Cocido: The Quintessential Caldo

Cocido Forever!

Michael Sedano

La Bloga-Tuesday, in association with El Gluten-free Chicano, continues our series on Gluten-free Soups with today's special memory. Except for my first birthday cake, Caldo de Res--restaurants call it--or Cocido-my gramma called it and so do I--is my earliest memory of food. And after seventy-nine years of eating all over the world, I remember a lot of outstanding foods. Cocido is the top of my list. 

Cocido is amazingly easy to prepare for such a delicious dish. In fact, keeping a cocido pot on the stove on lowest flame warms the kitchen and fills the entire house with alluring aroma. This technique keeps the soup ready to eat, at the drop of a ladle.

In fact, that's where my earliest memories grow from, a cocido pot left to simmer on a wood-burning stove on Lawton Street in Redlands, California.

The Gluten-free Chicano Cooks
When the weather outside turns frightful, it’s time for Cocido

My mother would drive over from across the colonia to visit gramma. As soon as I stepped down into the kitchen, gramma would sit me at the rough plank table, turn to her wood-burning stove, and ladle out a steaming bowl of cocido. She'd roll out a quick tortilla de harina, plop it on the stove-top and in a few moments hand me that hot tortilla and I was almost ready to eat.

Almost. Gramma would garnish my soup with a squeeze of lemon and then crush two pods of chile japonés, or chile piquín, into my bowl. “No, gramma, pica!” I would object. I don't remember her exact words but it was something about the picoso being good for a boy's growth, how it would keep me healthy and strong. She was right.

One memorable day, a doctor walked into a hospital room I was occupying and asked if he was in the wrong room, “I’m looking for a seventy-year old man,” he declared. I tell everyone I owe my youthful appearance and resilience to eating chile every day. A day without chile, my motto goes, is like a day without sunshine. Except when I was in the Army where there was no chile to speak of (Korean chile was insipid and had no bite), I've enchilared myself nearly every day of my life.

A week without cocido is somewhat similar. I never tire of the rich beef broth and soft-cooked vegetables of my favorite food. In the twenty-some years I worked in Vernon, California, I lunched on cocido two or three times a week. Diana’s on Pacific, Avila’s El Ranchito on Santa Fe, and Millan’s mariscos on Soto, all in Huntington Park, were in a race for the best non-homemade cocido in El Lay. For The Gluten-free Chicano, one key measure of a Mexican restaurant is the quality of its cocido de res. In Los Angeles, proper, La Fuente in Highland Park serves the best Cocido in town; except for no garbanzos, La Fuente's caldo is prefection itself.

Sadly, too many restaurants muck up the cocido. No papa. Chayote instead of papa. Never garbanzos. Weak, canned broth. Peor, universal broth used for albondiga soup and caldo de res. Ingredients cooked separately; the cook adds a few veggies from one pot, the meat from other pots. When I'm served third-rate soup I boycott the place for the rest of my life.

Sabes que? homemade cocido is always the best, for three key reasons: First, cocido is easy to make and you make it with all the right ingredients. Second, you have left-overs. Third, left-over cocido tastes even better the second and third day.

Ingredients – These vary based upon what’s in the reefer. In this instance, The Gluten-free Chicano forgot the carrots a nd ear of corn. I'll allow myself these errors but not a restaurant because the flavor of home-made makes up for almost all deficiencies. 

Beef ribs on the bone.
Celery stalks and the root end.
Onion.
Garlic.
Red papas.
Tomato (fresh or canned).
Cabbage.
Garbanzos.
Bell pepper.
Carrots.
Helotes (or frozen cobbettes).
Cilantro.

Dried chiles.

Lemon or lime.

Olive oil.

Water.

Cook by feel--Have a sense of what you're doing and visualize the final product.

Use a large soup pot. Salt and pepper the meaty bones then brown them with sliced onion and diced garlic in a little olive oil.

Add your water (make two quarts or a gallon, depends on how many mouths you're feeding, or who is eating), a pinch each of salt and coarse ground black pepper, a handful (a cup) of dried garbanzos, the root end of a head of celery, the carrot ends, and bring to a boil.

Cover the pot, boil on medium to high flame for half an hour or longer. The wafting perfume of the broth will beckon household members to the kitchen and everyone can stand around and get hungry. It's the smell of home sweet home.

Cut the vegetables into spoon-size or slightly larger portions. Cut the cabbage in quarters.
Use the entire pepper and pull out the stem later.

Add the vegetables to the boiling soup stock. Cover and simmer on medium flame
an hour or longer, or until the meat falls off the bone. Add the corn on the cob in the last ten minutes if you like
a crispy bite, otherwise put the corn in along with the other vegetables.

This is medium flame, doesn't touch the bottom of the pot. This lets the soup cook at a leisurely pace that
intensifies and melds all the flavors to full wholesome richness.

Serve generous portions of vegetables and broth in large bowls. 
Garnish with crushed chile japonés or chile piquín. Serve with lemon or 
lime halves. Restaurants serve chopped onion and fresh cilantro, and 
room-temperature rice. A spoonful of rice dipped into the
hot soup cools off the soup. If you're avoiding complex carbs, no rice.

Get a good quality tortilla de maíz. If possible, a tortilla made without guar gum or preservatives, just corn, lime, and water. For wheat-eaters, a freshly rolled tortilla de harina hot off the comal is a good option. Don't place flour tortillas against corn tortillas or you contaminate the gluten-free food.

A successful bowl of cocido leaves nothing but huesos and maybe a bit of cabbage stem.

¡Provecho!