Pork Patties with Corn (Boribori)

Making the mixture

1. Looking at the finished boribori, you can say with confidence that these are pork patties. The thing is, from that angle anything shaped right and made from ground meat can be called a patty. As the famous philosopher Kozma Prutkov said, look to the root! And the root is that it’s a patty, but not quite. A regular patty gets onion, garlic and soaked white bread, not corn and breadcrumbs.

2. Open the can of corn and drain off all the liquid. Usually there’s very little liquid in the can, so there’s hardly anything to drain.

   

3. Grind the pork in a meat grinder. The pork shouldn’t be too fatty: shoulder or leg. First rinse the meat and remove any bones and sinew.

   

4. In a bowl, mix the ground pork, egg and seasonings to taste: ground white pepper, paprika, chili and salt. Add the corn kernels and mix well.

   

5. Bring the mixture to the right firmness. Add 1 tsp of olive oil (from the 50 ml, the rest is for frying) and mix again. Then, still mixing, add breadcrumbs or grated stale white bread 1 tsp at a time until the mixture is firm enough to shape into patties.

   

   The finished mixture should be soft and barely stick to your hands.

   

Shaping and frying the patties

1. With wet hands, divide the mixture into 6 portions and shape them into round, flat patties. Flat is essential, because pork patties tend to puff up into balls as they cook.

   

2. Pour the rest of the olive oil into a well-heated skillet and first fry the patties over high heat on both sides until golden brown.

   

3. Then turn the heat down to the lowest setting, cover the skillet with a lid and keep cooking, being sure to turn the patties from time to time. After 15 minutes under the lid in total, the pork patties will be fully cooked.

   

Serving

1. Serve the patties with a side. As a side for the corn patties, Paraguayans recommend fried bananas, or a thick spicy tomato sauce with mashed potatoes; the corn patties always taste great. But for boribori without a side, a slice of lemon and a sprig of parsley is quite enough.

   

   Sometimes I make a side of fresh bell pepper and pickled onion with herbs. I add a few herbs, lemon and canned pineapple. The corn kernels that fell out of the patties and got toasted make a great addition to the side. It turns out really well: fruit and pork patties go together perfectly.