flipCampaign ration: charqui and tostado
Campaign ration: charqui and tostado
Why this dish? Manuela followed Bolívar's armies on horseback, in hussar uniform, into the sierra. There, no more locros: they lived on charqui (dried salted meat) and toasted corn, rations that fit in a saddlebag and do not spoil. This is the food of a warrior, not a salon lady.
Strips of dried salted meat, rehydrated and shredded, served with crunchy toasted corn: the preserved ration that fed troops at altitude.
Do not expect salon delicacies here, comrade: on campaign, I ate what my soldiers ate. Charqui is meat salted and dried in the cold wind of the sierra until it lasts weeks in the saddlebag; you fry it a little, shred it, and the toasted corn cracks under your teeth to fool the hunger. I crossed the cordilleras with this as my only feast, and I would not trade it for any viceroy's table.
- •Dried salted meat (beef or llama charqui) — strips (preserved protein)
- •Dry corn for toasting (tostado) — a handful (crunchy starch)
- •Salt — generous (preservation)
- •Animal fat — a little (cooking corn)
Campaign ration: charqui and tostado
Strips of dried salted meat, rehydrated and shredded, served with crunchy toasted corn: the preserved ration that fed troops at altitude.
Why this dish? Manuela followed Bolívar's armies on horseback, in hussar uniform, into the sierra. There, no more locros: they lived on charqui (dried salted meat) and toasted corn, rations that fit in a saddlebag and do not spoil. This is the food of a warrior, not a salon lady.
Do not expect salon delicacies here, comrade: on campaign, I ate what my soldiers ate. Charqui is meat salted and dried in the cold wind of the sierra until it lasts weeks in the saddlebag; you fry it a little, shred it, and the toasted corn cracks under your teeth to fool the hunger. I crossed the cordilleras with this as my only feast, and I would not trade it for any viceroy's table.
Ingredients (period version)
- Dried salted meat (beef or llama charqui) — strips (preserved protein)
- Dry corn for toasting (tostado) — a handful (crunchy starch)
- Salt — generous (preservation)
- Animal fat — a little (cooking corn)
Ingredients
- Dried salted beef (like cecina / charqui) — 200 g (protein)
- Dry toasting corn (or cancha corn) — 150 g (tostado)
- Oil or lard — 1 tbsp (toast corn)
- Onion, garlic (optional) — a little (revive charqui)
Method
- Soak the charqui in warm water for 1-2 hours to desalt and rehydrate, then shred.
- Fry it dry or with a drizzle of fat, optionally with a little onion.
- For tostado: heat the fat in a pan, add dry corn and stir covered until it browns and pops slightly.
- Salt the corn and serve the shredded charqui alongside, like a marching ration.
How it was made : Charqui (from which our word 'jerky' comes) is a pre-Hispanic Andean technique: meat was salted and left to dry and freeze overnight in the dry highland air. Light and non-perishable, it fed caravans and armies. Toasted corn (tostado/cancha) served as travel bread.
The contemporary twist : Serve as a 'sierra snack': shaved dried beef and crunchy corn in a paper cone, like a snack to nibble.
Manuela Sáenz · Charactorium
