Colombian Breakfast: Calentado

I am absolutely fascinated by food from exotic places. No more so than with Colombian food (I think you guys know why). I've been doing a lot of research on different Colombian recipes and I love that behind every recipe is generations of experience. Grandmothers passing recipes on to mother passing on to daughters. There's something so personal about it while at the same time so comforting and welcoming.

Unfortunately the Colombian dishes that I post weren't handed down to me, instead they were borrowed from other sites and places. But I really hope they don't mind to much, I do it out of admiration and the lack me knowing of my own cultural background.

I came across this amazing site called My Colombian Recipes . It has huge collection of traditional foods, everything from breakfast, lunches, dinners, desserts. I've been so hooked on it. The one down side is that most of these recipe aren't exactly vegetarian friendly, but that hasn't stopped me yet :)

One of the first recipes I came across was for calentado, a big traditional breakfast. Since I heart breakfast I decided that was a good place to start.


Calentado: (serves 2 adapted from My Colombian Recipes)

For the Hogao (Colombian tomato and onion sauce)

• 1 1/2T olive oil
• 1/2c chopped green onions
• 2c chopped tomato
• 1 garlic clove
• 1/2t cumin
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2T fresh cilantro

Heat oil in small sauce pan over medium - mud/low. Add green onions, tomatoes, garlic and cumin. Cook for 10 minutes stirring occasionally until softened.  reduce heat add remaining ingredients and simmer 10 minutes longer.

• hogao
• 2c cooked brown rice
• 2c cooked pinto bean
• 1 ripe (black skinned) plantain
• 2T chili powder
• 1/2 package soy chorizo

Combine hogao, cooked rice and beans in a sauce pan. Heat over medium heat and cook for 15 minutes. Stir occasionally.

While rice mixture cooks slice plantains, spray with cooking spray and toss sprinkle chili powder evenly over slices. Heat counter-top grill and grill plantains 10 minutes. At the same time heat pan coated with cooking spray over medium heat and saute soy chorizo until 5-8 minutes.