Recipes with 'Tapioca/Cassava'

Curried Cassava Chips

Peel and slice your tapioca/cassava root raw into 1/8” or smaller slices (that’s where the mandolin comes in handy). Bring a pan of oil (1.5-2 inches of oil will do) up to frying temperature. To test temperature, take a small piece of tapioca and drop it into the oil - if it starts bubbling and rises to the surface immediately it’s ready. Fry chips in batches, turning once, until crispy. Remove and drain oil. I noticed that the edges of my chips browned during this process, even with a lower temperature - not sure what that’s about but it looks neat.
Muddle a teaspoon of curry powder with some finely ground salt and pepper - sprinkle this spice mixture over the chips and shake around. What I do is throw the chips into a small brown paper bag and add the spices and then shake them up in the bag, but you’ll have to judge your chips to see if they are hardy enough to remain intact through that handling.

Fried Tapioca with Chipotle Aioli

Peel tapioca/yuca and quarter lengthwise and remove stringy middle section; chop into 1/2” chunks. Steam (20 mins) or Pressure cook (3 mins) your yuca until tender. Remove from pot and allow to dry a bit before frying (this reduces the splatter of water on oil). Bring a pan of oil up to frying temperature. Good high heat oils for frying include: safflower, sunflower, peanut, grapeseed, and canola (though canola is likely to be genetically modified if not organic). Turn the yuca chunks once, and fry until crispy on the outside. Remove from oil and allow to drain (we like to reserve paper bags for this purpose).

Chipotle Aioli

1 cup mayonnaise (I prefer to use Vegenaise)
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 teaspoons fresh lime juice (also from the CSA box)
1.5 teaspoon chipotle chile powder or chipotle hot sauce
2 tablespoons finely chopped green onions
Salt and pepper to taste

Mix all these ingredients together, and use as a dipping sauce for the yuca fries!

Garlic Tapioca

1-2 tapioca roots (depending on size), peeled
4-8 garlic cloves (depending on taste), minced
olive oil
1 bunch Kale (“Dino” kale holds up great in this recipe, but other types work too), de-boned and chopped into ribbons
salt and pepper to taste
optional: 1 nioi (hawaiian chili pepper - if you like spice), minced
optional: chopped green onions

After peeling your tapioca roots, quarter them lengthwise and remove the stringy vein that runs through the middle of each root. Slice into 1/2” pieces, and steam for about 20 minutes, until easily pierced with a fork. If you have a pressure cooker it takes 3 minutes to cook under pressure.
Add olive oil to coat the bottom of a pan, add garlic and saute until the garlic becomes aromatic and a little crispy. Add your kale and nioi (if using), wilt the kale, and the cooked tapioca chunks, stirring to coat evenly. Serve warm.