Ropa Vieja (Old Clothes) A Spanish recipe

I might have posted this before--ages ago--but it's been so long since I blogged anything, I figured I'd toss it out here for the world at large just in case I skipped putting it on.

For tonight's dinner I made ropa vieja, which will sit and rest in fridge and then I'll skim off the fat--easy as it gels and floats to the top. Basically this translates to "old clothes- or rags" you make a soup of the meat first. Use skirt steak or flank.

If you have a bone, plop it into the water too--espeically if it's a cut with marrow. Add salt, black pepper, pieces of red or green pepper. a small onion and several pieces of garlic. And then you cook the shredded meat in a fairly spicy sauce with minced onions, garlic and peppers and hot pepper and a hit of vinegar and a hit of vino, and some of the soupy water. Cook this for about 45 minutes or so, or until the water cooks out and you have a nice dense saucy meat to serve over white rice.

Save the rest of the broth to make vegetable soup a few days later--two meals from the same meat.