Alternative names | Mondongo |
---|---|
Place of origin | Mexico |
Main ingredients | Beef tripe (cow stomach), broth, hominy, lime, onions, cilantro, oregano, red chili peppers |
Variations | Menudo colorado (made with chili added to the broth): menudo blanco (made without red chili peppers) |
Menudo, also known as Mondongo, [1] pancita ([little] gut or [little] stomach) or mole de panza ("stomach sauce"), is a traditional Mexican soup, made with cow's stomach (tripe) in broth with a red chili pepper base. It is the Mexican variation of the Spanish callos or menudo. Similar dishes exist throughout Latin America and Europe including mondongo, guatitas, dobrada and, in Italy, trippa alla romana.
Hominy (in Northern Mexico), lime, onions, and oregano are used to season the broth. It differs from the Filipino dish of the same name, in that the latter does not use tripe, hominy, or a chili sauce.
Tripe soups of both beef and mutton have been traditional in Spanish cuisine since at least the 14th century. Don Enrique de Villena refers to them disparagingly in his Arte Cisoria (1423), saying: [2]
“Some eat the tongue and the intestines and tripe and lungs, and are not, in taste or health, such that they should be given to good and fine people.”
The first part of the novel Guzmán de Alfarache (1599) mentions the protagonist eating beef tripe callos. [3]
With the Spanish colonization of the Americas, the Spanish introduced the tradition of menudo or tripe soups throughout the Americas, including Mexico. In the Mexican cookbook Nuevo y Sencillo Arte de Cocina, Reposteria y Refrescos (1836), Antonia Carrillo includes many menudo recipes, including a beef or mutton caldo de menudo (menudo soup), a veal menudo soup, and a menudo sopa (bread pudding). [4]
In his cookbook Diccionario de Cocina o El Nuevo Cocinero Mexicano (1845), Manuel Galvan Rivera defined “menudo” in Mexico as: [5]
MENUDO: Although this word includes the stomach, feet, blood and head of the cattle that are killed, in cuisine it is commonly understood as only the stomach or “pancita” and the tripe. For lambs, it also includes the liver and all the extremities, as stated below.
There are a number of regional variations on menudo. In northern Mexico, hominy is typically added. In northwest states such as Sinaloa and Sonora usually only the blanco, [6] (white) variation is seen; menudo blanco is the same dish, but red pepper is not added (though jalapeño or chopped green chilies may be included to replace the spice in the red version), thus giving the broth a clear or white color. Adding patas (beef or pig's feet) to the stew is popular in the United States. In some areas of central Mexico, "menudo" refers to a stew of sheep stomach, pancitas stew of beef tongue. In south-western Mexico (in and around the Distrito Federal, Morelos, and Guerrero) it is called panza or panza guisada. The red variation is usually seen in the northern state of Chihuahua and Nuevo León . Only yellow hominy is usually used in menudo in Texas. A similar stew made with more easily cooked meat is pozole. Some variations of menudo substitute garbanzo beans instead of hominy.
In the United States, since the mid-20th century, prepared menudo has been common in food stores and restaurants in cosmopolitan areas and in other areas with a significant Mexican population. Restaurants often feature it as a special on Saturday and Sunday, [7] and some believe menudo alleviates hangovers. [8] Canned menudo is also available. [9]
An annual Menudo Festival is held in Santa Maria, California. In 2009, more than 2,000 people attended and 13 restaurants competed for prizes in three categories. The festival is organized by the National Latino Peace Officers Association of Northern Santa Barbara County and the money raised goes toward scholarships for local students. [10]
Since 1996, the Menudo Bowl is an annual event in Laredo, Texas. In 2019, over 30 teams participated to make the best menudo. The event is organized by Laredo Crime Stoppers, with teams conformed by public officials, law enforcement, media representatives, and members of the community. The event is attended by people from both sides of the US–Mexico border. [11]
In the United States, among Tejanos and Chicanos, [12] Menudo is traditionally prepared by the entire family, and often serves as an occasion for social interactions such as after wedding receptions where the families of the newlyweds go to one of their family's houses to enjoy a bowl of menudo before and after the ceremony. It is also believed to be a hangover cure. [13] [6]
Menudo takes a long time to prepare as the tripe takes hours to cook. It includes many ingredients and side dishes (such as salsa), and is garnished with chopped onions, chiles, cilantro, and often with lime juice; it is often prepared communally and eaten at a feast.
Documents from the American Works Progress Administration indicate that in the 1930s, among migrant workers in Arizona, menudo parties were held regularly to celebrate births, Christmas, and other occasions. [14]
It is typically served with chopped raw onions, oregano, diced chiles (usually serrano), and lemon or lime segments along with corn or flour tortillas. [6]
An enchilada is a Mexican dish consisting of a corn tortilla rolled around a filling and covered with a savory sauce. Enchiladas can be filled with various ingredients, including meats, cheese, beans, potatoes, vegetables, or combinations. Enchilada sauces include chili-based sauces, such as salsa roja, various moles, tomatillo-based sauces, such as salsa verde, or cheese-based sauces, such as chile con queso.
Tripe is a type of edible lining from the stomachs of various farm animals. Most tripe is from cattle, pigs and sheep.
Offal, also called variety meats, pluck or organ meats, is the internal organs of a butchered animal. The word does not refer to a particular list of edible organs, and these lists of organs vary with culture and region, but usually exclude skeletal muscle. Offal may also refer to the by-products of milled grains, such as corn or wheat.
Pozole is a traditional soup or stew from Mexican cuisine. It is made from hominy with meat, and can be seasoned and garnished with shredded lettuce or cabbage, chili peppers, onion, garlic, radishes, avocado, salsa or limes. Known in Mesoamerica since the pre-Columbian era, the stew is common across Mexico and neighboring countries, served both as a day-to-day meal and as a festive dish.
Peasant foods are dishes eaten by peasants, made from accessible and inexpensive ingredients.
Tripe soup or tripe stew is a soup or stew made with tripe. It is widely considered to be a hangover remedy.
Sancocho is a traditional stew in several Caribbean and Latin American cuisines. Latin variations represent popular national dishes in Dominican Republic, Colombia, Cuba, Honduras, Mexico, Ecuador, Panama, Puerto Rico, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela. It usually consists of large pieces of meat, tubers and vegetables served in a broth.
Kare-kare is a Philippine stew that features a thick savory peanut sauce. It is generally made from a base of stewed oxtail, beef tripe, pork hocks, calves' feet, pig's feet or trotters, various cuts of pork, beef stew meat, and occasionally offal. Vegetables, such as eggplant, Chinese cabbage, or other greens, daikon, green beans, okra, and asparagus beans, are added. The stew is flavored with ground roasted peanuts or peanut butter, onions, and garlic. It is colored with annatto and can be thickened with toasted or plain ground rice. Variations of kare-kare can be made with seafood, such as prawns, squid, and mussels, or exclusively from vegetables.
Al pastor, tacos al pastor, or tacos de trompo is a preparation of spit-grilled slices of pork originating in the Central Mexican region of Puebla and Mexico City, where they remain most prominent; today, though, it is a common menu item found in taquerías throughout Mexico. The method of preparing and cooking al pastor is based on the lamb shawarma brought by Lebanese immigrants to the region. Al pastor features a flavor palate that uses traditional Mexican adobada (marinade). It is a popular street food that has spread to the United States. In some places of northern Mexico and coastal Mexico, such as in Baja California, taco al pastor is known as taco de trompo or taco de adobada.
Sopa de mondongo is a soup that originally came from Colombia, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. It is made from diced tripe slow-cooked with vegetables such as bell peppers, onions, carrots, cabbage, celery, tomatoes, cilantro, garlic or root vegetables. The dish is generally prepared in former Spanish colonies in Latin America, Caribbean, and in the Philippines. The proposed etymology for mondongo is in the African Kikongo language, meaning “intestines, entrails of certain animals.
Carnitas, literally meaning "little meats", in Mexican cuisine, is a dish made by braising, simmering and frying pork in its own fat, lard or cooking oil. The name “Carnitas” is, historically, the vulgar, colloquial name given in Mexico for the French dish Rillons de Tours also known in Spanish as Chicharrón de Tours.
Picadillo is a traditional dish in many Latin American countries including Mexico and Cuba, as well as the Philippines. It is made with ground meat, tomatoes, and also raisins, olives, and other ingredients that vary by region. The name comes from the Spanish word picar, meaning "to mince".
In Mexican cuisine, cabeza, from barbacoa de cabeza, is the meat from a roasted beef head, served as taco or burrito fillings. It typically refers to barbacoa de cabeza or beef-head barbacoa, an entire beef-head traditionally roasted in an earth oven, but now done in steamer or grill.
Soup is a primarily liquid food, generally served warm or hot, that is made by combining ingredients of meat or vegetables with stock, milk, or water. Hot soups are additionally characterized by boiling or simmering solid ingredients in liquids in a pot until the flavors are extracted, forming a broth. Soups are similar to stews, and in some cases there may not be a clear distinction between the two; however, soups generally have more liquid (broth) than stews.
Flaki or flaczki ( ) is a traditional Polish tripe stew. It is one of the many Polish soups, which represent an important part of Polish cuisine. Along with bigos, żurek, and pierogi, it is one of the most notable specialities in Polish cuisine. Its name is derived from its main ingredient: thin, cleaned strips of beef tripe.
Guatita, or guatita criolla, is a popular dish in Ecuador, where it is considered a national dish, and in Chile. It is essentially a stew whose main ingredient is pieces of tripe, known locally as "guatitas". The tripe is cleaned several times in a lemon-juice brine, after which it is cooked for a long time until the meat is tender. Then it is allowed to cool and finely chopped. There are various vegetarian versions of the dish in which wheat gluten is substituted for tripe. Other variations use strong-tasting fish such as tuna. The traditional Ecuadorian recipe is served hot and accompanied by potatoes and a peanut sauce.
Menudo, also known as ginamay or ginagmay, is a traditional stew from the Philippines made with pork and sliced liver in tomato sauce with carrots and potatoes. Unlike the Mexican dish of the same name, it does not use tripe, hominy, or red chili sauce.
The cuisine of Chiapas is a style of cooking centered on the Mexican state of the same name. Like the cuisine of rest of the country, it is based on corn with a mix of indigenous and European influences. It distinguishes itself by retaining most of its indigenous heritage, including the use of the chipilín herb in tamales and soups, used nowhere else in Mexico. However, while it does use some chili peppers, including the very hot simojovel, it does not use it as much as other Mexican regional cuisines, preferring slightly sweet seasoning to its main dishes. Large regions of the state are suitable for grazing and the cuisine reflects this with meat, especially beef and the production of cheese. The most important dish is the tamal, with many varieties created through the state as well as dishes such as chanfaina, similar to menudo and sopa de pan. Although it has been promoted by the state of Chiapas for tourism purposes as well as some chefs, it is not as well known as other Mexican cuisine, such as that of neighboring Oaxaca.
Callos a la Madrileña is a stewed tripe dish, cooked slowly for hours over low heat, that is a speciality of Spanish cuisine associated with the city of Madrid. Traditionally pig or cow tripe was used but modern recipes use lamb or even cod. It includes pig snout and trotters, black pudding, sausage, ham, and soup vegetables like carrots and onions. When prepared correctly the broth is rich in gelatin and the tripe becomes very tender after the slow cooking process. The tripe can be browned before the cooking liquid is added, with trotter's, oxtails and other ingredients for the soup like ham, chorizo and smoked paprika. It is common to serve this stew with the morcilla blood sausage, a tapas dish typical of the region of Castile and León.
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