Chorizo & Eggs a la California
Chorizo is a spicy pork sausage with roots from Spain, though many countries with a history of Spanish colonization have their own versions. In my local store in Pasadena, I can find chorizo styles from Argentina, El Salvador and Mexico and you will also encounter regional styles of chorizo within each country. Mexican chorizos are unlike their Spanish cousins. The Spanish use paprika and the Mexican use chile. Most Spanish chorizo is cured and ready to eat; Mexican chorizo is soft and must be cooked.
Making a breakfast of chorizo and eggs is super simple. Remove the casing from the chorizo, break it up and cook it in a pan. Add eggs and scramble. But since I can’t help myself I had to mess with a perfectly great recipe. Why? Think of it like this – chorizo can be like a bass fiddle when some times you want the sound of a viola. So I designed this recipe to tone down the robustness of chorizo. So let’s get started.
Ingredients
Serves 4
½ lb Mexican chorizo
4 Eggs
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
¾ cup onions, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
½ lb ground beef
1 cup fresh or canned tomatoes roughly chopped
½ cup cilantro roughly chopped
Salt and pepper
Chorizo Preparation
Not all Mexican chorizo is lean so cook it separately to remove the fat. Remove from casings and cook (without oil) in skillet for 6-8 minutes, stirring and breaking up meat. If needed, place the chorizo in a mesh strainer and press the chorizo with a paper towel to squeeze out the fat. Set the chorizo aside.
Preparation
In a 10 inch sauté pan, add 1 tablespoon of oil and heat the pan to moderate temperature. Add the onions and sauté them 4 minutes. Add the garlic and sauté 1 minute and lightly salt and pepper. Add the beef and tomatoes and cook for 6 minutes. Lightly salt and pepper. Mix in the cooked chorizo; taste for salt and pepper.
The tomatoes will provide some liquid for simmering; if necessary, add 1 or 2 tablespoons of water to the pan to ensure your mixture has a small amount of liquid. Reserve 1 tablespoon of cilantro for the garnish and add the remainder to the pan. Simmer the mixture for 4 minutes then cover the pan to keep warm while you fry eggs for plating.
Plating
Place an egg in the center of the plate, lightly salt and pepper. Encircle the egg with the meat mixture. Sprinkle cilantro on the plate. Optional, serve with a side of oven fried potatoes slices and or flour tortillas.
Notes
Excluding the egg, this dish is a guisado (stew), therefore, you can serve as an entree without the egg. In Mexico, eggs are commonly accompanied with meat guisados (stews). The presentation for this dish was inspired from a recipe in the 2014 June/July issue of Saveur magazine. See Babylonian Breakfast page 22.
Buen Provecho!
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