I first heard of Salpicón which is another variety of Cuban Meat loaf at one of my favorite Cuban blogs called "
Cuban in the Midwest" it was 2 small meat loafs, simmered in a typical cuban style tomato based sauce (you the know the drill the sofrito of onion, garlic, bell peppers, lots of olive oil, tomato, etc.) Growing up my Tata/ grandma NEVER made "Cuban" style meat loaf, so it has always been something unknown to me until I started reading other Cuban blogs.
My first introduction to Cuban-style meat loaf was Marta Darby from the blog "
My Big Fat Cuban Family" she posted a large fried meat loaf, that was simmered in another variation of the cuban tomato based sauces, except it wasn't called "Salpicon" it was called "Pulpeta" it seems Salpicon and "Pulpeta" are cousins ha ha both seem to be loafs of meat that fried and simmered in those cuban creole sauces on stove top.
The main difference is that "Salpicon" are little loafs, and the Pulpeta are huge meat loafs usually with hard boiled eggs in the center. (Btw I've already cooked my own version of Pulpeta if anyone cares to see the post here's the link:
http://nathanscomida.blogspot.com/2009/11/pulpeta-cuban-meatloaf.html) my Pulpeta is awesome ;)
Anyways back to the Salpicon, these small fried loafs, reminded me of a large sausage in a savory creole sauce (don't thing wrong perverts ha ha) and so the recipe I came up with was inspired by the recipe I saw in the blog "Cuban in the Midwest" but this is my version/ variation. The way I made it was I wanted these fried meat loafs to taste like a spicy version smokey Spanish chorizo (like the Spanish chorizo's from La Rioja region of Spain) who's main elements are hot smoked spanish paprika and lots of garlic, thus I seasoned my ground meat mixture like that, and the ground ham in the meat mixture I used gives it that cured salty taste in addition the sauce I wanted it to accent the flavors of the loaf so I added to the sauce oregano because oregano and smoked spanish paprika really get along well together, not to mention I've noticed ground meat goes very well with oregano (of course this is just my opinion from messing around in the kitchen)
So here's my recipe hope you guys enjoy it :)
Main Ingredients:
-1 lbs. ground beef
-1 lbs. ground pork
-1/2 lbs. ground sweet ham
-5 eggs
-1 1/2 cups bread crumbs or cracker meal
-1/2 head garlic (peeled, through a garlic pressed or mashed to a paste in a mortar)
-1 tablespoon 1/2 hot or sweet smoked spanish paprika
-salt to taste (I used 2 teaspoons depends how salty your ham or bread or cracker meal is)
Ingredients for Sauce:
-1/4- 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
-2 large onion julienned
-2 large green or red bell pepper julienned
-1/2 head of garlic finely minced, or through a garlic press or mortar
-2 can 8 oz. tomato sauce
-2 cup of water
-1 cup dry white wine or red wine
-1 tablespoon ground oregano
-salt to taste (about 1 1/2 teaspoon)
Directions for loafs:
(1) Mix all the main ingredients together, but do not over mix the mixture or it will be tough.