Thank you Cedo for another recipe. Tonight is a beef dish stuffed with vegetables and topped with garnishes and a delicious sauce.
First, buy a Lomo Redondo. The cuts of meat here are all different so I don’t know what this would be in the US. Tenderloin, maybe? You can probably get about 10 servings. I figure this piece is 3.32 pounds so this comes out to about $3/pound and there are no bones or waste.
Cook the carrot and potato until soft but not mushy. It needs to be firm enough to stuff into the meat. Cedo peels them after cooking, but I peeled before out of habit. You can use anything you like for stuffing – hard boiled eggs, olives, other veggies, etc. I also used some raw celery sticks and slices of green pepper than I had on hand.
You will also need to make a sauce. Peel and smash 3 garlic cloves with your kitchen stone (or mash them however you wish), some salt, some Maggi and water (chicken bullion cubes), red sauce, and any other flavorings you like. She also used Mrs. Dash garlic and herb but I don’t have that on hand. Set the sauce on the stove to cook a bit.
While things are cooking, cut a pocket in the meat. Start at one end and carefully make a pocket as large as you can from one end to the other (without cutting through at the other end). This isn’t as easy as it sounds so it helps if you have a good knife with enough length to reach in there.
Then, rub the sauce on the meat inside and out, put the stuffing in the meat (also a bit challenging if your hands are big, so find a utensil to help), sew the end closed with needle and strong thread, and brown the meat in a bit of oil. By now other people in the house will be asking you what smells SO good!
Now, you will need flavored water to cook the meat in. Put a couple stalks of celery, half a green pepper, half an onion in the blender with enough water to blend easily. The instructions are to strain the juice so you will have a clear juice which will look nice for your end product. I didn’t do this though, which is why my sauce at the end looks more like gravy and hides the garnishes. Either way, put the blended liquid in the cooking pot with salt, red sauce, a bit of soy sauce, and any other flavorings you like.
Cedo cooks hers in a regular pot until the meat is nice and soft, maybe an hour. I think Panamanian soft and US soft are different since they are used to beef that is quite a bit tougher. I cooked mine in the pressure cooker for a hour and thought it was just right.
To finish up, take the meat out of the pot. Cook the juices to decrease the liquid and thicken the sauce. Saute some sliced green pepper, onion, and tomato in a bit of oil for garnish. Check the sauce for flavor and adjust seasonings as needed.
Then, slice the meat, top with garnish and sauce, and it’s ready to eat!
INGREDIENTS:
- one lomo redondo
- 1 potato
- 1 carrot
- 3 cloves garlic
- 2 celery stalks
- 1 onion
- 1 green pepper (or more if they are small)
- 1 tomato, or 2-3 Italian tomatoes
- Maggi bouillon cubes
- red sauce
- any other flavorings or stuffings you prefer
- enough oil for browning
- needle and strong thread for closing the top
Portions can be frozen for later. We took some of ours out of the freezer tonight and it was just as good as the day I made it, maybe even better.
The Panama Adventure 
This makes me very hungry, and I just had dinner!
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LOL Sorry 🙂 Maybe I should post recipes in the afternoon before dinner!
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And since we had it again tonight I can vouch that it can be frozen and served up quickly when needed, and it tasted great! Freezing left the potatoes a little soggy but that was not a problem since I microwaved a potato, added butter and sour cream. In a word, the meal was YUMMY!
Hats off to Cedo and Kris!!!
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I am wondering if we even need to cook the potatoes and carrots before stuffing them in the meat if they are going to be in the pressure cooker for a hour.
Anyway, keep raving about the food and I will keep going up the street for cooking classes. That is your plan, right? 😀
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http://thestayathomegringo.blogspot.com/2013/02/supermarket-tips-for-shopping-in-panama_11.html
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What things are called in the meat section in Panamanian markets
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Yes! I’d forgotten all about that. Thank you 🙂
I haven’t eaten meat for all of my adult life until a few years ago so I don’t know what most of that stuff is even in English. I’m still not a big fan of red meat but I think the recipe above is quite good.
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Very helpful!
Thanks Richard!
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That looks wonderful! There are many American/World versions of this as well. It can also be grilled or roasted. I like it stuffed with bacon and mushrooms. The meat is filet mignon, beef tender loin. $3.00 a pound is amazing! We are lucky if we can buy it for less then $18 a pound! We buy hormone free and grass fed.. no chemicals given to the live stock and pay over $20 a pound.
I wonder where all the beef is processed in Panama, and if it is grass fed? I would venture to say they don’t have all the growth hormones and chemicals that are prevalent in commercial beef houses here in the US.
Thanks for sharing!
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Filet mignon? Seriously? No wonder it was so good! $18/pound? Sheesh, we are lucky to be here.
Beef here is grass fed. It’s funny that we spend a premium for it in the US, and the expats here complain that it is so tough. Those cows that you see our in the fields and hills though, they get sent to the meat processing place right from the fields, and the meat isn’t aged either. Panamanians don’t understand why anyone would want meat that isn’t fresh. I don’t believe they give hormones either but I don’t know anyone who has meat cows to ask for sure. I think the meat here has an excellent flavor. It just needs to be cooked enough to soften it. We do know someone who sells aged angus and even that is a bit tough because it’s grass fed too.
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Milk cows, meat cows they are all the same here. And yes, they are all grass fed until near the end of Dry Season when the last few years most farmers have had to bring in supplementary hay. :Looks yummy, but like you I like my beef a little softer than the Panameños do. 🙂
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I have never heard of a feed lot here! And I think hay counts as grass, just a dried form. The pressure cooker is great for beef. An hour in there and it is tender and about to fall apart. As long as you don’t lust for steak, beef here is very good.
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I use the slow cooker for beef every time. I learned early on that even though it’s “Filet Mignon” it doesn’t cook anything like it. 🙂
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I know. Joel said “If it’s Filet Mignon we could make steaks!” I told him he wouldn’t be happy with them
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hi kris. been a long time reader. this is my first post. i was a meatcutter years ago. that is an eye of the round roast. maybe that makes sense for the translation ? you would not do that to a tenderloin, which is the most tender piece of meat in a cow but instead cook as a steak for a short period of time. looked very good tho and i do enjoy the cooking feature. keep up the good work…..dave
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Thanks very much for the comment and for following my blog 🙂 Thanks for the info too. My husband said it reminded him of a roast so this makes perfect sense
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