CALLOS

CALLOS

#SIAintheKitchen

I’m writing this as I polish off my second helping of callos. Is it possible to overdose on tripe? Because I seriously feel like I’m going to fall into a food coma…because callos is JUST SO DAMN GOOD.

Callos is originally a Spanish dish, specifically from Madrid, and is a hearty tripe stew. It’s simmered until tender and cooked with chorizo, chick peas, saffron and sofrito. Because the Spaniards colonized the Philippines, we have so much overlap in terms of food and culture including this one.

Callos is hands down my favourite childhood dish. My dad always made this for us growing up. As a child, I was always an “adventurous” eater. My mom always told me to try everything once. That’s stuck with me forever. In fact, tripe was one of my favourite things to eat! I always got it in my pho, at dim sum, and in my dad’s callos.

And following strong with my Filipino Fridays segment on my Instagram Live, I called up my dad to ask him for his recipe for callos. Of course, he gave me a mish-mash of a recipe. “A little bit of this, a little bit of that”. No real measurements as usual. To supplement, I looked at a few recipes online and they were all awful. Atleast the Filipino ones were. So many bell peppers, green peas, bacon, pork ‘n beans…and cheese?! WTF? I understand that each person has their own recipe for call but gosh, this was way off for the ones I grew up with.

The one I grew up wth was filled with tripe, chick peas, and chorizo. When my dad and I visited Madrid together last year for my birthday, we sample a lot of callos - I mean it! My dad ordered it every time he saw it in a restaurant. So we definitely had our fair share. I see now that my dad’s version moreso resembles the traditional Spanish version with the addition (I would say this is the Filipino part) of pork hock. I followed his recipe and added my own spin on things with the addition of Spanish hot paprika, red wine and saffron.

…which leads me back to my food coma. My version was absolutely heavenly! So glad I could take my dad’s recipe and replicate it and make it even better. So proud of myself.

Some tips for a perfect callos:

• An initial boil is necessary. Boil your pork hock and tripe to remove any impurities or coagulated blood from the meats and skim off the top. You’ll be left with a cleaner broth and one that tastes better too. Since you will be using some of the pork broth, this step is vital.

• Pressure cook your meats to cut down on time. I cooked my pork hock and tripe in my Instant Pot in 20 minutes (about 45 minutes in total when coming to pressure and de-pressurizing). A lot of people are turned off by cooking offal because of how long it takes. 20 minutes was perfect in making the tripe and pork hock fork tender.

CALLOS - serves 6 - 8

• 1 kg beef honeycomb tripe

• 1 kg pork hock

• 1/8 cup white vinegar

• 2 bay leafs

• 1 tsp black peppercorns

• kosher salt

• 4 tbsp vegetable oil

• 1 spanish onion, diced

• 8 cloves garlic, minced

• 1/2 tsp Spanish hot paprika

• 1 chorizo sausage, casing removed and sliced diagonally

• 1/2 cup hot soppressata, diced

• 1 tsp fish sauce

• 1 cup dried chick peas, soaked overnight and drained

• 1/2 cup full-bodied red wine

• 1 (300ml) can tomato sauce

• 3 cups reserved pork broth

• 1 pinch spanish saffron

• 1/2 tsp kosher salt

• freshly ground black pepper, as needed

1. Place the pork hock and tripe in a stock pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil and skim off any impurities, foam and blood from the top over 10 minutes. Turn off the heat, drain and rinse off the meats.

2. Transfer the meats to your Instant Pot or pressure cooker. Add 6 cups of water and generously season with salt, a good handful. Add the vinegar, peppercorns and bayleaves and place on high pressure for 20 minutes. Once the 20 minutes are up, quick release to allow for the steam to escape. Remove the meats and dice into 1” pieces. Save 3 cups of the reserved broth or reserve for other recipes or freeze. Set aside.

3. In a large Dutch oven, heat the vegetable oil over medium-high heat until glistening. Add in the onions and saute until translucent, about 3 minutes. Add in the garlic, soppressata, chorizo, paprika and fish sauce and saute for another 3 minutes until some of the oil from the sausages release.

4. Add in the chick peas, tripe and pork hock. Pour in the wine to de-glaze the pan and the wine is evaporated. Add in the tomato sauce and pork broth - it should be enough to cover all of the contents of the callos. Add in the bayleaves, freshly ground pepper, saffron threads, and kosher salt. Bring to a boil and then drop the heat to low. Cover and simmer for 1 hour or until the chick peas are fully cooked. Serve with white rice or crusty bread.