Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Recipe: Cachapas - Tasty Venezuelan corn pancakes



Cachapas are thick, tasty pancakes made from maize (sweetcorn) and served with a slab of white cheese at street stalls all over Venezuela.

The usual way to make them is to grind the maize kernels through a special machine, which gives the cachapa mixture just the right consistency, and then cook them on a flat griddle plate.

Anybody living outside Venezuela should try this easy to follow recipe by Jorge Franca, which adds an egg and plain flour to the maize and cleverly replaces queso de mano (a soft white Venezuelan cheese) with Mozarella.

Cachapas are an integral part of Venezuela's culinary history and their origin dates back to pre-Colombian times, when the indigenous population would grind corn with stone pestles and then cook it cachapa-style on clay budares, flat griddle plates that have been found in archaeological digs at many sites in Venezuela.

This sweet and savoury treat is best served with cheese, either a white cheese like Mozarrella or even a grated yellow cheese like cheddar.

The most exotic cachapa I've ever had was at a tiny roadside stall with a tin-roof in the Gran Sabana. The owner was selling "cachapa con cochino" and the steaming maize cachapas were topped with lashings of margarine, a thick slab of cheese, a pork chop and some chicharron, or fried pork rinds. Washed down with a cold Polarcita, it was like cachapa heaven.

10 comments:

Fan de 3 said...

I want to thanks Russell and Jorge for this post and run to buy the ingredients to make and zamparme a big cachapa.
By the way, great selection for the musical background.

DeniHP said...

Cachapa heaven! That's so funny! And it's written maiz! Good luck with your blog....I love it

Anonymous said...

Maize in the UK, Corn in the USA and Maiz in Venezuela.

dave said...

Jorge marry me.

Rozalka27 said...

After trying the cachapa for first time in Camden market today, I loved it. Thank you for your very helpful video recipe, and the ingredients are so easy to find in Tesco.
Will definitely try to make it at home for friends and myself

Anonymous said...

Te quedo bunesisima esta receta de cachapas, me voy a hacer unas ahoritica mismo, que Dios te bendiga, y que sigas pa' lante, cuidate, CHAO!

Anonymous said...

Awesome thanks!

Anonymous said...

Amigo
Excelente! Pregunto : y si le pones una cucharadita de polvo de hornear para que te queden abombaditas y suavecitas?

Unknown said...

Gracias bro la receta me salvo la vida :)

LANIA said...

Olà
Chevele !
Muchas gracias from Francia