Chimichurri à la Caracas

When I took my trip to New York last week, I knew I would come back inspired - probably by the campuses I'd visit, the people I'd meet, the food I'd consume in copious amounts - but I had no idea just how diverse those sources of inspiration would be.  Yes, the campuses are amazing; the CIA in upstate New York is basically a Disneyland for chefs-in-training, built for and inhabited by food-nerds all over the country; the students I met were filled with an enviable confidence and passion for their craft; the food itself was enough to make paying $800/mo in rent almost look worth it.  But the unexpected impacted me the most: the friend I stayed with, whose talent, vision, and work ethic both humble and excite me.  The charming $2 cookbook from Strand filled with recipes for beloved dishes from around the world.  And the tiny, almost missable Venezuelan eatery in East Village, a painfully long walk away from the wrong subway stop, serving up comfort food as good as it gets - arepas.



Now I'll have you know that while I was walking the streets of Manhattan, I never once stopped thinking about what I'd cook once home (okay, I might have been a little distracted in SoHo), and among the projects added to my mental to-do list throughout the week, "FIND A WAY TO MAKE AREPAS AT HOME" stayed on top.  If you haven't had the opportunity to try one, an arepa, a staple of Venezuelan cuisine, is basically a white corn cake grilled or fried to crispy perfection.  It can then be enjoyed as is or cut open and stuffed with all kinds of goodies like black beans, cotija cheese, fried plantains, shredded beef and chimichurri.  It's a seriously transcendent combination of textures, with the crispy arepa crust giving way to a light, fluffy, slightly chewy interior which is really only a precursor to the unlimited combinations of flavors from its fillings (*phew). Not convinced yet?  Maybe this'll help:

love at first bite - Caracas' Arepa de Pabellón; photo courtesy of seriouseats

So why isn't the title of this post "Arepas and Chimichurri à la Caracas", or "Arepas de Pabellón", or "I FOUND A WAY TO MAKE AREPAS AT HOME"?

See, I'm good at making grand plans.  I could have used a simple hummus recipe from my $2 book, or another (real) ice cream recipe I've been itching to make.  But then I thought, no.  I've gone a whole week without updating; I ain't gonna redo chickpeas and ice cream!*  No, I'll give the people what they don't know they want: AREPAS.  I Googled away for the next hour to find authentic recipes for arepas and the Pabellón filling, and was pleasantly (and naively) surprised to see how easy it was.  Turned out all you needed for the arepas was a special kind of corn flour mixed with hot water and some melted butter.  Easy, right?  I already had all the seasonings I needed for the beef, and even came across a convincing "Caracas Secret Sauce Recipe"online.  It was all so reminiscent of the hope I got when I came across a Martha Stewart recipe for French macarons that didn't use a scale - so easy!**

So I woke up this morning, much too close to lunchtime, and drove off to the nearest Latin grocery store to pick up the exotic essentials - cotija cheese, plantains, and a bag of masarepa (precooked corn flour; not the same as cornmeal).  Along the way I picked up cilantro, parsley, black beans, a mango, and a pound of skirt steak.  I was so gonna do this.


Only the beef came out chewy (cooked too fast), the beans dry (cooked too long) and the arepas...not perfect (mystery).  The dough looked similar enough to the stuff the areperos (arepa makers) at Caracas were using, except more rubbery than fluffy, even when I dumped the first batch and tried a second time.  When cooked, they were similar to Caracas' in texture (crispy outside, soft inside), but crumbled at any attempt to be sliced open and stuffed.  The plantains I chose weren't ripe enough and were still starchy when fried.  To top it all off, the few rushed pictures I took were really, really horrible and didn't even do a half-decent job of documenting the pain of the last hour.  I also somehow managed to dirty the entire island.

case in point

Thinking all was lost, I dejectedly placed a sad, unstuffed arepa onto a plate and piled some beans and steak onto it. I didn't even bother to get a spoon - just watched the beans slide off my spatula to land wherever they pleased: plate, arepa, counter, eh...but then I sprinkled it with crumbles of cotija, topped it with a pretty golden plantain slice, and drizzled chimichurri liberally over the whole thing. And it actually didn't look so bad.  Kind of like a glorified sope, which I know, before anyone murders me, is not Venezuelan at all.


So while I can't in good faith give you arepas today (good ones, anyway), I will give you chimichurri.  To be fair, it's almost amazing enough to make up for the lack of everything else. This sauce is addictive, bright, tangy, a little spicy, and surprisingly close to the stuff in the squirt bottles on that hallowed Caracas counter.  Best of all,  you won't have to go out of your way for the ingredients.

(And yes, I was absent for a week, and all I came back with was 8 tedious paragraphs and a chimichurri recipe.  Please don't hate me. At least not before trying it.)

* Written verbatim from my thoughts.
** Foreshadowing, for those who didn't see my first tray ever of macarons and therefore didn't get it.




Chimichurri à la Caracas
adapted slightly from Raven Burgos

What else can you use chimichurri for, other than as a condiment for failed arepas?  It's awesome as a sauce or marinade for any kind of grilled meat, especially flank steak. Mix it with some mayo for chimichurri aioli as an exciting spread for your sandwich or wrap. You can even drizzle it on eggs, dress potato salads with it, and spread it on bruschetta, or on your fingers, or whatever. I won't tell anyone.

4 cloves garlic
1/2 cup cilantro
1/2 cup parsley
1/2 cup vinegar
1 1/2 cup yellow jalapeno peppers, seeded (I used one yellow jalapeno, one green jalapeno, and one red chile because that's what I had; the red also adds nice color)
1/2 cup ripe, fresh mango
1/4 cup red onion
1/2 tsp pepper
2 tsp ground cumin
1 tbsp dried oregano (Oops! I actually forgot this, but it still tasted fine)
salt to taste (I used about 1 tsp)
1 cup olive oil

Place garlic cloves into food processor or blender and chop into fine pieces.  Add everything else except for the olive oil; blend until finely chopped. Then pour mixture into a large bowl and slowly mix in the olive oil until the desired consistency, like a more runny pesto, is reached. I used only about 3/4 cup for mine.