Empiñada - a Tomato, Pineapple, and Chicken Stew (a Pinedo recipe)

I'm on a roll making stews from the Pinedo's cookbook, El cocinero español.  ("On a roll" - a cooking pun!)

Last month I wrote about a beef and onion stew.  This time I tried a recipe on page 93, Empiñada.  This is not empanadas (a hand pie or dumpling) but a chicken stew with the dominant flavors of tomatoes and pineapple.  Yes, pineapple!

My Translation

My Redaction

1 cup dried bread crumbs

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 can crushed pineapple with its juice (20 ounce can)

2 cans diced tomatoes with their juice (14.5 ounce cans)

2 teaspoons cinnamon (or 1 tsp and then add more at the end to taste)

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1 1/2 teaspoon chopped garlic

1 teaspoon salt

2 to 2 1/2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thigh meat

Use just two cans of tomatoes and half that amount of chicken

Heat skillet over medium heat.

Add olive oil; swirl it to heat it.  

Add bread crumbs.  Stir constantly until the crumbs are golden brown.

Add pineapple, tomatoes, cinnamon, cloves, garlic, and salt.  Mix well.

Simmer over low heat while cutting the chicken into chunks.

Mix the sauce and the chicken pieces together in the slow cooker.  

Cook on low for 4 hours or until the meat is fall-apart tender.  Adjust salt to taste.

Beginning to toast crumbs

Toasted!

The sauce.  Just right.

My Notes

I did this recipe twice.  The first time I completely got the sauce-to-meat ratio wrong!  There was too much meat and the sauce was lost between the pieces.  My redaction above reflects the changes I made from the second time around. 

The point of toasting the bread crumbs - the technique is similar to toasting nuts but with oil to lubricate things - is to create an ingredient that will thicken the sauce.  

I didn't need to add any more water since I used the juices from the pineapple and tomatoes.

The first attempt did not include salt and boy, was it obvious.  I made sure there was salt in the second attempt.

You just have to love the slow cooker for making this recipe easy to cook and the chicken super tender.

For the second attempt, I created the sauce following the above directions then let it simmer for 30 minutes.  Then I added the first batch to it (the full amount was reduced from the three people who taste-tested it, but that wasn't much) and simmered it on low for 20 minutes warm it all the way through.

The Verdict

My guest taster who does not like cinnamon only tried the first version, which contained so little sauce that she couldn't taste it.  Honestly, we all tasted just tender chicken and not much else, so it was a bust.

Not enough sauce.

However the second time around had chunks of meat swimming in sauce.  Perfect!

See how thick it is?

The pineapple and tomatoes were the dominant flavors and they blended well together.  There was a bright acid note along with the sweetness from the fruit.  The spices were there but not competing for attention, although I noticed that I really enjoyed the slight dominance of the cinnamon. As one guest taster said, "They make something go on in the background so it is not just pineapple and tomato."  I agree!

The bread crumbs did their job and the sauce was thick.  I served the stew the first time with the pasta shells and the second time just by itself.  Both worked well.  

Success!  Simple and yet intriguing to have the pineapple and tomatoes working together.  I would probably add a little more cinnamon if I did this again.