Here's another that's not for people on a diet.
Where I come from it's pretty standard to have help at home (live in maid). Usually these women (which range from early teens to old ladies... and yes, there are stories... heck! I know of a few rich guys who ended up marrying their maids, but that's another thread) come from farms and very rural areas which generally have the best cooking traditions in the country (isn't that so for the whole world?). Anywho, we had this lady, Antonia, who used to make the most delicious yuca fritters. Though my version doesn't come close, they do taste delicious.
Here's my method:
- fresh yuca or the ones that come frozen if you're not into peeling these devilish roots.
- pot pan big enough to cover all of your yuca in boiling water
- half an onion, diced into small bits
- butter or margarine
- 2 battered eggs
- flour
- salt
- your favorite filling, mine of course, is ground beef and cheese
- deep fryer or deep frying pan
- canola oil is best, but whatever you like to fry in
First bring water to a boil, add salt to taste and dump your yuca root in for about 30 mins on high heat.
While that's cooking you can prepare your ground beef. I added a small amount of tomato sauce and a some olive oil. Season to taste. I add seasoning and some ground black pepper. I want this beef greasy. When it's about half way through I add a bit of oregano leaves. When it's almost done I add some basil leaves.
After yuca is done, remove those fibrous thingies in the center and start mashing while adding diced onions, butter/margarine to taste and battered eggs. You want the yuca to become kind of a dough. Yuca is very fibrous and hard, so you'll need some man force here. After it's pretty dough-like you'll need to dry it up a bit. As it is it should be pretty sticky, so start adding flour to dry it up. I like to put it in the microwave for a bit, say 2 mins, to remove moisture. You may need to do that several times in between mashing sessions. It's ready when you can take a lump and make a little ball by rolling it in your hands and it doesn't stick to them.
When the yuca 'dough' is ready you'll need to setup everything so that your 'workflow' allows you to go through the steps easily.
I start by putting a bit of flour on my palms, grabbing a lump of yuca and rolling it into a ball, flattening it, putting the filling in the center and covering it with the yuca, then rolling it into a 'bollito', that's what we call that shape, blimp would be more accurate as 'bollito' is also used for female genitalia. Anywho, after that's rolled, put it on the flour and roll it so that it's lightly covered with it. While you do this, turn on the deep fryer or deep skillet on. You should have plenty of oil in it so that the fritters are completely covered, they should actually float on it, that's even better.
Start frying! You want to get them golden brown, just so that the outer crust is crunchy. This shouldn't take long ...5 mins tops if your oil was hot enough.
Enjoy with a cold one ...make sure it's the good stuff.
