Alentejo's migas (Migas alentejanas)

Migas is a traditional Iberian dish made from softened bread cooked in fat. Iberian meaning it can be found in both Portugal and Spain. 

Very popular in the southern region of Portugal, Alentejo, Migas is a seriously calorific dish. In excess it can be quite sickening but it's delicious when eaten at just the right amount.

This recipe comes from Margarida Pinto's Alentejo cuisine.

The bread used is usually old wheat bread, but fresh bread can be used as well. Avoid industrial bread, use good shop bought bread or homemade bread.

Our home baker, aka my partner, had a small disaster. He wanted to make corn bread but it end up hard and not very palatable. Instead of throwing it away, I decided to use it to make migas. However, I must be honest. I used way too much and corn bread doesn't work as well as wheat bread. It was also way too hard and it took me quite a lot of time to break it down. Use good wheat bread!

Serves: 4 persons.

Ingredients:

• 100g bacon
• 250g diced pork
• 250g entrecote (I used belly of pork because the butcher didn't have entrecote - it worked well but because of the weight of the bones, it was only enough for 3 persons)
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 1.5 tsp red pepper puree (massa de pimentão) 
• 200g good wheat bread (this amount is half of what I used)
• hot water
• salt to taste
• olive oil

Method:

1. Cut the bread into slices, place in a bowl and cover with water. Leave to absorb, then drain the water and set aside. This step is not on the original recipe. I took it from an online recipe at the time of writing but, on hindsight, it would have been a great help and it would have saved me the aggravation of trying to break down hard bread.
2. Mix the meat with the garlic, salt and red pepper puree.
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. Fry the meat with olive oil in a frying pan until cooked. Stir often. Reserve. It took me about 15-20min.
   
   
   
   
   
   
4. Add the bread to the frying pan and mix vigorously with a wooden spoon, breaking down the bread. Add more water if needed. When I was at this stage I had not pre-soaked the bread so I had to resort to a masher to help me and it took about 30min to soften the bread and break it down. Soak!
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
5. Keep stirring the bread until it unglues from the pan and becomes golden brown.
   
   
   
6. Form a ball with the bread and serve with the meat around.
   
   
   
7. Serve with cooked vegetables or a salad to cut down the fat. Not necessary what we did though...