Tomaticán

Tomaticán is a Chilean stew. If you like stews, or any food, that is heavily tomato, this is something you should look into. I really liked it, but the original recipe is pretty simple so I spruced it up. It is 1 whole medium onion, 28 oz. of diced or chopped tomatoes, 1 can of lima beans (drained), and 2 cups of corn. For spices: it's a 1/4 tsp. cayenne and 2 tsp. cumin. I thought two full cups of corn was a little over doing it. So, since it turned out I only had 1 cup of corn anyway, I added 1 cup of peas too. I also thought a carrot would keep with the color and flavor of the stew overall, so I added one chopped carrot too. It is really easy to make.

You sauté the onions, carrots, and cayenne in a pot. Do this until the veggies soften a bit. Add the cumin and lima beans; sauté for a couple more minutes, and stir a couple times. Add the juice from the tomatoes, and let simmer, covered, for about 5 minutes. Stir in the chopped, or diced tomatoes, the corn, and the peas. In the recipe there is cilantro, but I personally hate cilantro, so I left it out. It tastes like soap. But if you like it, add it when you add the tomatoes and it's about a 1/4 cup chopped. Cover the pot, simmer for about 10 minutes, and you're set to go.

The prep time is about 5 minutes, depending on how fast you chop, or if you have fresh tomatoes. And the cooking time I would say is about 20 minutes, so this is a pretty quick meal. I really enjoy it; it's nice and spicy. The recipe I used left out garlic? I looked online for information on the stew and other recipes had garlic and used different beans, so feel free to experiment. Since it's a stew it's pretty versatile in terms of changing up veggies. I know next time I will be using garlic in it, since I love garlic and would use it in everything if I could.

More stews will be coming as winter progresses. What can I say? It's hot and delicious. Come spring I will try and use more seasonal veggies.