The First Recipe -- Frijoles con Carne

Pork and Beans

I am going to have to take photographs of my food -- I am not sure I cooked this right but it sure didn't taste like I did. I thought I picked a simple recipe but apparently it wasn't.

I got this recipe from the cookbook "False Tongues and Sunday Bread" by Copeland Marks.

It is a Guatemalan dish....

The cookbook said I needed:

1lb of dried small red beans

6 cups of water

1 teaspoon of salt

1/2 cup of tomatillos

2 small ripe tomatoes peeled

2 garlic cloves peeled

1 pound of pork, cut into 1 -inch cubes.

I needed to soak the beans in 3 cups of water for four hours and then cook the beans for one hour. I did this but the beans were really hard like rocks -- so I am not sure I did this correctly....instead I had to improvise and use canned red beans....with my kitchen full of smoke -- my husband did a pantry run and searched through our pantry until coming up with some beans --whew crisis sort of averted.

Anyone have any suggestions on how to cook beans I will take the advice.

Next I had to toast the tomatillos, garlic and onion in a dry skillet over moderate to low heat and then process into a smooth paste -- okay -- I went to THREE grocery stores and could not find one with tomatillos....I did however find a tomatillo sauce -- so I improvised here as well.

Also instead of using two small ripe tomatoes peeled I used a can of peeled tomatoes -- not a good idea.

I cooked the pork, as told, for one hour in three cups of water -- I did fabulous with this and can actually say the pork came out very good.

I then added the sauce to the pork.

My problem: The tomatillo sauce (I added too much) and I didn't know ratio of the tomatillo sauce I had to use compared to the regular tomatillo. I also should have used regular tomatoes instead of the canned tomatoes. This led to the dish being extremely acidic tasting and gave my family reflux for the entire evening...including my children....any suggestions on how to cut the acidity would be greatly appreciated.

Please note: My mother did not help me with this one but I could have greatly used some.

http://www.guatemala-times.com/