MIAMI — When Mary Urrutia Randelman wrote her pioneering Cuban cookbook nearly 20 years ago, its pages contained more than recipes for guiso de maiz (corn stew) and coco quemado (crispy coconut). They bound together memories of a happy childhood and a lost way of life with an unbridled appreciation for good food.
It was, in short, a love letter to her homeland and family.
Urrutia Randelman died 18 months ago of lung cancer at the age of 61. As a tribute to her life and her Memories of a Cuban Kitchen (Wiley, $19.95), the first Cuban cookbook by a major U.S. publisher, her siblings, mother, aunts and uncles recently hosted an evening of food, drinks and Cuban music at Books & Books in Coral Gables.
“We wanted to remember her in a special way,” said her eldest brother, Tony Urrutia. “The book still has a great following, so this is a perfect way of doing it.”
Urrutia Randelman dedicated her book to her youngest brother, Calixto, the only one of six siblings to have been born in the United States, and to her nieces and nephews who had never seen Cuba.
“For them and for other Cuban-American children,” she wrote in the introduction, “I hope to keep the traditions of Cuban life and food alive.”
Mary Urrutia was the second oldest child in a well-to-do family in Pinar del Rio. Her family moved to Miami from Cuba in 1958, fleeing violence and the inevitable change in government. When her mother, Maria Cecilia, went to work as a saleswoman at Burdines, the children took over cooking duties. The first dish they made, following their mother’s instructions, was Uncle Ben’s rice.
They soon became her prep cooks, learning to slice onions and peppers for sofrito, to marinate fish in olive oil and lime juice and to season meat.
“We’re all pretty much passionate cooks,” Tony said. “We learned early on.”
Urrutia Randelman’s siblings described her as organized and stylish, a world traveler and a gracious hostess with a flair for decorating (which she did professionally in later life).
“Mary was a great entertainer,” Tony said. “But she always managed to look like she hadn’t been cooking.”
Travels inspire focus on family recipes
Mary Helen, a younger sister, said Urrutia Randelman planned all her trips around restaurants and the foods she wanted to sample. For a 2006 family vacation in San Francisco, “she e-mailed me the itinerary and we knew where we were having breakfast, lunch and dinner.”
It was her introduction to world cuisines in her travels that inspired Urrutia Randelman to compile her family’s favorite recipes.
“She would think of the food and recipes, but she would also come up with memories of the places we would eat,” Tony says. “So she had to include those, too.”
Urrutia Randelman spent months interviewing relatives to trace her family’s history and flesh out the details of her own recollections. Then she recruited her mother to help with the recipes. They holed up for two months in Urrutia Randelman’s upstate New York home to finish their work.
“Mary would test the recipes and I would write the notes,” Maria Cecilia recalls. Eventually, editor Joan Schwartz modified some of the recipes — no lard and less sugar, for example.
Though successful as a fashion stylist and production designer, then as a food consultant, Urrutia Randelman never ceased yearning for her homeland. Mary Helen recalls that her older sister “loved, just loved” Cuba and was extremely proud of her heritage.
She and her husband, Hal Randelman, who died of cancer six weeks before she did, bought a house in Los Angeles because it looked as if it belonged in Cuba.
“I feel like I’m in Havana,” she would say when her sister called.
A longing for home infuses cookbook
In the book, Cuba sparkles and seduces. Urrutia Randelman describes summers in Havana with her Aunt Titi, lounging at the exclusive Havana Yacht Club, and visits to La Majagua, her great-uncle’s tobacco plantation; El Chamizo, the family’s cattle ranch, and Las Canas, her grandfather’s orange groves. Each of these places, with its corresponding dishes, makes a cameo appearance in her book.
At the yacht club, Urrutia Randelman remembers the doorman, resplendent in white livery, ushering them “into an extraordinary tropical garden of pink oleander, bright red cannas and long, yellow rocket flowers.”
The food was “incomparable” and her favorite delicacy was … freshly fried potato chips, followed by mariquitas, plantain chips. So of course, she included recipes for these as well as for black-eyed pea fritters, a favorite of Chinese-Cuban street vendors.
Whether she was writing lovingly of cattle roundups at El Chamizo, with recipes for such Cuban favorites as pulpeta (stuffed meatloaf), or describing the incredible desserts served at Las Canas Orange Groves, Urrutia Randelman evoked a Cuba that remains alive for the older generation of Cuban-Americans in Miami.
Guiso de Maiz (Corn Stew)
Serves 8.
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 pound bacon, finely chopped
2 medium chorizos or other spicy sausage, sliced 1/2 inch thick
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 medium green or red bell pepper, seeded and finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup drained and chopped canned whole tomatoes or tomato sauce
3 tablespoons dry sherry
8 cups chicken stock or canned low-sodium chicken broth
1 medium potato, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 cup peeled and diced calabaza or butternut squash
4 cups fresh corn kernels (cut from 8 large ears)
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Chopped fresh parsley (for garnish)
In a Dutch oven or soup pot, heat the oil over medium-high heat until it is fragrant, then add the bacon and cook until crisp. Reduce heat to low, add chorizos, onion, bell pepper and garlic and cook, stirring often, until the vegetables are tender, 6 to 8 minutes.
Add the tomatoes, sherry, stock, potato and squash and cook, covered, for 20 minutes. Add corn, salt and pepper and cook, partially covered, until all the vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes. Correct the seasonings and garnish with parsley. Serve in warmed bowls.
Mary Urrutia Randelman attributed this recipe to her mother. The contrast of sweet prunes and salty ham highlights the delicate flavor of the pork.
The roast can also be served cold. Ask the meat department at your supermarket to cut the pork loin as specified. Stores that carry Latin soft drinks will have malta.
Pierna Rellena (Stuffed Roast Loin of Pork)
Serves 8.
1 (4- to 5-pound) boneless pork loin, cut with a lengthwise pocket for stuffing
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
pound ham steak, cut in 1/2-inch chunks
1 cup pitted prunes
11/2 cups firmly packed dark brown sugar
2 (7-ounce) bottles Malta Hatuey
Parsley sprigs for garnish
Heat the oven to 350°. Season the roast liberally inside and out with salt and pepper and stuff the pocket with alternating layers of ham and prunes, using the handle of a wooden spoon to push the stuffing into the meat. Tie the roast with kitchen twine and place in a shallow baking pan.
In a small bowl, combine the sugar and malta and pour the mixture over the roast. Set the baking pan on the middle oven rack and roast, uncovered, 2 to 21/2 hours (25 to 30 minutes per pound), to an internal temperature of 160°, turning to brown all sides of the meat and basting often.
Allow the finished roast to stand, covered with aluminum foil, 15 to 20 minutes before carving it into thin slices. Arrange the meat on a serving platter, spoon the pan juices over and sprinkle with parsley.
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