share the love: sofrito for all

in response to my Vox Q ot D yesterday, markvancleve asks "Can you please tell me about sofrito? How you make and use it?"

well, first off, sofrito--as it was introduced to me by my Guaterican friend Julio--is a puerto rican caribbean thing. (julio immediately caught this error--he says "...sofrito is actually oh so much more than a PR thing...")  i learned about it when he taught me to make his rice (arroz con gandules) and there really isn't an easy substitute. you can buy it at the store, (goya makes a couple of styles) but it's just not the same as making it yourself and having it on hand at all times. plus, it's more expensive to buy in a jar.

so, that said, sofrito has become an essential in my cooking lately. i use a little bit (or a lot) in just about anything savory i make. it is a blended mixture of fresh onion, bell pepper, garlic, salt, cilantro and parsley. its consistency is sort of a chunky puree, its color a definite green--mostly due to the cilantro more than the bell pepper, i think.

sofrito works great when added to a skillet for sauteeing veggies or browning meat, can be used for a marinade with lemon/lime juice and olive oil (works well with fish, beef, chicken, pork--everything i've tried so far), is a great starter for beans, rice, stews of all kinds, etc. and keeps in the fridge/freezer FOREVER. (i don't know if it really keeps forever, i've just never had a batch go bad before i ran out of it.)

so here, courtesy of that Guaterican friend again, is a sofrito recipe for you and your friends to fall in love with and modify to your heart's content. the thing about sofrito is that everyone's is a little different. so make it your own.

Ingredients

• 6 yellow onions (not giant, but not the itty bittys either)--peeled and cut into chunky sections
• 6 green bell peppers (or 6 green, 1 yellow, 1 red)--washed, with stems & seeds removed, cut into chunky strips
• 4-5 heads of garlic (really, you can use as much or as little as you want, but 4 is good to start with)--peeled
• a BIG bunch of cilantro--washed, patted dry, with stems removed
• a very small bunch of fresh parsley (this is optional--it is sort of a poor replacement for a hard-to-find herb called "recao"; if you can find it, go for it, if not don't worry about it.)
• ¼ cup of vinegar (or less)
• 1-2 tbsp olive oil (again, more or less, it’s up to you—this and the vinegar are partly for taste and partly to help in the blending process
• salt and pepper to taste (start with about 1 tsp each and adjust for taste)

Directions

add the peppers, onions, garlic, and cilantro and everything else in a blender or a food processor. you can start with a little of each at a time or dump in all the peppers, blend, then the onions, blend, etc. don’t worry if it looks like everything won’t fit—you’re going to puree it all down, plus it’s ok to fill the blender more than once. (if you have to do that, then you should pour each blender full into a big bowl and mix it all together at the end before pouring it into storage containers.)

once everything is pureed, store a small amount of the sofrito in the refrigerator (in a small butter container or Tupperware bowl) and freeze the rest in a few other similar containers. you can thaw them out as you need them.

again, as long as you use the basics of onions, bell peppers, garlic, and cilantro, everything else is really to taste. some people add tomatoes. some folks skip the vinegar. so have fun, and happy cooking!