How to cook Menudo

From the flu to a hangover, this sometimes scary soup is what we would eat on New Year’s Day for as long as I can remember. The ingredients are not what you would call appetizing, but the end result is AMAZING! This is an all day process and it WILL stink up your house. Try it if you dare.

Ingredients
1 ½ lbs of pansa (cow stomach lining)
3 onions
6 cloves of garlic crushed
A ton of salt
2 16 oz cans of hominy (corn kernels soaked in lye, I said it was a scary soup!)
2 1/2 cups of homemade red chile sauce or Las Palmas Enchilada sauce (hot).


Garnish (optional)
oregano
lemon/lime
shredded cabbage
chopped onion


Clean, Cut, Boil, Wait

Take your pansa out of it’s packaging and inspect. Get your collander and turn on the cold water. You need to rinse and clean the “meat.” You are looking for stray hairs and other foreign items in the lining of the stomach. It will be easy to find against the white of the stomach. Rinse clean and drain. Again, the pansa I bought from Walmart was very clean, but I still gave it a little rinse.


Chop your onions into quarters and make sure your garlic is slightly crushed. Get a very sharp knife and cut your pansa into 1 inch cubes. Fill a large pot with water and add your onion and garlic. Add 2 palmfuls of salt, stir until dissolved. Add your pansa and let it cook for 2 1/2 hours on medium. Check periodically to skim the top of the soup. This frothy spuma needs no place in your soup, discard.


While You Wait.
At first I was going to just use canned enchilada sauce for this soup; which there is no shame in because that's how my Gramma would make her menudo - but I had plenty of time and all the ingredients to make the sauce so I did.


Almost Done!!
So after you have aired out your house and burned all of your incense...check the tenderness of the pansa. It should be chewy. Open the two cans of hominy and drain, add to your soup. Let the hominy simmer in the soup for half an hour. Add your enchilada sauce and stir until the soup is a beautiful deep orange. Let this simmer for another hour or so...the smell will improve. After an hour, taste.


Garnish with Love...


- oregano
- lemon/lime
- diced white onion
- shredded cabbage

Serve this cure all with hot corn tortillas and you’re ready to eat!! This is the soup I grew up with and sometimes there were yummy cow hooves in the soup but I figured one scary ingredient was enough. For leftovers, let the soup come to room temperature and put in an old tupperware (it will stain it orange) with a lid. It will congeal (kind of like an aspic) in the refrigerator. To reheat, add the soup to a pot and let it cook on medium low until it looks like a soup again...maybe 10 - 15 minutes or zap it in a microwave for 2 -5 minutes (depending on your microwave). Buen Provecho!

Menudo is traditionally served in a large bowl and may be topped with the following:

How to cook Black Bean Soup + Cilantro-Lime Yogurt Crema

This healthy and hearty Black Bean Soup is perfect for wintry days. Garnish with Cilantro-Lime Yogurt, and perhaps some avocado slices and sprigs of cilantro for a bright finish. This soup is even better the next day, and freezes well.


Serves: 6

Ingredients:

1 pound dried black beans (approximately 2 cups)
6 cups water
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 medium-size red onions, chopped
1 medium-size red bell pepper, chopped
1 medium-size green bell pepper, chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
4 teaspoons ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon chili powder (add more if you want it spicy)
Juice of 1 lime (reserve 1 tablespoon for yogurt topping)
2 teaspoons coarse kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper


Preparation:


1.Soak beans in water overnight. Drain and set aside.

2.Heat olive oil in a large, thick-bottomed pot over medium-high heat until the oil is hot, but not smoking. Add onions and both bell peppers and sauté until beginning to brown, about 15-20 minutes. Add garlic, cumin, chili powder, and salt; stir a few more minutes.

3.Add 6 cups water, beans, and bay leaves. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to a low simmer. Cover and let cook for about 1 hour 30 minutes, until beans are tender.

4.Transfer 4 cups of the soup (about half of it) to a blender. Purée until smooth and return to the pot of soup. (You may need to purée the soup in smaller batches — don’t fill the blender more than half way at a time and hold the lid while blending so that it doesn’t splatter up and burn you.) Stir in lime juice, and salt & pepper to taste.

5.Ladle soup into bowls and top with a dollop of Cilantro-Lime Yogurt (see recipe below).

Cilantro-Lime Yogurt:
1/2 cup plain yogurt
2 tablespoons finely chopped cilantro
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
Zest of 1 lime
½ teaspoon cumin
Dash of salt and pepper


Mix together all the ingredients and let chill until soup is ready to serve.