Arepas Dulces: Sweet Venezuelan filled corn cakes

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These little round disks are a staple food in my country.  Growing up in Venezuela these were eaten for breakfast, as a side to any dish even as a midnight snack after a night out of heavy dancing.

In Venezuela you have small local “areperas”, which only served this corn cake with tons of choices for filling: ham, cheese, eggs, shredded beef and many, many more choices.  We also have tons of nicknames for the way they may be served.  A “Reina Pepiada,” (shredded chicken, mayonnaise and peas with slices of soft avocado.) named after Venezuela’s first international beauty queen Susana Dujim.  A plain arepa is called a viuda or “widow,” because it’s all alone. A chicken and cheese arepa is called catiraor “blondie,” for its yellow color.  Arepa “Perico” is made with a scrambled eggs and you also have Arepa “Rumbera” (Party) which is made with Pork meat.  You can grill, fry or bake them.  In Venezuela they are usually made on top of a “budare”, which is a large skillet, that is heated until very hot and the arepas are then grilled.

For me I love them any way, but this past weekend I had a huge craving for them, but I wanted them sweet.  And this recipe is from my nanny (yes, I had one of those growing up – don’t you judge me, that’s another staple in my country, everyone had a maid living in their house).  My nanny, Maria, made them just like the “regular” savory arepa, but she did put a bit of sugar on them and instead of forming them into a thick disk, she made them a bit thinner.  This created a reaction when they got placed in hot oil to fry them and before you very eyes, the top of the arepa will bubble up and create a crispy dome.

The hint of sweet with the savory filling is such a blissful combination.  They are not very difficult to make and in less than 20 minutes you can have a batch ready.

There is a great debate that the only way to make them is by using pre-cooked corn meal flour called “Harina P.A.N” which is actually imported from Venezuela and found in most supermarkets in the Latin food aisle.  If you cannot find this, you can also use Masarepa, but be warned they are not going to come out as authentic.

To make about 4-5 Arepas you will need:

1 cup of Harina P.A.N (pre-cook corn meal flour)
1 ¼ cup of warm water (or a bit more)
¼ teaspoon of salt
1 tablespoon of sugar
1 ½ cup of oil for frying

Filling: Anything you want, in this recipe I filled my up with cheese and ham.

Warm up the water, and then mix in the sugar and salt – taste, the water it should be a bit sweet with a hit of salt.  You can add more sugar or salt at this point too.

In a mixing bowl, pour the cup of Harina PAN, then with your hands slowly mix while pouring about ½ of the water mixture. With your hands continue mixing, if dry, pour more water, while kneading, about 5 minutes or so.  The dough should end up smooth and not crack around the edges, moist but not sticky.

To form them, put some dough between both palms, slowly start rolling the dough and form a ball, then still rolling between both palms, slowly flatten the ‘dough’ to the thickness you want, in this case about 1/4” or so. Make sure the edges (and the tops) are round with no cracks! If you have any cracks, they will not bubble up when you immersed them in the oil. When you are flattening them you see some cracks forming,  dab your finger in water and try to ‘erase’ the crack.

As you form them put them aside and cover them with a damp towel or paper towel, so they don’t dry up.

Place the oil in a deep saucepan in medium high heat, the oil needs to be very hot, but not smoky or when you put the first arepa it will burn - not good.  To test it, take a bit of the dough, roll into a small ball and dip in the oil, if the ball start to fry fast (bubbles all over it) and raises to the top, then the oil is ready.

Slowly, take the prepare arepa disk and place in a metal slotted spoon and slowly dip in the oil.  It will start to bubble up fast and then within a minute or so (sometimes a bit more), the top should start to inflate up … fry for about 2 more minutes until the top is nice and golden color. Take out and place in a dish covered with paper towel so it will absorb the oil.  Note: If they don’t inflate, don’t worry, continue to cook and remove once they are golden color - they are just as good.

Continue doing this until all of your prepared dough disks are cooked.  

When ready to stuff them with your favorite filling, open a slit in 1 side of the arepa to make a pocket (or slice in half) and filled them with your favorite filling.

You can also do the same steps, to create one without the sugar.  Just obmit, and instead of flatted them, make the a bit thicker about 3/4-inch.  You can also fry them, or simply bake them in the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes or so, until they sound a bit hallow when you tap them, or grill them in a hot grill.  There is a good video in how to make them here.

HCB: True Orange Génoise

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This week heavenly Cake was the True Orange Genoise Cake and boy was everyone looking forward to that one.  The buzz on this cake was tremendous.

It started with a mad hunt for Seville oranges.  You would think that living in the sunshine state; I would have no issues finding this orange, especially since Florida at one time was the main exporter of Sour Oranges to England! (that’s a fact, look it up). But, you would be wrong.  It was incredibly hard to find them… specially since we had a couple of weeks with temperatures in the 30’s and 40’s, which means that many orchards/groves lost most of their crops to freezing temperatures.

Strike one for the cake!

My hunt began by simply calling our local Fresh Market and talking to “someone” in the produce department, who told me that nope, they did not carry it and there was no way to pre-order them either.

I.was.not.giving.up…There was a cake that needed to be made and the hunt continued

Next up was Whole Foods, I mean WHOLE-FREAKING-FOODS, if they did not carry those little suckers - the end of the world was near. 
Note to Whole Foods management: You need to work on their produce department education because the phone call went something like this:

Me to the produce rep:  Wondering if you have Seville Oranges in stock?
Produce rep: I’m sorry, Sev.. what?
Me [thinking, OH BOY!]: Seville Oranges or you may know then as Sour Oranges?
Produce rep: No, I don’t think so, we have regular oranges, is that what you want?
Me: [counting to 10]: no I’m looking for sour oranges, would you be able to order them for me?
Produce rep: I don’t know
Me: is there a manager there?
Produce rep: I don’ know…
Me: Thank you, never mind. *Click*

Strike two for the cake!

Then during a dinner with the future mother in law, I explain what had happen and she promptly told me to give her a couple of minutes, left the room, picked up the phone and the next thing I knew, I had a bucket of sour oranges compliments of a farmer that had some trees in his back yard.  The power that woman yields!

Point one for the CAKE!

  

Since I have been keeping up with the bakers and all keep writing how delicate the oranges were, I decided to not take any chances and bake it a week earlier than scheduled.

Baking the génoise cake was easy and as Rose suggests in the book, I baked it a day earlier.  I’m really getting the hang of this new technique of warming the eggs, sugar, and vanilla together before whipping it up to full volume in the mixer.  (Previous sponge cakes were done without this pre-cooking step, and I think it just makes a huge difference on the final texture of the cake).

Then, because I was on a roll, I decided to make the orange curd the same day.  And this was fairly as simple mixing the orange juice, sugar, eggs, butter and zest together and stirring until it thickened - The hardest part for me was factoring in a whole lot of patience while it cooked over the stove. I hate to wait around for anything – you know that phrase, “good things come to those that wait”, It’s OVERRATED, seeing as, this orange curd took FOREVER (at least in my world) to get to the point that the book said it would be done.  You know how boring facing your stove and stirring is?

I bet you all do.  Because IT WAS THAT BORING to the power of 3!

When it was FINALLY done, I put it away and decided to quit while I was ahead and do the syrup and ganache the next day. 

    And those two things went without any major roadblocks.  The only thing I did different was not use Triple Sec, but instead used Patron Liqueur Citronge which I happen to have in my liquor cabinet (I’m fancy that way). Putting the cake together was reasonably easy as well.  The only doubt I had was not using all of the orange syrup and curd as the book pointed out, my instincts were shouting in the inside to use it all, but again, I followed the instructions, so a continued on…after I hid the left over curd from Tom, who stole a quick taste and wanted to eat it with a spoon.

I had a lot of fun covering the cake with the chocolate ganache and I wanted to make sure I did justice to the picture in the book… I was very proud of the way it came out.  Very sophisticated and classy looking. 

But, did it taste as good as it looked?

The Feedbacks:

Tom: Oh, this is my favorite so far.
The Little man:  It’s good, I like the orange flavor, but I like the pineapple one better.
My mother:  The cake was a bit dry for me (A HA! I knew it!), but the flavor was good, and by the way can I have the recipe for the orange curd?
The Future Mother in Law: I like it but, I would not make it again, the orange flavor is quite strong.

As for me?

Remember my cook fruit with cake anything hindrance?

This cake almost made me a believer, mainly because I’m a huge dark chocolate fan, and the dark chocolate combination with the tangy/sweet orange curd was YUMMY!  I had to agree with my mother and found the cake was a bit dry and I know it’s because I did not use the whole syrup/curd.  My other take would be that while is a beautiful cake and show stopper, it’s also a cake that needs a certain sophisticated palate (not to offend anyone here) to be enjoyed.  The majority of people out there would have some reservations to this type of combination (see future mother in law comment above), limiting the pool of people you can served it too.

Would I make it again? Only if Tom really, really, begged for it.  Plus it looks pretty. 

As far as the Orange Curd, that has been made twice already. And if you don't believe me, moosy over to Rose Levy Beranbaum site where you can find the recipe.