Bowl of Cau Cau
(click to enlarge)

Cau Cau - Tripe & Potatoes


Peru   -   Cau Cau de Mondongo
Serves:
Effort:
Sched:
DoAhead:  		 5 w/rice
***
2-3/4 hrs
Most		 A traditional Peruvian dish. Presumably the Incas would make it from llama tripe (llamas are related to camels). The tripe can be cooked and cut a couple days ahead and refrigerated.

1-1/4
1/2
1
1-1/2
3
8
2
2
1/4
1/2
1/2
1/3
2
1/2
-------

#
t

#
cl
oz

T
t
t
t
t
T
c
---

Beef Tripe (1)  
Salt (twice)
Lemon
Potatoes (2)
Garlic
Onion
Fresh Chili (3)
Olive Oil
Cumin
Turmeric
Salt
Pepper
Mint
Peas, frozen
-- Serve with
Steamed Rice

Additional vegetables, particularly carrot dice, are sometimes used, and some people prefer to use beef stock rather than the tripe cooking broth.

Prep   -   (2-1/4 hours - 20 min work)
  1. Place TRIPE in a pot with Water to cover. Add 1/2 t Salt and a couple of Lemon slices or a little Citric Acid. Bring to a boil and simmer for about 10 minutes. Drain and rinse. Again cover with Water with 1/2 t Salt and a couple Lemon slices. Simmer until it reaches the desired chewiness. This depends on your tripe and may be 1-1/4 hours or up to 1-3/4 hours. It must not be cooked until mushy.
  2. Drain Tripe, but Reserve two cups of the Broth. Cut the tripe into 3/4" squares.
  3. Peel POTATOES and cut into cubes about 1/2" to 3/4". Hold in cold water until needed.
  4. Crush GARLIC and chop coarse. Chop ONION medium. Chop CHILI small. Mix all.
  5. Chop MINT small.
Run   -   (30 min)
  1. In a spacious sauté pan heat Oil and fry Onion mix and Cumin until onions are translucent but not browned.
  2. Stir in Tripe, Potatoes, Turmeric and 2 c Broth. Simmer until Potatoes are cooked, about 20 minutes.
  3. Season to taste with Salt and Pepper.
  4. Stir in Peas and Mint. Bring back to a simmer and take off heat.   Note: If preparing in advance, do this step just before serving to avoid discoloring.
  5. Serve with Rice. Include some of the broth with each serving.
NOTES:

  1. Tripe:

      This recipe presumes tripe as found in Southern California markets, cleaned, bleached, parboiled and ready to cook. The recipe weight presumes Blanket Tripe which will be about 1/2 that weight when cooked to the right chewiness. Honeycomb Tripe will shrink a little more, and Book Tripe may be as little as 1/3, so adjust to suite. For details see our Beef Tripe page.

  2. Potatoes:

      White Rose or similar work well in recipes of this sort. White potatoes are used in Peru, but they have 200 varieties there, none of which are available here. Avoid Yukon Gold type potatoes, they disintegrate into mush with even moderately long cooking. For details see our Potatoes page.

  3. Chilis:

      In Peru they use moderately hot, orange Aji Amarillo chilis, which have a unique flavor, but those are near impossible to get in North America. My Aji Amarillo plants had no chilis when I made the photo example. Around here every ethnicity uses red ripe Fresno chilis, so that is what I used. Some recipe call for Aji Amarillo paste, which is reasonably available here in Southern California. For details see our South American Chilis page.
  4. U.S. measure: t=teaspoon, T=Tablespoon, c=cup, qt=quart, oz=ounce, #=pound, cl=clove in=inch, ar=as required tt=to taste
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