Pastel de Choclo

Carlos' favorite food of all-time is Pastel de Choclo, a Chilean corn casserole full of an odd medley of ingredients. It contains layers of ground beef, olives, raisins, hardboiled eggs, chicken and a special corn mixture and topped off with sugar. I really wanted to make this for Carlos and it was important that I get it right. I found two recipes. The first was from Food Network. I read the reviews and most people complained that this recipe was lacking ground beef. So I found this recipe which included ground beef but called for bone-in chicken. I opted to combine the two recipes, instead of sticking with one, to create my own version.

This recipe is pretty complex with lots of time-consuming steps. Make sure you have a free afternoon to devote to it.
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Ingredients:

2 boneless skinless chicken breasts
2 cups of chicken broth

5 ears of corn, grated
1 cup of milk
3 tablespoons butter
chopped fresh basil

4 hard-boiled eggs sliced
1 cup black olives
1 cup raisins

1 large onion chopped
1 pound of ground beef
4 tablespoons olive oil

2 teaspoons confectioner's sugar

salt
pepper
cumin

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Start off with 5 ears of corn (6 is preferrable)

Grate each corn by hand. Do this first because it takes the longest amount of time of everything you will do. Once you are done, set aside the grated corn mush.

Heat up your 2 cups of chicken broth, add a dash of cumin and the two chicken breasts. Cook the breasts until they are tender and you can easily pull apart the meat with two forks. This will take a while so keep it in the background while you are working on other things.

Prepare 4 hardboiled eggs. Peel them and slice them and set aside.

Now on to the corn mixture. To a pot add 3 tablespoons of butter, basil, salt and the corn mush.



Slowly add the 1 cup of milk incorporating it into the mixture. Cook the mixture over medium heat for about 5 minutes. Pour into a bowl and set aside in the fridge.

Chop one large onion and sautee in a pan with 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Set aside the onion.

With 2 more tablespoons of olive oil, brown the ground beef. Season the beef with salt, pepper and cumin to taste. Make sure you use a good amount of cumin, around 1/2 teaspoon. Cumin is a very important spice in this dish. Mix your cooked beef with the onions.

Take your baking dish and spray it with a cooking spray. Add the onion-beef mixture to the dish. This is your first layer.

Then add hardboiled eggs, olives and raisins. This is your second layer.

Take out your two poached chicken breasts and shred the meat with two forks.

Add the shredded chicken to the dish as your third layer.

Carefully top the whole thing with the corn mixture. Make sure you cover every piece of chicken. Then sprinkle confectioner's sugar over the top.

Bake in a 400 degree oven for 35 minutes.

Serve hot! Sorry I couldn't get a better picture of the final product. This casserole took so long that by the time we ate, it was night time and all my natural light was gone. Oh well!

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Carlos' verdict - 4 stars and 20 million points!