Mote Sucio
A easy and delicious corn dish native to the southern mountain regions of Ecuador.
What you need:
Mote: this is a type of corn that is hard to find in the states but I have seen a dried version of this on amazon. If you purchase this you will want to soak it for several hours in water with a squeeze of lime juice.
Pork meat: traditionally this dish is made with the remains and scraps in a wok thats been cooking all day, usually in food stalls or markets.
Favorite cooking oil- I like Olive
Paprika
Salt
Peper
Acoite *real is better but the suzon Goya works too, get this from international section at your supermarket)
Garlic powder
Water
Scallions
How to make it:
Cut your pork up into small pieces. I mean really small. You’ll see why later
Pre heat a large pot to medium heat and add your cooking oil. You’ll need enough to keep your meat form sticking to the bottom… say 2 tsbs
Throw your meat into the pot or a wok with your spice mixture and 1/8 of a cup of water. Cook until the water evaporates. Add another 1/8 of a cup of water and keeping cooking until it evaporates again. Do this until the meat starts getting crispy on the outside. You can also just cook it until its fully cooked through if you dont like crispy pork, but mote sucio is better with chicaron
Once your meat is cooked to your liking, add in your Mote and stir until the Mote and pork is incorporated. Slice up you scallions and add those to the pot as well. Let cook for about 10 minutes to bring the mote up to temperature.
Serve with fresh chopped scallion
I love this recipe. Traditionally it’s served in the market places by the women who cook up whole pigs all day. Using a wok they confit bits of pork all day into something called chicharron, a fatty crispy bite thats good for the soul but bad for your arteries. Once they’ve run out of larger cuts of pork meat they throw in this delicious large kernel corn called Mote. The Mote takes on some of the flavor of the fat and spices the pork ad been cooked in, and picked up any of the crunchy bits of meat left in the wok. Mote itself has this mild, buttery almost potato like flavor
It’s so good and worth going back to the stall for seconds… if she has any left. My time in Ecuador had me eating and trying a bunch of great recipes, this one being the easiest to make.
Have you tried any of the recipes I’ve posted so far? If so drop your impressions in the comments! I’d love to see what you think!
xoxo
Sara 💜