Andorra, I do adore ya!

Ah, Andorra. A teeny tiny country that sits between France + Spain in the Pyrenees. It's my first country that I couldn't find a restaurant for, but that's okay! As I've said before I will try to make a dish from countries that I could not visit a restaurant for. I scoured the internet looking for recipes and found some delicious-looking dishes. I also discovered some cool tidbits about the country like it's the only country governed by two co-princes. The two princes surprisingly are the President of France + the Bishop of Urgell of Catalonia, Spain. The official language spoken is Catalan, but folks also speak Spanish, Portuguese + French. Andorra isn’t a part of the EU, but uses the euro as its form of currency.

I discovered a simple recipe for a dish called trinxat. Didn’t require a lot of ingredients or to turn on my oven in this sweltering NYC heat so it was a win-win! Trinxat is very similar to the British dish bubble and squeak, which is a mixture of potatoes + cabbage fried together. This beauty adds garlic to the mixture + a pretty bacon wreath on top. Since I had just bought a big ol’ bag of garlic scapes I used those instead of garlic cloves, but feel free to use garlic cloves if you desire to remake this dish. Now let’s make trinxat!!!!

These are garlic scapes. They are the tender stems of garlic bulbs that are harvested late spring + early summer. The garlic bulbs are harvested later at the end of summer.

Trinxat

2 large potatoes, peeled + chopped

½ small head of cabbage, finely chopped

2 super long garlic scapes, finely chopped came out to scant ¼ cup (or use 3-4  minced garlic cloves)

4-6 slices of bacon

Olive oil

Salt/pepper 

Ingredients needed for trinxat.

Boil chopped potatoes in a medium saucepan until tender enough to pierce with a fork. Remove potatoes with a slotted spoon into a large bowl and set aside. Reuse that same water in the saucepan to gently simmer cabbage for 6-7 minutes. Drain cabbage + add to the same bowl of potatoes. 

I cut my potatoes about this size, which helped them boil faster + easier to mash later.

Nicely chopped cabbage.

Take bacon slices and wrap them into loose circles (almost like trying to tie a loose knot). In a medium saute’ or frying pan cook bacon until thoroughly crisp and slices retain their shape, set aside to drain on a paper towel. In the same pan lightly fry garlic scapes or minced garlic in bacon gold (aka bacon fat) for 3-4 minutes over medium heat. If frying up garlic cloves do it for 2-3 minutes so that the garlic doesn’t burn + go bitter. Add garlic to potato + cabbage mixture.

Using my hand for scale for chopped scapes.

With a fork or if you’re lucky a potato masher, combine and mash all ingredients together. Add several generous pinches of salt and pepper to your liking. The mixture shouldn’t be mashed to oblivion, just mashed enough that it’s a bit chunky + funky.

In the same pan that the bacon was cooked in, add a couple of drizzles of olive oil over medium heat. Take about a palm-size amount of potato mix and compact it into a patty (don’t worry it won’t look perfect, which is totally okay!). Fry the patties until each side is crispy golden brown. Make sure to only flip the patty when you see the edges are getting dark. If you flip too early it may fall apart.

Fried potato patty goodness.

Crisp + golden brown.

Once you’ve sufficiently fried up your trinxat patties, plate with a wreath of bacon on top. I added a dollop of sour cream to mine which helped cut through the saltiness of the bacon and starchiness of the patty.

Guyssssss. Look at this beauty!

This recipe can be prepared vegan by omitting the bacon or using a meat alternative. Instead of frying the garlic in bacon gold, using a couple of drizzles of olive oil will suffice. Also, this recipe can be dressed any way you want! Add sour cream, hot sauce, some chopped chives, or a few sprinkles of freshly grated cheddar on top. Trinxat was quick to make + even faster to eat. These guys are also great for breakfast, I saved some mixture and had some the following day with eggs + avocado. 

Andorra, I do adore ya! Trinxat will be added to my rotation of recipes that are cheap, satisfying, and easy to put together in a snap. If you try this recipe please let me know! I’d love for folks to adapt it to their taste + liking. 

The next country we visit is Angola! 

Cook. Eat. Repeat.

Natalie