Making Sofrito

Clockwise L-R: red bell pepper, yellow onion, green bell pepper, cilantro, tomato, cubanelle / italian pepper, culantro, garlic

Sofrito is a vegetable seasoning base that’s used in a lot of Latin cooking and usually consists of peppers, garlic, cilantro, onions and tomatoes. It really makes anything taste good, and only takes minutes to prepare. It’s really worth adding to your pantry if you can!

Almost every culture seems to have their own type of “sofrito”. The French have mirepoix, a mix of celery, onions, and carrots. In Cajun/ Creole cooking, a base of celery, bell pepper and onions known as The Trinity is used. Thai cuisine uses red and green curry pastes. And lastly, Spaniards and Italians use sofrito / soffrito, which is usually a mix of peppers, herbs, garlic, and onions…

Really, the list could go on and on…

Unfortunately, as the ingredient list for a seasoning paste grows longer, the more cumbersome it becomes to prepare fresh for every dish. This is why I almost never made sofrito, and opted to buy the Goya brand instead, lol.

That changed about 2 years ago when I saw Daisy Martinez, the host of “Daisy Cooks!”, make her own sofrito and freeze it. I had seen people freeze cooked sofrito before, but for some reason that always rubbed me the wrong way, lol.

I liked that she froze her mixture raw, and then cooked/defrosted it straight in the pot when she needed it.

Now I always have some on hand. It saves me the trouble of chopping up extra peppers and onions with every single dish, and it packs a lot of seasoning punch. Best of all, I have total control as to what’s in it…no preservatives :).

There are a quite a few little variations to sofrito recipes since everyone has their own personal touch. You can start with mine below, or search around the net and use one that strikes your fancy.

I combined what I liked best in both Cuban and Puerto Rican style sofritos.


Sofrito
This takes less than 15 minutes to make. I usually set aside time to do this on a Sunday if I’m running low.


20 garlic cloves, peeled
2 medium yellow onions, peeled & quartered
1/2 each red & green bell pepper, seeded & roughly chopped
2 cubanelle peppers, seeded and roughly chopped
1 large ripe tomato, roughly chopped
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 bunch of cilantro leaves, washed and coarsley chopped
4 culantro leaves (you can leave this out if you can't find them, sub more cilantro instead)
2-3 teaspoons red wine vinegar

* if you're not a fan of cilantro, use half parsley and leave out the culantro

Put all the ingredients a food processor/blender and process until very finely chopped. It should still look a little chunky, not too smoothly pureed or liquidy.

When I saw Chef Daisy make her homemade sofrito, she froze it in ½ cup portions in little Ziploc bags. You can do it that way or freeze the mixture in ice cube trays like I do. This recipe fills about 3 ice cube trays. Once the cubes are frozen, you can transfer them to into a large freezer bag.

Usage:

You add sofrito during the stage when you saute spices/onions etc.

It tastes really good stirred into soup and meat stews as well!

I usually use about 3 sofrito cubes (~ ¼ cup) per cup of rice



I'll have recipes using sofrito soon!