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Callos a la madrileña

Callos a la madrileña: Madrid's slow-cooked tripe in a paprika sauce with chorizo and morcilla

In old Madrid taverns around La Latina and Lavapiés, callos come in little clay dishes, sticky and brick-red, on winter Sundays and as a weekday tapa with bread. The tripe is cooked for hours with a pig's trotter until the sauce sets like gelatin when cold, then finished with chorizo, morcilla and paprika. This contains pork (chorizo, morcilla, ham and pig's trotter). Buy beef tripe that the butcher has already cleaned and blanched. Chef's tip: make it a day ahead; callos taste better reheated and the sauce thickens beautifully overnight.
Total time
270 min
Difficulty
hard
Serves
6
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Ingredients

Serves6

For the tripe

For the sauce

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Fresh ingredients (4)

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Method

0/8 done
  1. Step 1: Wash 2 ¼ lb cleaned beef tripe and 1 pig's trotter well, then put them in a bowl of cold water with ½ cup white wine vinegar for 30 minutes. Rinse.

    30 min
  2. Step 2: Put them in a large pot, cover with cold water, bring to the boil and boil for 5 minutes. Drain and rinse; this removes the strong smell.

    10 min
  3. Step 3: Cover with fresh cold water by 3 cm, add 1 onion, 2 bay leaves, 3 whole cloves and 1 tsp black peppercorns, and simmer gently, partly covered, for 3 hours, until the tripe is very tender and the trotter falls apart. Top up with hot water as needed.

    180 min
  4. Step 4: Lift out the trotter, pick the meat and skin from the bones, chop it and return it to the pot. Discard the onion and bay. Keep about 1 litre of the liquid with the tripe.

  5. Step 5: In a frying pan, warm 3 tbsp olive oil and fry 3 ½ oz serrano ham and 7 oz cooking chorizo over a medium heat for 3 minutes, until the oil runs red. Add 1 onion and cook for 8 minutes until soft, then 4 cloves garlic for 1 minute.

    12 min
  6. Step 6: Take the pan off the heat, stir in 1 tbsp sweet smoked paprika and 1 dried chilli, and immediately tip everything into the tripe. A common mistake is frying paprika over the flame; it burns in seconds and turns the stew bitter.

  7. Step 7: Add 5 ½ oz morcilla (black pudding) and simmer, uncovered, for 30–40 minutes, stirring gently, until the sauce is thick and glossy and sticks to your lips. The chorizo must be hot through, at least 160°F. Season with 1 tsp salt.

    35 min
  8. Step 8: Cool, cover and refrigerate overnight if you can. Reheat gently until bubbling and serve in small earthenware dishes with crusty bread.

Nutrition per serving

Calories
480 kcal
Protein
38 g
Carbs
6 g
Fat
33 g
Fibre
1 g

Nutrition values are estimates.

K
Recipe by

KrazyBadal

All recipes by this chef →

Good to know

How long does callos a la madrileña take?
About 270 minutes in total: 30 minutes to prepare and 240 minutes to cook.
How many people does it serve?
6 as written. Change the servings above the ingredients and every amount scales to match.
Can I make it ahead?
Yes. It keeps well, so you can cook it earlier in the day or the day before and reheat it.
What can I use instead of white wine vinegar?
Cider vinegar or rice vinegar, same amount.
What can I use instead of onion?
2 shallots per onion.

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