Whatever Became of the Palacios Chorizo Challenges?

My musings on ice cream may have lead you to wonder how I'm doing with my fridge full of sausage. Believe it or not, I am almost all the way through the Palacios chorizo. However, as I recently received another shipment of samples (of Hungarian origin this time), the fridge still remains practically full of cured meat.

How did I manage to use up my remaining chorizo friends? A variety of ways. I was not above slicing the chorizo into sandwiches of fresh baguette, tomato, basil and manchego cheese. I also served much of it as part of a cured meat tapa dish (alongside good Seville olives and slabs of tortilla--see the Tapas Episode). My favourite use, however, continued to be a chorizo based paella (see First Challenge), which I returned to again and again, particularly in times of ingredient scarcity.

Another impromptu invention, albeit one requiring more ingredient planning and therefore less frequently attempted and still requiring some perfecting, was the chorizo tart (pictured). While the tart does require a few things that you may not normally keep in your fridge (e.g. puff pastry), it is in fact ridiculously easy to make. Here is as far as I got with my experiments:

Ingredients:
1 sheet of pre-prepared puff pastry
2 small chorizo sausages, quartered length wise
10 small rounds of young goat cheese (about 1 cm thick)
1 handfull of asparagus (trimmed) or 1 cup of red pepper (roasted in 200C oven for 1/2 hour), sliced
4 cups of whole milk (you can substitute 2 cups of creme fraiche for the same quantity of milk for more deliciousness)
2 large eggs
salt and pepper, to taste

Press the puff pastry into a greased 9 inch pie pan. Precook according to package directions. While the pastry is baking, beat together the eggs and milk; season with salt and pepper to taste. Once the pastry is out of the oven, place the rounds of goat cheese evenly across the bottom of the pastry. Top with milk and egg mixture. Lie the chorizo and the asparagus (or peppers) evenly across the top of the tart; they should be only partly submerged in the egg mixture. (To convert this into a vegetarian friendly delicacy, simply omit the chorizo.) Bake in a 180C oven for approximately 20-25 minutes or until the tart is set.

Accompany with a crisp white wine, perhaps an albariño.

The Palacios Chorizo Challenges - First Challenge

So, to the Palacios Chorizo Challenges.

You may not be as familiar with Palacios Chorizo as you are with Louis Vuitton. The simple explanation is that Palacios is a large industrial producer of various embutidos (sausages) and prepared foods. One of the largest in Spain, if not the largest. Chorizo, in turn, is a spicy Spanish sausage flavoured with paprika, from which it gets its distinctive reddish hue.

As it happens, I currently have more than one girl's fair share of Palacios chorizo sausage in my fridge. A year's supply? Maybe slightly more. Who's to say? It occupies an entire shelf and comprises well over a dozen sausage links. Whether that makes a year's supply all depends on how much you like sausage, I suppose.

In any event, there's a perfectly simple explanation. And, no, it does not involve a bottle of tequila and a 24 hour grocery store...although, in other circumstances, it might have.

About a month ago, I went on a road trip with Mike Tkachuk, the CEO of the Canadian Serrano Imports, his good natured sales manager Art and Derek Bendig, the chef de cuisine of Toronto's Pangaea restaurant. The product of this trip was the Hog Heaven article that I've reproduced under the More Ham title below. As you can imagine, we spent much time touring the farm and production facility of the family owned Embutidos Fermin, the exporter of jamon iberico to Canada. We also stopped at the much larger Palacios, the exporter of chorizo to Canada.

At the end of our Palacios tour, we were kindly offered a box of Palacios samples. Due to some language barriers and our failure to understand what the size of a box of Palacio samples might actually be, upon leaving the factory, we were presented with four enormous boxes (one for each of us), each about the size of two cases of wine, neatly stacked at the back of our van. Reluctant to offend and even more reluctant to have our diminutive hostess carry three of the giant boxes back with her, we smiled politely and thanked Palacios for the kind gift. The boxes barely fit into the back of the van.

The kicker is that all this food was of course destined for my place because all three of my companions were flying out in a day or two and there was no question of them being able to take anything back. And so I found myself with a fridge full of sausage.

The logical resolution of this state of events was to set myself a challenge: I challenged myself to eat all of that chorizo this year--if I do, I may well buy myself a Louis Vuitton bag.

Just to make things a bit more interesting for you, I'm going to create new Palacios chorizo recipes as I go. The first one is a simple but delicious paella:

1 medium tomato, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
3-4 cloves of garlic, slivered
2 small Palacios chorizo sausage links, sliced (about 1 cup)
3-4 tbsp olive oil
2 cups rice
4 cups chicken stock
pinch of saffron
1 cup chickpeas
1 bunch asparagus, chopped into 1 inch pieces
salt and pepper to taste

Sautee the garlic and onion in the oil until soft. Add the chorizo and brown on all sides. Mix in the rice, coat thoroughly with the oil. Add the chicken stock all at once and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer, add the saffron and distribute the rice evenly in the plan. After 10 minutes, mix in the chickpeas and adjust the seasoning. Spread the asparagus spears on top. When all the liquid is absorbed and the rice is al dente, turn off the heat and let rest for 5 minutes or so. Enjoy with a fine glass of rioja and Louis Vuitton catalogue by your side.

The Palacios Chorizo Challenges

A few months ago now, a couple of friends came to visit. They stopped in Paris on the way. After a particularly inspiring trip to the Louis Vuitton store, they found a cafe for lunch and, through error or inattention, ordered an enormous plate of blue cheese, a food item they both abhor. It was then that my male friend (the challenger) challenged my female friend (the challengee). The challenger promised that if the challengee ate the entire plate of cheese, he would buy her the 800 euro Louis Vuitton bag they saw that afternoon.

The challengee didn't trust that the challenger was sincere and didn't attempt to make a dent in the cheese. Later, after repeated assurances of good faith, the challengee came to believe that she had made a horrible mistake. To revive her chances of obtaining the coveted bag, she requested that further challenges be proposed. The challenger obliged, but he was no longer in a generous mood.

The second incarnation of the Louis Vuitton challenge involved the challengee walking into the Mediterranean (off of Barcelona's city beach) fully clothed, submerging herself completely and, once back on land, making the hour long trek home on foot in her soaking clothes. The challengee tried to negotiate this one to permit the leaving behind of personal items like her watch and purse, but to no avail.

Finally, just before they left Barcelona, the challenger gave the challengee one last chance. We were picnicking in Parc Guell, a tourist filled park of a hundred hectares or so situated on the side of a fairly steep hill. After we finished lunch, just as we were on the verge of getting a little restless, the challenger made this proposition to the challengee: run around the park twice in 10 minutes or less and the bag is yours. By way of reference, it had taken us just under 10 minutes to climb up the hill to where we were sitting (approximately a quarter of the route that the challengee--in flip flops--would have to run twice). The challengee couldn't say no. She raced off before we could shout "go!". We stopped timing after 15 minutes had passed and she hadn't yet completed the first circuit. Eventually, she showed up, pink and breathless, asking how she was doing on time.

In the end, all the challengee had to show for the Louis Vuitton challenges was a fairly impressive blister on her right foot. We photographed it alongside the mosaic tiled benches of Parc Guell--the mosaics are pictured above without the blister.

The challenges came to be known as the Louis Vuitton Challenges and their high brow nature perfectly sets the stage for a new set of challenges: the Palacios Chorizo Challenges.

I will have to tell you about those tomorrow.