Ingredients
- 2 tbsp coconut or vegetable oil
- 1 large yellow onion, finely chopped
- 1 red pepper, 1 green pepper, 1 yellow pepper, deseeded and finely diced
- 4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
- 750 grams of minced beef (or pork, or a mix, depending on what you prefer)
- 2 tsp of hot sauce (or tbsp, depending on how hot you like it)
- 1 tbsp of tomato puree (or 2 if you prefer)
- 1 heaped tsp of ground cumin
- 1 pinch of cinnamon (less than ¼ tsp)
- 1 can of chopped tomatoes
- 50 grams of raisins (sultanas)
- 50 grams of pitted olives, thinly sliced (cut them in 4 slices ish)
- 40 grams of capers, rinsed and drained
- lime juice to taste (roughly half a lime for me)
- finely chopped parsley
- salt
- freshly ground black pepper
Recipe
1. Heat the oil in a large heavy-based saucepan and add the onion and peppers.
2. Cook onions and peppers over gentle heat until the onion is soft and translucent.- Season this with some salt and pepper.
3. Add the garlic, minced meat, hot sauce and spices, and 1 tbsp of tomato puree.
4. Continue to cook over slightly higher heat until the mince is browned
5. Season with salt and pepper again, and add the tomatoes and raisins.
6. Cook uncovered for ~20 minutes, then add olives and capers, and simmer for 5 more min.
7. Taste for seasoning, adjust salt/pepper/hotsauce accordingly.
8. Liven up the dish with a squeeze of lime juice, and add the freshly chopped parsley.
9. Serve with rice/pasta/whatever you fancy.
Optional
If you want to balance the dish out more, feel free to add a dash of Thai Fish Sauce and/or a dash of Worcestershire sauce, to bring out a load more of that umami.
This isn’t appreciated by everybody, and it’s not in the original recipe, but that’s what I usually do just to get another kick of flavour out of this dish.
Another optional thing to do: Replace a third of the minced meat with chopped mushrooms. Saves money, slightly better for the environment, and just as delicious. Add these before step 3.
Timesavers
Here’s a few tips to save time, that I had to figure out for myself:
– Cut the peppers and onions first, and start frying them before chopping other things
– Crush the garlic, saves a lot of time
– When the stew is simmering, then start prepping your olives, capers and parsley
– Ignore garnishing, throw in the parsley along with the capers and olives
**all credit to Si&Dave