Ropa Vieja is one of my favorite items on a local Mexican restaurant’s menu. I almost always have it in a salad in a tortilla bowl. So of course I had to figure out how to replicate it at home.
I have tortilla bowl molds and make them for lunch salads all the time. Although you don’t need them, use this method here.
Now to up my game with some tasty ropa vieja.
Ropa Vieja
- 3 lbs of Chuck, London Broil/Top Round, Brisket or Flank*
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 1 large red pepper, seeded and chopped
- 3 cloves of garlic, minced
- 28 oz of diced tomatoes – I had freshly frozen. Canned is fine.
- 1/2 cup cider vinegar (or wine vinegar – white or red)
- 1 tbsp sweet paprika
- 3 tsp oregano
- 1/2 tsp cumin
- 1/2 to 1 tsp cayenne (depending on your desired heat)
- pinch of red pepper flakes (or to your desired heat)
- 2 bay leaves
- salt and pepper to taste (I like lots of black pepper, so I’m hesitant to give my measurements, LOL)
- green olives (so very optional! I HATE olives, so you will not find them in mine)
instant pot or slow cooker
Heat oil and brown meat on both sides, add onions, and saute until translucent. Then add peppers and garlic, stirring for a minute before adding remaining ingredients.
Instant pot: Cook for 45 to 50 minutes on soup or meat setting (or pressure cooker high setting). Check meat after depressurizing. If it doesn’t shred easily, make sure there is enough sauce (add water if needed) and repressurize for an additional 10 minutes.
Slow-cooker: Cook on low for 8-10 hours, add water if the liquid gets too thick too soon.
Whichever method you use, you want the meat to shred easily when done.
When I depressurized mine, the sauce was thin, so I cooked it an additional 20 minutes on the slow-cooker setting until it had reduced to a thick sauce.
Serve with rice and black bean or in salad.
*this cooks until it’s shreddable, so cut doesn’t matter much. I used London Broil because it was at a super sale price. So I stocked up for several recipes that will simmer forever.
Anyone have favorite restaurant items they’ve recreated at home? What’s on your plate this weekend? Don’t forget to share your special recipes!
Recipe open thread
Yutsano
I used to think ropa vieja was exclusively Cuban. I should have known it’s a peasant dish with origins in the Canary Islands. Naturally that would bleed into Mexico! I’ve never seen it on a Mexican restaurant menu here, but it’s so wonderful to make it’s worth cooking!
EDIT: to answer the question, my mom makes zuppa Toscana better than Olive Garden’s any day.
NotMax
Ooh, food. Been holding this one back for just such a thread.
Around the world in
80a bunch o’ cakes (and more).:)
Speaking of cakey treats, a new one on me which jumpstarted the salivary glands and now want to try. His recipe in text version.
NotMax
re: the main post
As always, remove the bay leaves after cooking has finished. Just a reminder.
Sure Lurkalot
Great timing! I have a hunk of chuck roast in the freezer from the cut I bought to make the excellent Beef with Barley recipe you posted a while back. I will make this soon!
Snow and wicked cold coming tomorrow to Denver so I’m making lamb stew. It’s a simple recipe with carrots and onions, broth, wine and herbs. I serve it with polenta and make polenta fries later with the excess.
I have herbs drying in the basement and cut a bunch more before the big freeze. Not sure if I can get through them but I am going to make a pesto that has parsley, mint and raisins…it sounds yucky, but it is delicious and will go well with leftover lamb.
TaMara (HFG)
@Yutsano: I actually didn’t know it was Cuban until I started researching how to make it.
mali muso
Mmm, looks very tasty. Hubby has high cholesterol, so we’ve been avoiding red meat. Shredded chicken from the slow cooker or instant pot is acceptable but doesn’t have the deliciousness of beef.
Just finished mixing up our usual weekend fare, a yeast batter that will sit overnight in the fridge and make delicious Belgian waffles tomorrow morning. Thanks to King Arthur Baking (formerly KA Flour) for the recipe. Been making it for 10 years now.
TheOtherHank
Well that’s got Taco Tuesday sorted for next week.
zhena gogolia
Not recipe related, but happy talk. This is a great compilation of Mayor Pete’s recent smackdowns on Fox News:
youtube.com/watch?v=VmbAuBGtArg
frosty
Favorite restaurant item? Not food, but mojitos from the Columbia Restaurant in Florida. We liked them so much we went to the gift shop and took a picture of the page with the recipe.
Unfortunately, it didn’t include quantities of the ingredients, so we went back to the bar and asked the barkeep how much we should use. She said “That’s not how we make them!” and wrote it down for us. We tried it and they came out great. The secret was to infuse the simple syrup with mint.
mali muso
@zhena gogolia: Mayor Pete is truly doing the lord’s work. Hope to see him get a good position in the next administration to set him up for bigger and better things.
DesertFriar
Since we’re talking Mexican food, one of the best Mexican restaurants in the Southwest permanently closed due to Covid. The restaurant was Cafe Poca Cosa in Tucson. The menu changed twice a day. The menu was on chalkboards; written in Spanish, which were brought tableside.
Will be missed.
frosty
@zhena gogolia: Duh, I just figured out the pun. Slayer Pete rhymes with Mayor Pete. A great name for what he’s doing to Fox!
Baud
If you’re still around TaMara, this is for you.
dailycamera.com/2020/10/22/boulder-county-man-leaves-behind-animals-as-he-flees-calwood-fire-the-ani…
debbie
@NotMax:
If I ever get back to baking again, I will be making this cake.
TaMara (HFG)
@mali muso: Well, yum. What time is breakfast? ?
TaMara (HFG)
@Baud: You know I’m keeping track!
mali muso
@TaMara (HFG): Well, one of the reasons this recipe works well is that I prep it on Saturday night and then the hubby just cooks it on the waffle iron when he wakes up with the kiddo. Sunday morning is mama’s sleep in day!
VOR
Well now I want to make this. Sounds good!
CarolPW
Just ordered a turkey for Thanksgiving. Only me and the ex this year so got a smallish one. Ordered a lamb two weeks ago (eating kind, not pet) and will pick up the custom-cut and wrapped meat tomorrow afternoon.
Over this summer I finally nailed cooking chili rellenos. Already did good refried beans (thank you Rancho Gordo for mayocoba beans!). Enchiladas not right yet though. Will work on that next summer.
Miki
This recipe should work wonderfully for the top round I discovered in the bowels of the freezer a couple of days ago as I was rearranging things to accommodate 7 lbs of ground venison and a couple of pounds of venison steaks, compliments of my seester and her very skilled bow-hunting hubby.
Gotta lotta lean ground beef/turkey recipes that can be easily adapted to venison – chili, picadillo, cottage pie, tacos, burritos, enchiladas, stuffed Acorn Squash, meatloaf, meatballs, etc.
Miki
@CarolPW:
Read this once and it felt so normal I kept reading without pausing. Second-ex and I continued to spend certain holidays together, including the Easter before he died from a widow-maker infarction. Miss him still, and would love to share a Covid T-Day with him, but it would have to be virtual because the darling just couldn’t acknowledge mortality. Sigh.
MagdaInBlack
I much prefer this post and thread to the “prepping for disaster omg buy tp, rice and beans” post and thread.
Not a great saturday here. I’d rather read about food.
CarolPW
@Miki: We can’t live together sanely, but we go with each other to the vet if we have to say goodby to one of our pets, and help each other bury them. He’s family, and he also likes turkey a lot more than I do! But I love the stuffing so it’s win/win.
Pete Mack
Miki
@CarolPW: So much of what you wrote I’ve known. He was at my house with his gf when “our” 14 yr old doggo’s splenic tumor burst, and both of them followed me to the E Vet where the two of us sat with our dear doggo as she passed (it was the 10 year anniversary of our wedding and the same day Princess Di was killed).
We also worked together for 10 years after we split – not recommended, but hey ….
All that was a very long time ago and I’ve moved on, except when I remember him.
Enjoy your time and turkey.
cope
I love Ropa Vieja. There is a tiny Cuban sandwich place near us and that is what I have ordered 9 out of 10 times I’ve eaten there. I would love to make this but it’s just the two of us in our locked down house these days and the missus has become somewhat meat averse in the last year or so. Not philosophically, just that it appeals less to her so I’m not sure I’ll invest the effort to make something just for me even if she is always encouraging me to cook for myself. My recreation of a restaurant recipe story is not totally authentic as I didn’t figure it out on my own but I’ll bore you with it anyway.
I did a lot of geology work on the Jicarilla Apache Reservation back in the day. The closest town was Cuba, New Mexico. A place called Bruno’s (still there) serves carne adovada. That’s all I ever ate at Bruno’s. If I were to go there today, that’s what I’d eat.
I’m not creative enough a cook to have figured it out on my own but over the years, I tried many different recipes until I finally found “The One”. It’s a bit involved as the sauce is the foundation of the recipe and I won’t bother copying the recipe here since it ain’t mine but suffice it to say it includes a couple of different dried, reconstituted peppers; frozen orange juice concentrate; fish sauce; raisins; canned chipotles and their adobo sauce; onion and garlic; spices and a lot of time to cook the chunks of pork shoulder into submission. Some warm flour tortilla and I’m back in Cuba (New Mexico, that is).