(Chicago) – Americans have their meatloaf and Italians have their meatball. We, Pinoys, have our very own embutido. The sweetness of the vegetables, meaty juice from the pork and a touch of creaminess from the cheese make me adore this dish.
It’s not that simple to make. This explains why your mom or lola only make this on special occasions. Oh well, I saw some frozen homemade embutido being sold in Filipino stores here. It’s more accessible now. But when I have some idle days, I make a lot of embutido logs and store some of them in the freezer. Then, I have something to pull out when my cravings kick in. The frozen ones can last for a couple months.
Some people eat this right after steaming, some cool it first and others dip in egg wash and then fry. It doesn’t matter whatever form or state you eat your embutido- it will remain delicious. Lagyan mo pa ng ketchup, sarap! And see how appetizing it looks, ganda! 🙂
Ingredients:
- 3 lbs ground pork
- 3 medium carrots, finely chopped
- 1 large onion, finely chopped
- 6 cloves garlic, finely chopped
- 4 stalks celery, finely chopped
- 1 cup pickle relish
- 1 cup raisins
- 1 cup cheddar cheese
- 4 tablespoons cornstarch
- 2 cups bread crumbs
- 4 eggs
- 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
- 2 teaspoons pepper
- 3 teaspoons salt
- 5 hotdogs, halved length-wise
- 5 boiled egg, quartered
- aluminum foil (12″ wide)
Prepare the mixture : Just combine all the ingredients, excluding hotdog and egg, in a large bowl. I use food processor to chop the vegetables. If you don’t have one, manual chopping always works.
Mix thoroughly. Use your hands, it’s fine. 🙂
Assembly: Cut out the aluminum foil, 5 sheets of size 12” x 12”. Lay one sheet flat on the board. Spoon a hefty amount, about 1/5 of meat mixture and flatten on the middle part of the sheet leaving 2 inches of space from the bottom edge and 1 inch from the sides. Put slices of hotdog and eggs in the center of the meat, horizontally. From the bottom edge, fold it over to create a log. Press the meat tightly and then, roll throughout the foil. Crumple the foil on the sides to seal.
Cooking: If you have a steamer, that’s great. Steam for 1 hour and you’re done. Since I don’t have a steamer, I use my oven and a deep baking pan with wire rack to cook this. Pre-heat the oven at 375F. Place the embutido on the wire rack on a baking pan half-filled with hot water. Make sure the water does not touch the wire rack. Cover tightly with aluminum foil and cook in the oven for 1 hr.
You may serve this warm or a little cool with ketchup.
Makes 5 logs