Re:visiting Peru | Mika's Lomo Saltado

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The goods.

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Ladies and gentlemen, I'm getting back to eating Peruvian food thanks to the lovely Miss Mika Sobieski. Mika is my new roommate and an amazing cook who spends her summers preparing breakfast, lunch, and dinner for 150 teens at a Spanish immersion camp in Minnesota. Random, right? But through her contact with Argentinians, Peruvians, Columbians, and whatever else, she's brought mate, quinoa, all sorts of wine, and Peruvian food back into my life.

You all will love her because she made the best Peruvian dish in existence for us last night: lomo saltado. This could very well be the most popular dish in Peru, and with damn good reason. Marinated steak, home-made french fries, delicious rice, and red onions sautéed with tomatoes and cilantro (and a ton of spices) is a great combination. You won't be able to stop eating it if you make it right!

Mika made her version of lomo saltado for us, which included green bell pepper and jalapeños. You'll be seeing another variation of this classic, delicious dish in a few weeks! This makes enough for two, but it can be expanded for more.

The ingredients:

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We're not big on censorship.

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• Beef sirloin or tenderloin for two (we used a 12 oz. strip steak)
  
• Enough red wine to cover the meat
  
• 2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
  
• 2 tbsp. soy sauce
  
• 1 clove of garlic
  
• 1 jalapeño pepper, diced
  
• salt and pepper to taste
  
• 1/2 red onion
  
• 1/2 tomato
  
• 1/2 green pepper
  
• 1 tbsp. fresh chopped cilantro
  
• juice of one lime
  
• 2 tbsp. cumin
  
• rice
  
• french fries
  
  1. Slice the steak into cubes, then marinate it with the soy sauce, red wine vinegar, a good red wine (we used a Rioja), garlic, black pepper, and salt for at least 20 minutes.
  2. Start making the rice. We made one cup of parboiled rice, because we love it. I used the beef fat to saute diced garlic, added a touch of olive oil, and continued with the rice preparation.
  3. Prepare the french fries. They're supposed to be made from scratch, but we were in a time crunch. We cheated and bought frozen Texas home fries, so at this point we put them in the oven to bake.
  4. Slice the red onion and green pepper into petals and dice half a tomato in large chunks; set aside.
  5. Once the 20 minutes are up, place the meat and marinade in a pot on medium heat.
  6. Sauté for five minutes, then add the lime juice, red onion, bell pepper, cumin, and fresh cilantro.
  7.Sauté for five more minutes, then add the diced tomato. Cover the pot and simmer for 5 minutes, or until the onions and green peppers are soft.
  8. Place rice on a plate, serve the meat and juices over the rice, add french fries, and devour.
  

What to Grill Today | Pizza

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Looks like the best pizza I've never had.

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My sister and her fabulous could-be-a-chef boyfriend have a delicious tradition of making grilled pizza when the weather is right in Miami. The photo above is their latest creation: grilled breakfast pizzas, eaten poolside.

They'd get more "foodie points" if they made their own dough, but they buy it from Whole Foods, which is the next best thing. They roll the dough out to the desired thickness and throw it on a cured, pre-heated grill. The dough puffs up when heated, so they pop it, flatten it, and flip it over. That's when they sauce it or add other toppings.

The pizza on the left has sliced baby 'bella mushrooms, bacon, scrambled eggs, cheese, and home fries. The pizza on the right has their home-made chunky marinara, fresh spinach, home fries, egg, sausage, and cheese.

Everyone invited to these impromptu poolside pizza parties swears by the pizza. I expect to have a few made for me the next time I grace them with my presence, which means a full report for my readers!

Re:visiting Peru | Cerdo Relleno con Manzana

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I made one heck of a dinner tonight, thanks to that old cookbook my mom sent up. "Cerdo Relleno con Pure de Manzana" is a simple dish, perfect for those nights that you don't want getting too complicated.

If you do it right, the pork is tender, the apple sauce is savory, and it's so tasty, you won't even want a side dish (that's all filler, anyway).

To reproduce this dish you'll need-

• 2 lb pork tenderloin
  
• sea salt
  
• freshly ground black pepper
  
• powdered cumin
  
• 1 tbsp of raisins and 1 tbsp of cranberries
  
• 4 tbsp olive oil
  
• 4 tbsp butter
  
• 2 medium-sized onions (small dice)
  
• 2 large apples (peeled, cored, sliced)
  
• 1.5 cups chicken stock (as required)
  
  1. trim excess fat and silver membrane off pork tenderloin; wash and pat dry
  2. butterfly the pork and season both sides liberally with sea salt, freshly ground black pepper, and powdered cumin
  3. place either the prunes or the raisins and cranberries in pork
  4. dice the onion; peel, core and slice the apples thinly, set aside
  5. sear pork until golden in olive oil over medium heat, set aside
  6. discard the olive oil, add butter to the same pan and saute onions and apples for 5 minutes over medium heat
  7. return pork to the pan and add 1/2 cup of chicken broth
  8. cover pan, adding chicken broth as needed so that the mixture doesn't become dry
  9. cook for 25 minutes (or to your preferred temperature), flipping the pork over halfway through
  10. slice pork in 1/2" thick slices, serve with rustic apple sauce on side
  
  

I took a few liberties with the recipe, substituting cranberries and raisins for the recommended prunes. I also plumped up the raisins and the cranberries by heating them in chicken stock, before placing them in the pork. I added cumin to the list of seasonings, as well - and you can see from the picture that the apple "sauce" isn't, since I prefer apples in their rustic form. I also added some fresh goat cheese (with lemon pepper) as a counterpoint to the sauce's sweetness.

The end result was better than I could have asked for, and definitely a recommended "bucket list" recipe!