Nicaraguan Taste + Indio Viejo

Indio Viejo resembles the bond between Mayan and Spanish culture, for centuries this has been a meal in every Nicaraguan table. It's one of the most known dishes in Nicaragua after Gallo Pinto. Originally made with goat meat, this recipe has been handed down trough generations, and each one of them have added something new to it. Vibrant and classy, Indio Viejo has represented Nicaraguan cuisine as no other.

I personally love it, is one of my all time favorites, and I think that you'll love it too. Some ingredients might be very hard to find depending where you live but if I found the ingredients here in Bergen Norway you have a big chance of finding them all!

Hope you enjoy it!

serves 4

For this you will need

1 kg Shoulder top blade steak
1 Green bell pepper
3 Tomatoes
1 Onion
3 Garlic cloves
A handful of spearmint
Maseca (corn flour)
Achiote
Salt

To cook

Cut the meat in thick slices, in a pot pour in 1 Lt of water, put the sliced meat on the pot and bring to the boil, once is boiling take away any foam and blood, once is not producing any foam add  salt to taste a quarter of the bell and half of the onion together with the 4 garlic cloves peeled.

After leave the meat on a medium-low heat and boil further for an hour, sometimes the meat can be hard, if so it can take up to an hour and a half.

Mean while get slicing the tomatoes and the onion
and the bell pepper you have left.

When the meat is tender, take off the stock and set aside to cool, then proceed to crumble the meat slices as shown in the pic at the left, after you've done that is time to do the Maseca (corn flour) batter

Keep the beef stock as you will use it for the batter. Use a colander to separate the stock from the vegetables.

                                                                             

Achiote paste

 This corn based dish, hasn't been always done with
 corn flour, originally made with tortillas, it really depends on the taste of the maker, my mother likes the fine smooth texture that gives the corn flour to this dish, other people like the flavor of a tortilla.
In some parts of the country this method is used regularly.
People leave tortillas in water for about 2 hours and then they mince them by hand.

However I prefer to make them with Maseca based batter because the texture is even and the flavors spread better.

To make the batter start off making a normal Maseca dough follow the instructions on the back of the bag, or follow mine if you like, pour 2 cups of Maseca and add 1 cup and a quarter of water, once you've got your dough done add in the achiote paste.

Now you've got be careful as this is one powerful natural colorant, use 1tsp of achiote, and add the stock gradually until the batter has the thickness of oil.

In a deep frying pan, add oil and fry the sliced veggies at a high heat let them fry for about 4 mins and then add the crumbled meat and lower the heat to a medium heat continue frying for a 3 mins and then add the batter, stir vigorously, if you stop stirring the batter will get hard so you've got to work it a lot.



When the batter starts to get a orange color add the spearmint and
stir a little, keep cooking for 5 mins at a low heat and then take off the heat and serve!











I hope you liked it and enjoyed it as much as I enjoy it. We serve this with fried or boil Maduro (plantain) I'll upload the recipe for the fried Maduro soon.!