Panecicos (Cassava and Pork Crackling Rolls) is an obscure dish of our cuisine, known better as roadside fare. Our recipe is a modernized version of this Tierra Adentro classic.
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Panecicos are not something people make at home, if you've ever encountered it "in the wild" it was almost certainly at a roadside stand. It is also known as bobote, or chola, depending on the region of the country.
While I would love to think of myself as an intrepid investigative writer, traveling the Dominican countryside in search of hidden treasures of our culinary culture, the fact is that I am not that. We just travel aimlessly around the country from time to time, sampling the local foods and befriending perfect strangers on local colmados.
That is even easier to do if you realize how amazingly friendly and talkative we Dominicans are.
I originally learned from my readers about this dish, it was Dominican's friendliness and openness that led me to find out how to make it. This is a pretty obscure dish, I have only tried it from one vendor on the road from Dajabon to Loma de Cabrera, although I have heard of at least two other vendors in the country.
About this recipe
If you know this dish you might not recognize it in this shape, it is usually a square, flat, dense "bread" cooked wrapped in plantain leaves (you can see more here).
I tried that, and I honestly found it too dense, so I set out to modify this to make it lighter, prettier and easier to make for those of us that don't usually have a plantain tree lying around. The taste is unchanged, though.
Panecicos Recipe (Cassava and Pork Crackling Rolls)
Ingredients
- 1½ lb cassava [0.7 kg]
- 1 cup chicken broth , unsalted
- 3 tablespoons butter
- 1 tablespoon aniseed
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 lb pork cracklings (chicharrones)
- Some oil to rub on your hands and grease baking tray
Instructions
- Grating yuca: Peel and wash the cassava. Grate using the least coarse side of the grater, or using the grater attachment of your food processor (which I did).Place the grated cassava on a clean cotton cloth and squeeze as much liquid as you can. Catch the liquid into another container.
- Prepping yuca: When you have finished straining the cassava, measure the amount of liquid that you extracted and add that same amount of chicken broth to the cassava (I used 1 cup of broth, the amount may vary depending on the cassava you use). You may discard the liquid extracted from the cassava.
- Making the buns: Add butter, aniseed, and a ½ tablespoon of salt to the cassava. Mix well with your hands.Add the cracklings to the cassava mixture and mix well. Place the mixture in a large non-stick pan and heat over low heat.
Cooking dough: Cook stirring constantly, turning the mixture at the bottom until it turns into a darker, more translucent color (see the picture of mixture halfway the process). Remove from the heat and place it into another container (to stop the cooking process). Let it cool down to room temperature.Rub oil on your hands and place ¼ cup of mixture on your hand. Form balls with it and place it on an oiled baking tray or silpat.- Baking: Bake in preheated oven to 400 ºF [200ºC] until the top turns a light golden color (15-20 minutes).Remove from the heat, serve warm.
I'm allergic to pork. Is there any other kind of crackling I can use?
Just made this with bits of sliced ham instead of cracklings. Came out delicious! I'm always looking for cassava recipes as my son is allergic to gluten and this is is a definite winner. I freeze a lot of my baking so my son always has something on hand to… Read more »
That's fascinating. It's like a twice-cooked bread roll. It is perfect for my no-grains diet. I must go hunt out some cassava. I guess different things could be substituted for the crackling if you wanted to.