Mesoamerica · Volume 02, Achiote, the Pib and the Lebanese Table

Queso relleno

Name: Queso relleno
Total time: 25 min
Yield: Serves 10; the stuffed cheese steamed roughly 25 minutes
Cuisine: The Yucatán Peninsula
Ingredients: 1 large ball whole Edam cheese (queso de bola); 1kg pork, minced, for the picadillo; 2 tomato; 16 olives; 15 capers; 2 tbsp raisins; 3 tbsp flour, for the k'óol sauce

Yucatán, Mexico

Queso relleno, a whole Edam cheese stuffed with picadillo in white sauce: a rounded wheel of pale yellow cheese with its red wax rim still visible at the base, cut open to reveal a dark savoury filling studded with olives and raisins.

An illustration of the dish, not a photograph of it cooked.

Time: 25 minutes

Researched: Researched from 26 sources in the brief, none yet linked in the text
Reviewed: Not yet reviewed from inside the tradition
Cooked: Not yet cooked and reported

As tradition built it

Queso relleno

Serves 10; the stuffed cheese steamed roughly 25 minutes

Ingredients

1 large ball whole Edam cheese (queso de bola)
1kg pork, minced, for the picadillo
2 tomato
16 olives
15 capers
2 tbsp raisins
3 tbsp flour, for the k'óol sauce

Method

Hollow a whole Edam cheese ball (queso de bola).
Stuff it with a picadillo of minced pork, tomato, olives, capers and raisins.
Bathe the filled cheese in a flour-thickened white k'óol sauce.

What a modern chef changes

Sous vide picadillo, clarified k'óol, direct-heat finish

Method

Cook the picadillo filling sous vide in its own fat before it goes into the cheese, holding it properly moist through the second, longer bake the whole stuffed cheese needs.
Clarify the k'óol sauce's base stock through a chinois for genuine smoothness rather than the slightly grainy result a home-thickened white sauce can give.
Finish the whole stuffed cheese briefly under a Big Green Egg run for direct high heat, for real, fast browning on the exterior.

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