El Cubano Covers the Gulf

At Food Bag, fondly called “El Cubano” by many of the market’s longtime regulars, there’s always a crush of people gathered in the tiny bakery area, where a jovial woman dispenses grilled Cuban sandwiches, tres leches and refugiados (incredibly rich Cuban pastries) and the creamy tropical fruit-and-milk shakes called batidos.

“We’ll soon be expanding this to a cafe,” says Roberto Rodriguez Jr., who owns Food Bag with his father.

The remodeling that Food Bag began more than a year ago is nearly complete. The formerly unassuming neighborhood Cuban grocery has become a larger, up-to-date supermarket. The freshly painted peach-color exterior is accented with heliotrope neon, a stylish domed awning the shade of ripe papaya and festive orange shopping carts.

The shelves are still filled with everything for the Cuban cook, but a broader selection of Latin items has gradually been added. These days, Food Bag’s customers include former residents of the Caribbean area, Central America and parts of Mexico where the cuisines share the same basic ingredients. More than half of the store’s clientele is from Central America.

When they arrived in the United States after escaping Cuba during the late ‘50s, Rodriguez and his father, a wholesale grocery salesman, worked as busboys at the Sportsmen’s Lodge in Studio City until they could put together the funds to open a small market in 1969. The elder Rodriguez ran the store during the time his son served in Vietnam, and in 1976 they bought Food Bag together.

Rodriguez says his father has always had an extraordinary business sense. As a young boy, to supplement the 25 cents a day he earned cutting sugar cane, the elder Rodriguez would package roasted peanuts in snack-sized bags to sell on the streets at night. He found the peanut business more profitable than cutting cane. And he also found his calling as a grocery salesman, one who would eventually afford his family a middle-class standard of living. The philosophy that Rodriguez Sr. has long held: “Always offer customers the three Bs-- bueno (good), bonito (attractive) and barato (inexpensive).”

Knowing what your clientele wants is also, clearly, part of the formula. As I walked the aisles with Rodriguez Jr., a friendly but quietly formal man, he reminisces about his life in pre-revolutionary Cuba. He points out things on the shelves he remembers from those times--such as the Coco Rico coconut milk-flavored soda or the Cuban-style crackers kids crumble into cafe con leche for breakfast.

Standing in front of the cooking chocolates, Rodriguez Jr. remembers how his mother used to scrape shavings from a bar of Menier chocolate into warm milk to make hot chocolate. Later, in the wine section, he talks about New Year’s Eve in Cuba, when everyone would eat 12 grapes at midnight before consuming a glass of sparkling cider--the Champagne of middle-class Cubans.

There is a wealth of Cuban convenience products-- empanada wrappers, instant marinades and seasoning mixes. Cuban food companies package everything from black bean soup to instant bunuelo mix. Several of these companies were well known in Cuba and have successfully relocated to Florida. And some products come from Cuban-run firms in Los Angeles, such as Gavina coffee and Cacique cheese.

Rodriguez Jr. stops to chat with customers--he remembers that a woman’s daughter will soon marry and that one man recently had bypass surgery. Meanwhile, always working, he scans the shelves, getting rid of any signs of disorder, removing a candied apple abandoned among the soup cans and a bag of radishes tossed into the otherwise picture-perfect mango display.

The market has changed over the years, reflecting the changes in Los Angeles’ Cuban community. “People who have lived here a long time, myself included, have changed their eating habits,” he says. “They eat fewer rich meat dishes and fewer sweets. But when they get those cravings for wonderful Cuban flavors, they’ll say, ‘Let’s go down to El Cubano.’ ”

SHOPPING LIST

COMFORT FOODS

* Gofio: Just as some of us used to eat dry instant chocolate milk powder straight from the package, kids in Cuba ate two-cents’ worth of sweetened gofio from a little brown bag. This powder of pulverized toasted wheat is usually mixed with milk or broth.

“We’d buy some after school, cut a small hole in the bottom of the bag and sprinkle the gofio into our mouths as we walked along,” says Rodriguez Jr. Imported from the Canary Islands, where it originated as a staple food, gofio has a rich, nutty flavor. Whether they eat it dry or mixed into liquid, most people sweeten gofio slightly with sugar.

* Malta Hatuey: For Cubans, Hatuey, the name of a famous Indian folk hero, is as synonymous with malta as the name Kleenex is with tissues. This nonalcoholic malt-flavored drink is made from hops and is similar to dark ale. It’s almost as common in Cuba as Pepsi. Malta Hatuey is now bottled by Bacardi in Miami and Puerto Rico and sold throughout the United States. Malta is consumed cold, without ice, either plain or mixed with cold condensed milk.

* Melao de Cana: This unusual product, a sweet, dark, fairly viscous liquid, is made of unrefined sugar. Its principal use is as a topping for bunuelos , which are deep-fried fritters made from cassava flour. Ready-to-fry bunuelos may be found in the freezer section near the tropical fruit purees.

CONDIMENTS

* Sofrito : The foundation of just about every Spanish-inspired dish in the Cuban repertoire is a mix of onion, sweet peppers and garlic gently sauteed in olive oil or lard and usually simmered with a little tomato.

Not all sofritos are exactly alike. Some omit the garlic, some include diced bacon, ham or sausage, and others are seasoned with a bay leaf or Sherry. But all good sofritos have something in common. They require patience--you can’t rush the onions or they’ll taste either raw or scorched. The peppers also need the right amount of gentle heat to soften and mellow the taste.

But with sofrito criollo concentrado , a ready-to-use product packaged in a jar, a quick dish of fish fillets, a soup of ham and beans or rice cooked with sausages and tomatoes can be assembled in a few minutes. Sofrito criollo concentrado is found on the shelves below the meat case along with the marinades and other sauces.

Displayed with it are several prepared marinades including mojo criollo , Cuba’s famous garlic sauce and dressing served over vegetables, meats, chicken--in fact almost everything.

* Adobo criollo seasonings: These dry marinades based on garlic, oregano, salt and other seasonings come in shaker-top bottles. In addition to the plain version, there’s an adobo criollo flavored with annatto (Cubans call it bijol ) and one seasoned with cumin. All versions of adobo criollo are made in mild and spicy versions.

MEATS

* Cantimpalo : Cumin and cayenne add to the spiciness of this dry-cured sausage. It’s a favorite for grilled sausage sandwiches called pan con chorizo or, when the sausage is grilled with onions, choripan. Cantimpalo isn’t usually a cooking sausage. It is often served cold; heated slices of the sausage, impaled on wood picks, are offered as an appetizer. Look for cantimpalo in the meat and deli department.

* Chorizos en manteca : Sausages packed in lard might seem like overkill, but these crumbly sausages--along with the lard--are primarily used as flavoring in sofritos for soups and simmered dishes. A marvelous transporter of flavor, the lard has absorbed the taste of the seasoned meat, and it lightly suffuses a dish with sausage essence. Two dishes that would benefit from chorizos en manteca are potaje de garbanzos (a chick pea, potato and cabbage soup) and Galician white-bean stew. Chorizos en manteca are found in the canned meat and fish section of the store.

* Dry chorizos: Packaged in pairs, these small links have the strongest paprika flavor of all the sausages. You could use them in the above-mentioned stewed dishes, but in my opinion they’re best when you want a flavor accent--as opposed to a melding of flavors. Consequently dry chorizo is my favorite for paellas , arroz con chorizo and other rice dishes. In the thick Cuban-style omelets called tortillas , dry chorizos add the perfect snap of spicy flavor. In tortilla Vasca (Basque omelet) for example, they enhance a filling of potatoes, asparagus and shrimp. Look for these chorizos in the meat and deli department.

* Tasajo : In the days before refrigeration, the partidario , or section managers of large ranches--and probably many small farmers as well--would preserve their beef by rubbing it with salt, annatto and lard and hanging it to dry in the carniceria , a cool airy room reserved for this purpose.

Tasajo , unlike jerky, is not preserved in slices but dried in a large piece. You can buy plain tasajo in the meat department, where it’s kept near the cheeses. Before being used in a dish, tasajo must be desalted by overnight soaking of the pieces, and the water must be changed several times. It must then be simmered in fresh water with a bay leaf for about one to 1 1/2 hours, or until it is soft. Tasajo’s rich flavor and slightly chewy texture is worth all this attention. It makes bland root vegetables delectable in a traditional ajiaco criollo , a hearty stew of short ribs, flank steak and other cuts of beef stewed together with many kinds of root vegetables plus squash, corn and green plantains. It’s also eaten stir-fried with garlic and onions or simmered in a sofrito in a dish called tasajo aporreado.

The label of ready-to-eat canned tasajo aporreado suggests serving it with eggs or omelets in sandwiches or . . . as a pizza topping. Look for it in the canned meat and seafood section.

* Tocino : Simply the word for bacon in Spanish, in Cuban recipes this refers to unsliced slab bacon that is often diced fine to flavor sofritos.

* Steaks: Most Cubans love to barbecue meat. They love it plain, marinated or sprinkled with adobo seasoning. Food Bag’s steaks are proudly lined up, and usually they’re labeled both in Cuban (which is not the same as Spanish when it comes to meats) and English. Look for lomo de res sin huesa , boneless Spencer steak; rinonada , well-marbled Porterhouse or T-bone steak, and filete de rez , filet mignon.

Thinner steaks include palomilla , beef top sirloin, and canada , top round. Either of these cuts can be pounded thin, dry-marinated or marinated in garlic and lime juice before quickly being browned on each side.

PREPARED FOODS

* Prepared main dishes: A number of Spanish-style bean dishes that have worked their way into everyday Cuban eating and are sold ready to eat in cans, such as fabada Asturiana , a white-bean stew made with sausages, bacon and cured pork. Other dishes include frijoles colorados , a red-bean stew flavored with bacon and sausage, and patas de cerdo (pig’s feet) with garbanzos.

* Picadillo : One of my favorite products, picadillo (labeled “Cuban hash” on its can), is a versatile blend of beef, pork, sofrito , olives, raisins and potato. Picadillo fills small pastry crusts for empanadas ; for tambor de picadillo , it is layered with mashed potatoes, and for tambor de picadillo y platano it is sandwiched between two “crusts” made of mashed plantains. The label on the commercially made picadillo suggests serving it with eggs or home-fried potatoes.

PRODUCE

* Plantain: This triangular-shaped banana-like fruit, eaten ripe, green and in-between, has a multiple personality in Cuban cooking. Always served cooked, plantains can be a sticky-sweet dessert when ripe, when green a starchy vegetable in a soup or stew. Tostones , flattened rounds of green plantain, deep-fried twice, are the equivalent of North America French fries and they accompany just about everything.

To help cooks make them perfectly every time, Food Bag carries a toston press. This implement is two wooden disks, one with a circular indentation. The disks have handles and are hinged together so you can press each green plantain slice into a neat circle.

* Naranja agria : Cuba’s garlicky marinades are often shot through with a tart fruity flavor that livens up the taste of any fish or meat. It comes from Seville orange juice, known as jugo de naranja agria. The flavor is slightly bitter as well as sour. Seville orange juice comes bottled, but in the winter season, Food Bag’s produce department carries fresh Seville oranges. They are slightly larger than golf balls, and their flavor is worth the work it takes to squeeze them.

* Apple bananas: These scaled-down bananas, only two inches long, look like something a child would feed a teddy bear. Apple bananas are sweeter than the standard variety, and they make delightful Alice-in-Wonderland-ish garnishes for bowls of ice cream or for sundaes.

The variety found in Cuban cooking is charmingly introduced in “Memories of a Cuban Kitchen” by Mary Urrutia Randelman and Joan Schwartz. Even so, most of the book’s recipes embody Cuba’s Criollo cooking, the fascinating tropical mix of Spanish, African and New World ingredients and cooking methods. There are many fish dishes and recipes based on vegetables in which meat is used for flavoring, rather than a main ingredient. Leafing through the book, I could see how many of the Cuban ingredients found at Food Bag could be put to delicious use. Consider the following recipes.

POLLO CRIOLLO EN CAZUELA 1 (3-pound) chicken, cut into quarters or serving pieces, or 3 pounds chicken breasts and thighs Salt Freshly ground pepper 3 to 4 cloves garlic 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin 1/2 cup Seville orange juice, or substitute 1/4 cup sweet orange juice mixed with 1/8 cup each fresh lime juice and lemon juice 1/4 cup pure Spanish olive oil or vegetable oil 1/2 cup dry Sherry 1 large onion, thinly sliced 1/2 cup chicken stock or canned chicken broth 1 tablespoon flour, optional 2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley Steamed white rice

Wash chicken, pat dry with paper towels. Season chicken liberally to taste with salt and pepper. In mortar, crush garlic into paste with cumin and rub garlic paste into chicken. Place chicken in non-reactive bowl, pour orange juice over, cover, and refrigerate at least 1 hour or overnight.

Remove chicken from marinade, then pat dry. Reserve marinade. In heavy-bottomed casserole, heat oil over medium heat until fragrant, then brown chicken on all sides. Add reserved marinade, Sherry, onion and stock, reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer until chicken is fork-tender, 35 to 45 minutes.

Transfer chicken to serving platter. Strain sauce through colander and return sauce with flour to casserole. Cook sauce over low heat, stirring, until thickened, 5 to 6 minutes. Adjust seasonings to taste. Pour over chicken and garnish with parsley. Serve with white rice. Makes 4 servings.

Select very ripe plantains that are soft to the touch with skins that are almost black. This is not a dessert but a wonderful accompaniment to spicy Creole dishes.

PLATANOS A LA TENTACION (Baked Sweet Plantains) 4 very ripe medium plantains 1/2 cup dry white wine or light rum 1/4 cup dry Sherry 1/4 cup brown sugar, packed 4 tablespoons salted butter, cut into cubes Ground cinnamon or nutmeg

Arrange plantains in baking dish. Pour wine, Sherry and brown sugar over. Sprinkle with butter. Season to taste with cinnamon.

Cover and bake at 350 degrees 20 minutes. Uncover, turn plantains over, baste and bake, uncovered, until golden brown on top, another 15 minutes. Serve hot. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

Food Bag Inc. (El Cubano), 11350 Victory Blvd. (at Tujunga), North Hollywood, (818) 506-0911. Open Monday through Friday 9 a.m. to 7:45 p.m.; Saturday 8 a.m. to 7:45 p.m.; Sunday 8 a.m. to 5:45 p.m.