torta

TORTA 
10 eggs, separated
10 tablespoons sugar
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 cup chopped nuts; walnuts, pecans, black walnuts
3 tablespoons cracker meal
dash of salt

NUT TORTA ICING
1½ cups milk
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1½ cups granulated sugar
1½ cups white shortening (or substitute butter, room temperature)

MAKE TORTA: Beat the egg yolks until thick and creamy, adding 7 tablespoons of the sugar gradually. Add cracker meal, nuts, baking powder and salt, stirring by hand.

Beat egg whites until stiff, gradually adding the remaining 3 tablespoons of sugar. Gently fold meringue into egg yolk mixture until combined. Pour batter into 4 lightly greased and floured 8-inch cake pans. Bake in a preheated oven at 350 for 20-30 minutes. The cakes will puff up, then deflate to about a third of the pan when cooling. The final cake is spongy and dense.

ICING DIRECTIONS: In a medium saucepan, whisk together the sugar and cornstarch. Add in the milk and whisk to combine. Begin cooking the pudding on medium heat and cook, stirring until thickened. Let cool. Alternatively, pour into bowl of a stand mixer and allow the paddle attachment run on lowest setting while mixture cools. This also prevents a skin from forming on the pudding as it cools.

Once the pudding is cooled to room temperature and would no longer melt the shortening (butter), begin adding it in, about 2 tablespoons at a time, beating to completely incorporate before adding more. If at any time the icing looks curdles, chill the bowl briefly, then continue beating until all the shortening or butter is incorporated and the icing is glossy. Vanilla or other flavoring may be added, if desired.

A couple of things I thought about once I had made and eaten this cake after so very many years:

• I believe this would be easily made gluten-free using 2 tablespoons psyllium husks instead of cracker meal
• the icing is curious, but butter in place of the shortening makes this recipe far more palatable!

I am planning to give my ideas a try. I may use walnuts instead of black walnuts, partly just to try something different and partly to avoid making too much of the same thing. In the meantime, while this is a short blog, I will end here for now. Cheers to memories of grandmas everywhere!



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Little Cookies from Guatemala: Polvorosas

I had never made Polvorosas before today. I lived in Guatemala for 12 years and loved these little cookies so very much, but never had a recipe to make them. It makes me wonder why? But, it's never too late to start, I say.

Polvorosas get their name from the root word, "Polvo", meaning dust or powder. They are little shortbread cookies dipped in confectioners' sugar. One bite and the crumbs and powder go everywhere. Hence the name. Similar cookies are known as Mexican Wedding Cakes. I love the apt name of Polvorosas better. 

Polvorosas

I was thinking about these little cookies as I have been working through various Guatemalan recipes lately. I have been eating black beans like no tomorrow, and I made Rellenitos de Platano, or plantains with a black bean filling last week. I made enchiladas; no resemblance at all to what we know in the U.S. as an enchilada. Another thing on the agenda before I am over this Guatemalan food kick is Empanadas de Manjar. Many have heard of Empanadas as a meat filled pastry, but the ones I ate in Guatemala were a little orangey colored pastry filled with a cornstarch pudding. Delicious. I haven't made them for probably 30 years. I am craving my little antojitos (snacks, or cravings). 

packing into mini muffin tins

Back to the Polvorosas. I know from many years of baking that they are a shortbread cookie. Shortbread, if any of you are unfamiliar, is a dough made with no eggs. Often it is a simple, basic three ingredients: flour, butter or shortening and sugar. I chose to go with a little cornstarch to lighten the flour a bit, and I used a combination of butter and shortening; butter for the flavor, and shortening for stability. The next thing I wondered was how to get the right shape? These cookies are always about 1 1/2 inches in diameter and about 1/2 inch high. Making shortbread stick together in any shape is not easy. Then a had a flash of brilliance! Mini muffin tins.

unmolded from mini muffin tin

I took the "dough", more like a bowl of crumbs, and packed some into a mini muffin cup. Just one, to try out my theory. I pressed it in well, then turned over the tin, holding it from the opposite end and sharply rapped the tin down onto the cutting board. I lifted the tin, and there was the little formed cookie, pretty as you please. Okay, that worked. I continued on, using one row of 4 mini cups at a time, then turning it over and rapping sharply to get them out. Worked like a charm. 

Making these, I started out using pounds and ounces to measure the ingredients, though I translated that over to cups. Pounds and ounces is a more accurate measurement, of course. Here is my recipe.

Polvorosas

Makes 35 to 40 cookies

8 ounces all-purpose flour (1½ cups)
4 ounces cornstarch (¾ cup)
9 ounces sugar (1 cup)
5 ounces butter, room temperature (10 tablespoons)
4 ounces shortening, room temperature (8 tablespoons)

Place granulated sugar into a food processor or blender to make it very fine. Cream the butter and shortening, then add the sugar and cream well.

In another bowl, sift or whisk together the flour and cornstarch. With a wooden spoon mix the flour and cornstarch mixture into the creamed mixture, with a pinch of salt. This will never be a cohesive dough like other cookies, but crumbs that can be pressed together.

Using a mini muffin tin, pack the crumbs into the little wells, then turn the muffin tin over, holding from the opposite side. Rap sharply down onto counter or cutting board to release the cookies. You may try to make other forms out of this mixture, but the mini muffin tin idea worked really well.

Gently place cookie forms onto a baking sheet. Bake these in a preheated 350 degree oven for 15 minutes. Dredge in confectioners' sugar while still hot from the oven.





My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Guatemalan Foods; Heathy and Delicious

In general, the typical foods from Guatemala are quite healthy, and certainly full of fiber. I learned a lot about  foods in Guatemala when I lived there in the 1970s and early 1980s. They use a lot of vegetables and beans in very creative ways, with the addition of tomatoes, tomatillos, pumpkin seeds and sesame seeds in the most unlikely places. And the food is so good. Even now, so very many years later, I crave some of these foods. The fact that it takes a fair amount of time to create some of these dishes is the only deterrence from making them all the time. I am going to make Rellenitos de Platano today, and some time this week I am making Guatemalan Enchiladas. Guatemalan enchiladas are nothing at all like Mexican enchiladas, and I cannot wait to taste them again.

Rellenitos ready to eat

I have been eating black beans regularly for the last 4 weeks, just because I got in the mood, suddenly. I love them made "volteados" or pureed and cooked down to nearly dry  consistency, where they hold the shape of the pan, when flipped back and forth. But just pureed is easy and really good, and that is how I have made the last batch. But there are dishes using black beans that make one wonder. One of these is Rellenitos de Platano. Relleno means filled. Any word with the addition of the letters "ito" or "ita" afterwards is a diminutive. Rellenito (rrray-yen-EE-toe) means something small and filled. Platano is the Spanish word for Plantains, so we come to "small fried filled plantains".  Somehow that doesn't sound quite as lyrical as Rellenitos de Platano, but I will go on to wax lyrical about how good these little things can be! 

So, okay, what are these little things? And, how are they made?

Rellenitos de Platano are cooked, very ripe plantains, which are then pureed. A little sugar is added, with some cinnamon. For this recipe, only true cinnamon will taste right, so if you are unsure what this is, look in the Mexican section of your grocery, or go to a Mexican grocery. They always have true cinnamon. True cinnamon, cinnamomum verum, is distinguished by its very thin quills, making it very easy to break into bits. With the thick-quilled cassia we are so accustomed to, this is not an easy task. Cassia tastes very different.
 
Once you have your plantains ready, you need to have some black beans made into volteados, or very cooked down and dry and paste-like. You take a small ball of the plantain puree, probably about an ice cream scoop size. Oil your hands well and take the plantain mixture in one hand and pat it out a little. Place about 2 teaspoons or so of the black beans and place in the center, and then form the plantain mixture to encase the black beans, making it into an oval. Now you have the relleno, or filled part of the recipe. At this point, though it is not authentic, I always dredge the filled plantain lightly in flour. This helps when frying so they do not stick to the pan. If you leave off the dredge in flour, or use maybe a rice flour instead, these are naturally gluten free.

The little ovals are fried in oil in a skillet to brown. The ingredients are all cooked already (except if they are dredged in flour), so they do not need a long cooking period. In Guatemala, they generally fry them in a little oil, but I have also filled the pan with oil to about an inch or so, so that when they are frying, they partially float, ensuring that they are not sticking to the pan. If the plantains are very soft, they can stick. Once fried, they are rolled in white sugar, to coat. These are good hot or cold and oh, so delicious.

If all of this does not sound good, it is just as I said. Guatemalan foods use lots of ingredients in unlikely places, but you really have to try the foods to believe how good they can be. It may be less likely that someone just tries this out without any prior knowledge, but I do so hope that someday you all may find a good Chapina to make them for you, or lacking that, someone like me who lived there long enough to become enchanted with the foods. 


My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.