Family Chef: Sarita’s sangrecita from Peru
Sarita is the sole provider for her four children and loves to cook healthy food. Her delicious and iron-rich recipe of peppers stuffed with chicken blood, or sangrecita, was chosen as a winner of a competition co-organized by the World Food Programme to promote affordable dishes that help combat anaemia.
Twenty years ago, Sarita Rivera settled in Lima, Peru, with her four children. She left behind a troubled family situation only to be faced with more challenges, fighting for four months to secure a plot of land with no water, sanitation or electricity in Almirante Grau, in Lima’s Ventanilla District.
“When I came for the first time, it was all just sand, there were no services,” she explains. That sand would constantly become mixed in with her family’s food.
Sarita now works as a cook in a buffet restaurant and volunteers to help people in her community. In her spare time, she enjoys shopping for cooking supplies and using the cooking skills she learned from her step-mother to delight her family and community with delicious meals.
Sarita’s cooking prowess was recently demonstrated when she created a very special recipe, chosen as one of the winners of a competition organized by the World Food Programme and Cordon Bleu. The aim of the contest was to promote affordable dishes that help combat anaemia, a condition caused by iron deficiency in the diet.
Her winning recipe is called ‘pimiento relleno’, and it’s made from peppers stuffed with ‘sangrecita’, or chicken blood, which is rich in iron. Sarita is proud to have had her recipe published in a volume called ‘Recipes from Peru to Combat Anaemia’.
Sarita begins by preparing the chicken blood, putting it into a strainer to wash it thoroughly under running water to clean out impurities such as feathers. She then brings a pot of water to the boil and adds the washed blood, cooking it for 20 to 25 minutes. Depending on what dish she’s making, she’ll add a sprig of mint or a bay leaf into the water for savoury dishes, or cinnamon and clove for sweet dishes.
After boiling, the blood can be strained and it is ready to use. Next, Sarita prepares the peppers, cutting off the tops and removing the seeds and veins. She then fries onion and garlic in a pan, adding ground paprika and seasoning with salt and pepper.
To this, Sarita adds the chopped chicken blood and boiled carrots, mixing them together thoroughly. She uses this mixture to stuff the peppers, topping them with cheese and covering them by using the pepper tops as lids.
She then puts the peppers into a pan along with any leftover filling, adding a splash of water and covering with the saucepan lid. When they have cooked, they’re ready to be enjoyed as a tasty way to combat anaemia.
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