Author: typepadtowordpress

Starring at the Hole in One, Lake Chapala, Jalisco: Chef Eric Enciso Cárdenas

My dear friend Darrell Schmidt (left) with Eric Enciso Cárdenas, who for several years was part of his father's wait staff at Restaurante Mario's at Lake Chapala. Eric was probably sixteen years old in this snapshot. Photo courtesy Jackie Shanks.

A few weeks ago, it was Mexico Cooks!' enormous pleasure to dine at a golf ball driving range. "A what?" you might well ask. "What did you eat, hot dogs on a roller-grill?" Oddly enough, the Hole in One driving range has become the hot spot for superb food at Lake Chapala. Even odder, the exciting and innovative chef is a young local man whom I've known since he was ten years old.

The two faces of the Hole in One: fine dining combined with a driving range. Makes perfect sense to me. Photo courtesy THIS.

Eric grew up in a restaurant family. His father, my camarada Jaime Enciso, is head of the wait staff at Restaurante Mario's in San Antonio Tlayacapan, one of the small towns strung like beads along the north shore of Lake Chapala. His mother, Alicia Cárdenas, is the pastry cook for the same restaurant and a caterer in her own right. Eric hung at out the restaurant from the time he was no taller than the tables, and started working as a waiter when he was about eight or nine years old. Nevertheless, when asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, the answer was always, "A doctor."

Looking north toward the mountains from the Hole in One. Photo courtesy THIS.

As the saying goes, life is what happens while you're making other plans. Eric's mother wanted something different for him. She suggested that he try culinary school instead of medical school. Eric balked, but he gave in and after finishing high school, he was accepted by the Universidad de la Ciénega in Guadalajara to study a four-year licenciatura en gastronomía (similar to a bachelor's degree). "At first I didn't like it at all," Eric said. "It was just book study about things that didn't really interest me, like nutrition and history. I didn't think it had anything to do with cooking or with me. I stayed with it, though, even though I was bored."

Crema de elote al tequila terminada con reducción de pétalos de rosa (cream of corn and tequila soup with a swirl of rose petal reduction), on the September 20, 2010 Hole in One evening menu. Photo by Mexico Cooks!.

After about a year of study, Eric was seriously injured, run over by a car in Guadalajara. During the six months he spent in bed following the accident, he continued to study his books. When he was finally able to return to the university classrooms, he said, "I really threw myself into it. Something had changed.

"I was in school in Guadalajara from mid-afternoon till late evening every day, but I was still driving back and forth and living at home here at the lake. I needed to work at night to help with my expenses, so I went to the restaurant called Number Four [in Ajijic, another of the Lake Chapala north shore towns] to see if they needed any help. The chef there asked me a lot of questions and decided that I knew absolutely nothing about cooking. He was right."

Ensalada de conejo salteado al ajo, lechugas orgánicas, fresas, pitahaya y nueces con una vinagreta de vinagre balsámico (salad with rabbit sautéed in garlic with a mix of organic lettuces, strawberries, dragon fruit, and nuts in balsamic vinegar dressing. Photo by Mexico Cooks!.

"In spite of my not knowing anything about preparing food, the chef offered me a huge break. He gave me hands-on lessons in everything. The first thing we did was line up all the fresh herbs he used, from cilantro and epazote to basil, oregano, parsley and rosemary, and he made me memorize how they looked, how they smelled, and how they tasted. When I knew those things, he started with spices: curry, ginger, allspice, nutmeg, everything! Which is this one, which is that one! It was an entire hands-on education that put me far ahead of my schoolmates, who were still studying just from books.

Rack de cordero con jalea de menta servido sobre puré de papa perfumado de trufa y ejotes franceses salteados (rack of four lamb ribs, grilled with select herbs, served over truffle-scented mashed potatoes and sautéed French green beans. With mint jelly. This main dish was perfectly prepared, beautifully presented, and entirely memorable. Photo by Mexico Cooks!.

"So many wonderful opportunities have been offered to me. I worked with every extraordinary chef who passed through the kitchen at Number Four, and I learned from them to prepare exotic cuisines of many countries. When I finished my licenciatura, I had much more real-life restaurant experience than the other members of my generación (graduating class). And most important, I realized that I was truly meant to be a chef. Every day is an adventure in taste, in innovation, in preparing something to widen your eyes and your horizon of what food can be.

Rib-eye "Premium Beef" marinado en romero y ajo, a la parilla con salsa de cebolla-Nebiollo, servido sobre puré de papa al parmesano, espárragos, y col Bruselas salteados (ribeye marinated in rosemary and garlic, grilled and served with red wine onion reduction, served over Parmesan mashed potatoes, sautéed asparagus spears, and Brussels sprouts. I thought this was the least successful dish of the evening and even it was delicious. Photo by Mexico Cooks!.

"I love to experiment, love to bring new touches to traditional cuisines. For example, the restaurant just offered a two-night special event in honor of Mexico's 2010 Bicentennial. The menu was completely de vanguardia y de autor (avant garde and the chef's personal creations), but everything was prepared with traditional Mexican ingredients. My assistants and I prepared the crema de elote that you just ate, a tamal filled with rabbit and huitlacoche (black corn fungus) and bathed with yellow mole, a local-ingredients salad, fish rolled with hoja santa with two salsas, locally-grown quail stuffed with figs, plums, and pumpkin seeds in a hibiscus-chile sauce, and pork medallions stuffed with requesón (a cheese similar to ricotta), huauzontle (a green vegetable), hoja santa, and other totally traditional pre-Hispanic herbs served in a sauce made of sour cactus fruit and agave syrup.

"Few of the foreigners who ate here during the Bicentennial fiestas knew what they were eating, since most of them are only familiar with standard Mexican fare like tacos and enchiladas. But the nearly 600 people who ate our food on those two nights asked so many questions about the delicious things they tasted–'what is this, why did you use that, where does this come from'–and they loved it all. Best of all, they went away with a different appreciation of what Mexican food can be. Obviously this is not comida casera (home cooking). Instead, it's the first time real alta cocina mexicana (Mexican haute cuisine) has been offered here at Lake Chapala.

Granita Hole in One: duo de guanábana y tuna morada con vino Zinfandel (two sorbets, one of soursop (right) and the other of purple cactus fruit with Zinfandel). Photo by Mexico Cooks!.

"The most important thing to me is to take my cooking from the base of Mexico's traditional ingredients. The foods that were here thousands of years before the Spanish arrived have mixed with Spanish, French, and Asian influences since the 16th Century. It's tremendously exciting to me to be a young chef in this epoch, bringing my own ideas into the context of existing cuisine. I can hardly wait to get into the kitchen every workday."

Creme brulée flavored with lemon grass and vanilla, served with locally grown blackberries. Photo by Mexico Cooks!.

And what does Mexico Cooks! think about this young chef? If you live at Lake Chapala, if you are anywhere in that vicinity, if you are planning a trip to Guadalajara, GO!–hurry to experience Chef Eric Enciso Cárdenas while he is still in the kitchen at the Hole in One. It won't be long before someone from a more elegant room in a bigger city steals him away. His culinary genius and his incredible joy in his profession make him my pick for who to watch in the Mexican kitchen in 2011.

Mark my words, world.

Looking for a tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click here: Tours.

9 de October de 2010
The Michoacán Kitchen: A Wealth of Memory

This traditional Mexican kitchen dates to the early part of the 20th Century.

Home cooking for you might be your mother's macaroni and cheese. For my
friend Shana it's her grandmother's potato latkes, for Danny it's the
fond memory of his Aunt Ethel's apple crumble. And for me? For the last 30 years, my taste buds and heart have been drawn by the smells and
flavors of the Michoacán home kitchen.
The first kitchen fragrance that fills my memory is that of pine wood
burning in the clay stove centered in the mountain kitchen. One note
behind the wood smoke is the scent of beans boiling in a clay pot, and
the fragrance chord is finished by a top note of tortillas toasting on
the clay comal (a
large flat clay griddle). The home kitchen closest to my heart belongs
to Débora, my friend who lives at more than 9500 feet above sea
level, about two-thirds of the way up the highest mountain in Michoacán.

Thick, handmade Michoacán blue corn tortillas baking on a clay comal.

When I visited Débora at home for the first time, my entire notion of
how a house looks was turned upside down. My friend Celia (Débora's
sister) had invited me to travel home with her for two weeks:"Ven conmigo a mi tierra, a conocer a mi mamá,"
she said. ("Come with me to my hometown, to meet my mother.") Thirty years ago, we
traveled for 52 hours, from Tijuana to what I often tease Débora as being el último rinconcito del mundo
(the last little corner of the world), by train and by three different classes of bus. The last 27 kilometers of the
trip (approximately fifteen miles) was a jolting three hour ride in a converted school bus, on an unpaved road. You read that
right: three hours to drive fifteen miles. We were traveling on a dirt road that wound nearly
straight up the mountainside.

From the bus stop in front of the mayor's office we walked two blocks up another hill and opened a
small door in a long wall. We walked up three wide slate steps into a dirt
patio—and the house? I looked around, wondering where the house was.

Outdoor kitchens like this one are still common in Michoacán's rural areas.

I could see one room with a door (the bedroom, I found out later,
complete with three rope beds and their corn husk mattresses), and
a sitting-eating-sewing-talking room that had only three walls and
was open to the air. The kitchen was a tiny room with an opening
but no door to close. That was the entire home.

Looking around, I saw chickens picking and scratching all over the dirt floor of the central patio, the pila

(a single-tap cold water concrete sink used for washing clothes and dishes), an
outdoor beehive clay oven, a path that I later discovered led to the
outhouse, and a tiny, elderly woman wrapped in a rebozo
(typical shawl) sweeping with a broom made of twigs: Celia's mother.
Flowering trees and shrubs surrounded the patio; enormous dahlias in
all colors blessed the wildness of the garden.

Tired from the long trip, I was soon put to bed at Aunt Delfina's house next door.

Early, early the next morning, I stuck my head out the spare
bedroom door and saw mist hanging among the mountains. I sniffed
the clean scent of pine smoke in the chilly air. A hint of coffee fragrance
followed, and the toasty corn smell of freshly handmade tortillas
cooking. I dressed and went to see what Débora was doing next door in
that tiny kitchen.

The metate y mano (three-legged volcanic stone grinding stand and its rolling pin) have been in use since centuries before the Spaniards arrived in the New World.

Débora was outside, standing near an outdoor stove made of a vertical oil drum. She was grinding
nixtamal (dried
corn prepared for making dough) on a metate (grinding stand) and patting out tortilla
after tortilla, placing them onto the clay comal on top of the stove to cook. We smiled buenos días
to one another and she gestured to offer me a fresh hot tortilla. I ate
it eagerly and excused myself and went to peek into the kitchen.

What I saw astonished me. In the center of the dim windowless kitchen
was a rectangular stove made of clay, plastered over and colored deep
brick red.

The four burners were six-inch diameter holes on top of the stove.
Below each burner hole was a long horizontal compartment for inserting
and burning split pine wood. The center chimney took most of the smoke
out through the roof.

Wooden shelves holding dishes and clay cooking pots hung on the neatly
whitewashed walls. On a low
ledge, several kinds of fresh and dried
chiles were piled on reed mats. A few cobs of dried corn, a plate of
fresh pan dulce,and
some fruits I didn't recognize were arranged on a small wooden table.
Above my head, aged woven reed baskets filled with foodstuffs—dried
corn, flour, coffee, a bag of beans—hung from smoke-blackened beams.

A votive candle burned in the corner near a small print of Our Lady of
Guadalupe. A jelly glass filled with garden dahlias graced the tiny
altar. A steaming clay pot of beans for the midday meal burbled on a
stove burner.

Typical bean pots made in Capula, Michoacán. If you need one, just tell the vendor the weight of the beans you usually cook: half a kilo, a kilo, or more at a time. The vendor will show you a pot of the correct size.

I gazed at this amazing kitchen with awe. There were no modern
conveniences at all, not even a sink or refrigerator. As I stared, Celia
stepped in and smiled at me. "This is the way the kitchen has been
since long before I was born," she said. "My great-grandmother cooked
here, my grandmother cooked here, my mother cooked here, and Débora and
I learned to cook here. All that we know of the kitchen is from here."
She gestured to encompass the tiny space.

"How does Débora keep food like milk and leftovers cold?" I asked.

Celia thought for a minute. "The milkman comes on his horse
every morning and sells her just what she thinks she'll need for the
day. He dips the milk out of his big metal milk can with a liter
measure and pours it into one of her clay pots. If there's a bit left
over at the end of the day, she gives it to the cat or she mixes it with really stale
tortillas for the pig.

The local butcher sells Débora exactly the quantity of meat she needs to prepare each day's comida (main meal of the day). In Mexico's small towns, a red flannel flag hanging on a pole outside the shop is the indication that the butcher has freshly-butchered meat.

"Débora only buys enough meat for today, and it's always meat that is recién matada
(butchered today). The meat that's killed and wrapped in plastic to be
sold in the big markets—who knows how old that is! It never tastes as
good as today's freshly cut meat.

"Then if there is food left over from la comida (the
midday meal), we eat it for supper later. If there's still a little
left, she gives it to the pig. Nothing goes to waste. And if she buys a
few limones (Mexican limes), she buries them in the ground to keep them fresh."

"What else will you teach me while I'm here?" I asked.

Celia shook her head. "This time you just watch and pay attention. Next time you can try your hand in the kitchen."

Many of the traditional recipes from Michoacán have their roots in the Purhépecha culture. Corundas, uchepos, minguiche, churipo—the first two are types of tamales, the third is a cheese dish and the fourth a soup—are just-post-Conquest Purhépecha recipes and are only a few of the many dishes that make Michoacán's cuisine extraordinary.

There are other Mexican recipes that, while not unique to Michoacán,
have strong ties to the state. There are some recipes which you may
want to try to duplicate in your home kitchen. If you're not able to
purchase all of the ingredients you need for these recipes, buy a
ticket instead and come to taste the cuisine of Michoacán in its
natural habitat. I'd be glad to take you on a food-tasting adventure.

Queso Cotija (cheese from Cotija, Michoacán) is aged–like fine wine–before being sent to market.

Many recipes from Michoacán include both corn and cheese,
cornerstones of the daily diet. Corn is one of Mexico's native grains
and Mexico, especially the state of Michoacán, is famous for its
cheeses. Cotija
(coh-TEE-hah), a town in Michoacán, has given its name
to the aged cheese used for topping refried beans and other dishes. If
you can't find it in your grocer's cheese case, you can substitute
another aged, crumbly cheese.

Chiles are also an important part of the Michoacán diet. Nearly all of the
fresh and dried chiles available everywhere in Mexico are found in the
state, as well as at least one variety that grows almost exclusively in Michoacán,
the chile perón. Chile perón
is approximately the size of a golf ball and is bright yellow to orange
in color. It has black seeds, a fruity flavor, and is extremely hot. On
a scale of one to ten, it registers about an eleven!

The beautiful and muy picante (very spicy!) chile perón is used extensively in the cuisine of Michoacán. It's also known as chile manzano–and is the only chile in the world with black seeds.

The corunda is a traditional Michoacán tamal that can be made
either with or without a filling. These are made with a cheese and mild
chile filling and are served with cream and a spicy salsa.

Corundas Michoacanas (Michoacán Corn tamales)

For the corundas:
3 kilos masa (corn dough) (if there is a tortillería near you, buy it there)
2 cups water
1 kilo (2.2 pounds) pork lard or vegetable shortening
5 Tablespoons baking powder
Salt to taste
30 fresh green corn stalk leaves (NOT the dried corn husks sold for ordinary tamales)

For the filling:
1 kilo queso doble crema (similar to cream cheese, which you can substitute)
1/2 kilo chiles poblanos, roasted, peeled, seeded, and cut into strips 2" long by 1/4" wide

Preparation:
With a large wooden spoon, beat the corn dough and the water together for approximately 30 minutes. Set aside.

With another large wooden spoon, beat the lard until it is spongy. Add
the beaten dough to the lard, together with the baking powder and the
salt. Continue beating until, when you put a very small amount of the masa in a cup of water, it floats.

Take a fresh corn stalk leaf and place three tablespoons of dough on
the thickest side of it. Make a small hollow in the dough and put a
tablespoon-size piece of the cheese and three or four strips of chile in the
hollow. Cover the cheese and chile strips with another three tablespoons of
the dough. Fold the corn stalk leaf over and over the dough until it
has the triangular shape of a pyramid.

Continue making corundas until all the dough is used.

Put three cups of water in the bottom of a large steamer pot or tamalera. Use the rack that comes with the steamer pot to hold the first layer of corundas. Place all the corundas
in the pot, cover, and bring to a boil. Lower the heat so that the
water is actively simmering but not boiling. Be careful during the
steaming process that the water does not entirely boil away; check this
from time to time. Put a coin or two in the bottom of the tamalera; as the water boils, the coins will rattle. When you no longer hear the rattle, add more water immediately.

Allow the corundas to steam for one hour and then
uncover to test for doneness by unwrapping one to see if the dough
still sticks to the corn stalk leaf. If it still sticks, steam for
another half hour. When the leaf comes away from the dough without
sticking, the corundas are done.

Salsa:
1/2 kilo (1 pound) tomates verdes (called tomatillos in the United States), husks removed
6-8 chiles perón (substitute chiles serrano if necessary), washed
1 small bunch fresh cilantro, washed
Sea salt to taste

Wash the tomatillos until they are no longer sticky. Fill a large saucepan half full with water and bring to a boil. Add the tomatillos and the chiles and boil until the tomatillos begin to burst open. With a slotted spoon, remove each tomatillo from the pot. When all of the tomatillos are in the blender, add the chiles
to the blender. Cover and blend at a low speed until the ingredients
begin to chop well, and then stop the blender. If your blender has a
removable center piece in the cover, add the cilantro little by little
through that hole as you turn the blender back on to 'liquefy'. If the
cover has no center hole, add some cilantro, blend, stop, and add more
cilantro until all is blended. Do not chop the cilantro too finely, as
you want flecks of it to help give the salsa both color and texture.
Add salt to taste and stir.

To serve the corundas:
Unwrap a corunda and place it in a shallow soup bowl. Spoon unsweetened heavy cream over the corunda and top with several spoonfuls of the salsa.

Making any sort of tamales (including corundas)
is hard work and is always more fun if you can plan to do it with a
friend or two. Let the kids help, too. Make a party of it, with the big
reward—the eating—at the end.

A corunda with salsa and crema, served by Doña Ofelia at her stand near the Basílica de Nuestra Señora de la Salud (Our Lady of Health) in Pátzcuaro.

There will be plenty of corundas left over for everyone to take some
home for the next day. It's easy to reheat them. Just leave them
wrapped in their corn stalk leaves when you put them in a plastic bag
to refrigerate them. Then when you're ready to reheat, place as many as
your microwave will hold in a Pyrex dish. Cover them with paper
toweling and microwave on high until they are hot throughout. They're
just as good left over and they also freeze well.

Looking for a
tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click here: Tours.

2 de October de 2010
Santa Clara del Cobre: : Michoacán Ferias y Fiestas Pueblerinas 2010 :: Small-town Michoacán Fairs and Festivals 2010

Hand-hammering the finish in a Santa Clara del Cobre copper workshop. Many of the copper artisans' tools are made by the men themselves in order to meet the specific needs of their work.

Death fights a bull at the parade for the 2010 Feria Nacional del Cobre (National Copper Fair).

Carros alegóricos (parade floats) pulled by ox teams represented the stages of crop growth. This one is called "siembra del trigo"–sowing the wheat.

This carro alegórico represents la milpa (the corn field).

Michoacán's governor, Leonel Godoy Rangel, crowns Berenice Saucedo as the 2010 Reina del Cobre (Copper Queen).

La reina Berenice (center) and her two princesas Citlali graciously posed for Mexico Cooks!. Yes, both princesses were coincidentally named Citlali. Note the tiny copper pitcher on the top of the queen's scepter–and the copper crowns and jewelry made just for the occasion.

La Reina Berenice and her princesses, Citlali Nuñez and Citlali Maldonado, rode through the parade crowd in this cart.

Other floats were built on trucks. Unión de Artesanos Pito Pérez (a copper workers' union) decorated this truck bed with the typical roof of a troje (Purhépecha building), tissue paper flowers, and handmade garlands of huinumo (pine needles).

In addition to copper, woven textiles are part of the artisan culture of Santa Clara del Cobre. Weavers and their looms rode the parade route on this flatbed truck.

Coliman, with acres of orchards near Santa Clara, produces huge quantities of Hass avocado, better known in Michoacán as oro verde (green gold). This truck, decorated for the parade and loaded with crates of avocados, barely fit on the narrow main street of town.

This flatbed float is dedicated to Don Vasco de Quiroga, who arrived in Michoacán in 1531 and worked with the indigenous population to raise the quality of artisan work made in this region. Click on any photo to see detail.

After the floats passed by, the parade treated the crowd to local men and boys on dancing horses.

Gorgeous!

And after the horses, heroes of Mexico's 1810 struggle for independence marched by–here, Padre Miguel Hidalgo, who gave the initial grito (cry) for independence on the night of September 15, 1810.

Other men from Santa Clara represented foot soldiers from Mexico's 1910 revolution. The instant after I snapped this photo, the man in the red shirt jovially pointed his mock-up gun at me!

In the traditional copper workshops of Santa Clara, wood fires are still made to blaze with a hand-and-foot operated bellows.

Incredibly complex and beautiful copper artistry comes from this elegant copper shop. The glowing copper pots, on the left are hand enameled with monarch butterflies (a symbol of the state of Michoacán). The dark finish on the pots in the foreground is entirely natural, not applied. Each pot is hand-hammered from a solid ingot–each pot is seamless.

The shirt tells the story: 'los artesanos en Michoacán trabajan' (the artisans of Michoacán work).

Join Mexico Cooks! at the August 2011 Feria Nacional del Cobre. Email me for dates!

Looking for a
tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click here: Tours.

25 de September de 2010
My Sweet Mexico: Recipes for Authentic Pastries, Breads, Candies, Beverages, and Frozen Treats

Fany Gerson's new cookbook, My Sweet Mexico, is hot off the press and selling like pan caliente (fresh hot bread). You know you can't live without it!

The postman rang the bell at Mexico Cooks!' house today and caught me in the middle of roasting and peeling the last of a batch of chiles poblanos for our comida (midday meal). Mildly annoyed at the interruption–peeling chiles is a messy job and I just wanted to be done with it–I accepted the package. My annoyance instantly turned to joy and delight: Fany Gerson's long-awaited new cookbook, My Sweet Mexico, was in my hands at last.

Frutas cristalizadas (candied fruits), a wonderful standby of the traditional Mexican candy kitchen.

The publication date for My Sweet Mexico was scheduled to coincide with the 2010 celebration of Mexico's Bicentennial and gives even more reason to celebrate. I, for one, am ecstatic. The book is a huge accomplishment: beautiful to look at, written with love and fond remembrance, and clear as the call of the tzintzontle (Mexico's nightingale) for ease of use. My Sweet Mexico brings Mexico's traditional pastries, breads, candies, sweet beverages, and frozen treats into the home kitchens of the English-speaking world.

Cocadas (toasted coconut candy), one of the easy-to-follow traditional recipes in My Sweet Mexico.

Fany Gerson, a native of Mexico City, graduated from the Culinary Institute of America, the foremost cooking school in the United States. Her work as a pastry chef includes stints at three-star restaurant Akelare in Spain, Eleven Madison Avenue in New York City, and Rosa Mexicano (also in New York City), where she prepared a hugely popular new menu of deliciously modern Mexican desserts. A well-known food writer, her work has been featured in Gourmet magazine, the New York Times, Fine Cooking, and other top spots.

My Sweet Mexico brings us recipes for no fewer than seven kinds of tropical-flavor ice creams, a rainbow of easy-to-prepare sorbets, and three kinds of pure fruit paletas (ice pops).

Publisher's Weekly has this to say about My Sweet Mexico: "Rare is the cookbook that successfully infuses scholarly research with the pure joy of food, but this collection, focusing on the sweets of Mexico, nails it…American readers who have only encountered the occasional tres leches cake in a Mexican restaurant will be stunned by the breadth and depth of recipes here, ranging from coffee-flavored corn cookies to guava caramel pecan rolls and hibiscus ice pops, all culled from Gerson's family, friends, and generous strangers."

Tejocotes en almibar (a fruit similar in size and shape to small crab apples, cooked in syrup) are traditional during early winter, the season when the fruit ripens in Mexico.

Rick Bayless (author of Mexico: One Plate at a Time) waxed poetic: "Mexico’s sweet kitchen is a wellspring of captivating tastes and seductive textures; it courses through Fany Gerson’s veins like caramely cajeta, like a rich flan, or a silky hot chocolate…This is a treasured volume I’ll own two copies of: one for home, another for our restaurant’s kitchens."

Fany's recipe for macarrones (sweet milk fudgy logs) could easily be shaped and wrapped in festive, colorful tissue paper, as are the candies in the center of the photo. What a perfect party favor!

Limones rellenos de coco (limes stuffed with sweetened coconut) are slightly bitter, very sweet, and altogether satisfying.

Roberto Santibañez (author, Rosa's Mexican Table) echoed my feelings exactly: "My Sweet Mexico is fascinating and charming—it is much more than a collection of great recipes. Fany takes readers on a voyage through our country’s marvels and realities, capturing all of its fabulous grandeur with her clever scene of humor. I actually got teary-eyed as Fany’s words carried me on a sweet trip back to my childhood, full of heartwarming memories. I love this amazing cookbook; it is an enormous addition to the archives of Mexican cooking!"

Fany's recipe for traditional mueganos (sticky, sweet, crunchy dough balls) came from a mutual friend, José Luis Curiel Monteagudo. When it comes to antique recipes for candy and other sweets, Professor Curiel is the most knowledgeable person in Mexico.

Few cookbooks have elicited this sort of visceral response from other chefs and food writers. Fany's anecdotes that precede each recipe take us back to an almost forgotten time in Mexico, a time when the sweet smell of caramelizing sugar, simmering seasonal fruit, cinnamon-scented chocolate and woodsmoke wafted from kitchens all over whichever Mexican town we happened to be living in. Santibañez's tears welled up in my eyes, too, as I read Fany's classic recipe for ate de membrillo (quince paste) and was plunged into the old memory of how I learned its preparation in a convent kitchen in Tijuana. In my mind's eye, I can still see Sister María Luisa stirring, stirring, and stirring the quince and sugar until, with her sixth sense of a lifetime of kitchen experience, she pronounced the ate to be al punto–ready to pour into its molds.

Fany's pastry repertoire includes an easy-to-follow recipe for conchas (shells), one of the most common (and delicious) forms of pan dulce, a sweet bread to eat for breakfast or a light supper. When you make them, serve your conchas with a cup of Mexico's foamy, cinnamon-laced chocolate caliente (hot chocolate).

My Sweet Mexico is destined to be a classic of the Mexican kitchen. In my opinion, it's the best single cookbook published in 2010. World, take note: look for My Sweet Mexico on the short-list for all the cookbook awards. Get your copy now: simply click on the book cover just to the left; it will take you to Amazon.com to buy My Sweet Mexico. If you love Mexico, if you love Mexico's kitchens, if you love sweets of any kind–this is a two-thumbs up, marvelous tour of remembrance, love, and most of all, extraordinary deliciousness. Mexico Cooks! is simply wowed.

Pan de muertos (dead man's bread)! The bread dough is flavored with orange and the knobby top represents bones. November 2 is Día de los Muertos (the Day of the Dead)–order your copy of My Sweet Mexico now, in time to honor your deceased relatives and friends by making this marvelous bread. Just click on the book cover at the top of the left-hand sidebar–you'll be taken to the Amazon.com page to order My Sweet Mexico.

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18 de September de 2010
Mexico’s Bicentennial Celebration of Independence: September 15, 2010

The official logo for Mexico's bicentennial and centennial celebrations–yes, both are being celebrated this year.

Mexico's rich heritage and history reach back thousands of years. It's hard to grasp the reality that Mexico is just now celebrating its bicentennial, and even more difficult to hold onto the idea that we are also celebrating our centennial. The bicentennial of what, and the centennial of what? What does it all mean?

Padre Miguel Hidalgo, whose 1810 cry for freedom from Spain set the fight for independence in motion. His original banner bearing a likeness of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe (Our Lady of Guadalupe) is part of Mexico's historic patrimony.

Mexico's struggle for freedom from Spanish colonization began
sometime between midnight and dawn on September 16, 1810, when Father
Miguel Hidalgo gave the Grito de Dolores (Cry of Dolores) from
the parish bell tower in the town known today as Dolores Hidalgo,
Guanajuato. Mexico celebrates its Fiestas Patrias (Patriotic Holidays)
on September 16 with parades of school children and military battalions,
politicians proclaiming speeches, and general festivity.

Flag sellers' carts blossom all over Mexico for the two or three weeks before Independence Day.

Hundreds of books have been written about Mexico's break from Spain,
millions of words have been dedicated to exploring the lives of the
daring men and women who knew, a bare 200 years ago, that the time had
come for freedom. You can read some of the history on the Internet. Another excellent source for Mexican history is The Life and Times of Mexico, by Earl Shorris. You'll find that highly readable book available on the left-hand side of this page. Just click on the book cover to order it from Amazon.

For well over a year, Mexico has been covered with these road signs and others that are similar–to the point that several tourists have asked Mexico Cooks!, "Why are all the highways here called Route 2010?"

In addition to the bicentennial of the beginning of independence from Spain–the original ruta a la independencia–Mexico is also celebrating the 100-year anniversary of the 1910 Mexican revolution. That armed uprising was led by Francisco Madero to protest the long presidency/autocracy of Mexico's President Porfirio Díaz. The roots and facets of the 1910 revolution are complex and the outcome was equally complex. Mexico's Constitution of 1917, which still embodies Mexican law, actually predates the end of the revolution, which many historians peg to 1920. Nonetheless, civil conflict continued to erupt in Mexico until nearly 1930.

Francisco Madero (standing in car waving hat) arriving in Cuernavaca, June 1912. Photo courtesy Wikipedia. Click on any picture for a larger view.

This bandera monumental (monumentally-sized Mexican national flag) waves over one of the highest points in the city of Morelia. In 1999, former Mexican president Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León initiated the program of oversize flags made to fly over some of Mexico's historic cities. These enormous flags generally measure more than 14 meters high by 25 meters long and fly from 50-meter-high flagpoles.

The balcony of Mexico City's Palacio del Gobierno (government office building). On the night of September 15, President Felipe Calderón will stand on the balcony to give the annual grito (shout) that replicates Padre Hidalgo's rallying cry for independence. In every Mexican town, no matter its size, the elected official will also give the grito during that night.

Mexico City's metropolitan cathedral and the zócalo (main square) with its bandera monumental, ready for Independence Day festivities. The 2010 verbena patria (patriotic festivity) in the nation's capital promises to be extraordinary, in keeping with the idea of the bicentennial.

The preparations for the 2010 bicentennial celebration have been enormous, and enormously expensive. In Dolores Hidalgo, Guanajuato, where Hidalgo gave the 1810 cry for independence, the budget for the celebration is more than 550 million pesos. At today's exchange rate, that figure is equivalent to approximately 42 million United States dollars. In Morelia, considered to be the cradle of independence–it was in this city, then called Vallodolid, that the independence conspiracy was developed–the budget is a paltry 28.5 million pesos (a bit over two million United States dollars). Many Mexicans are thrilled with the bicentennial party plans, while many others are outraged at this huge expenditure that comes at a time when Mexico is suffering not only an economic but a political and psychological crisis.

A tiny kiosko (bandstand) in a small-town plaza in the state of Jalisco, decorated for its Fiestas Patrias.

Today, Mexico is as it has always been: a country of profound contrasts. Life parties with death in 2010 just as much as it did in 1810 and 1910. The road behind us and before us is littered with confetti and spent shell casings. Our continuing task is to find la ruta a la independencia (the path to independence).

José Guadalupe Posada (1851-1913), La Calavería.

Viva México! Qué viva!

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11 de September de 2010
The Mexican Flag on Your Plate: Chiles en Nogada for Independence Day
Chiles en nogada (stuffed chiles poblanos in walnut sauce), Pátzcuaro, Michoacán. Photo by Mexico Cooks!.

Mexico celebrates its independence
the entire month of September with parades, parties, and traditional
food and drink in restaurants and at home. The traditional festive dish
during the weeks before and after the Independence Day holiday is chiles en nogada, a magnificent tribute to the seasonal availability of granadas (pomegranates) and nuez (freshly harvested walnuts). From late August till early October, fresh pomegranates and walnuts make chiles en nogada possible. Spicy chiles poblano, stuffed with picadillo and topped with richly creamy walnut sauce and pomegranate seeds, flaunt the brilliant green, white and red of the Mexican flag.

This
festive dish is
traditionally served on September 15 or 16 in honor of Mexico's
Independence Day, though it is popular anytime in the late summer and
fall. During
August and September in the highlands of Mexico, particularly in Mexico
City and Puebla on the streets bordering the markets, village women can
be seen sitting on blankets painstakingly peeling off the brown skin
from each individual walnut. It is important to use the freshest
walnuts possible, as they produce such a creamy, rich sauce that it is
worth the effort demanded to peel them. Yes, the recipe is time-consuming…but you and your guests will jump up and shout "VIVA!" when they've licked the platters clean.

Ingredients

For the Meat
- 2 pounds beef brisket or other stew meat or 1 pound beef and 1 pound pork butt
- 1 small white onion, quartered
- 2 large cloves garlic
- about 1 Tbsp sea salt
For the Picadillo
- 4 Tbsp safflower or canola oil
- 1/3 cup chopped white onion
- 3 large cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
- 1/8 tsp ground cloves
- 3 heaping Tbsp raisins
- 1 or 2 chiles serrano, finely minced
- 2 Tbsp chopped walnuts or pecans
- 2 Tbsp chopped candied pineapple
- 1 fresh pear, peeled and chopped
- 1 apple, peeled and chopped
- 1 large potato, peeled and diced
- 3 large, ripe tomatoes, roasted, peeled and chopped
- sea salt to taste
For the Chiles
- 6 fresh chiles poblanos, roasted, peeled, and seeded, leaving the stem intact
For the Nogada (Walnut Sauce)
- 1 cup fresh walnuts
- 6 ounces queso doble crema or cream cheese (not fat free) at room temperature
- 1-1/2 cups crema mexicana or 1-1/4 cups sour cream thinned with milk
- about 1/2 tsp sea salt or to taste
- 1 Tbsp sugar
- 1/8 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1/4 cup dry sherry (optional)
For the Garnish
- 1 Tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley
- 1/2 cup fresh pomegranate seeds
Method

Cut
the meat into large chunks, removing any excess fat. Place the meat
into a large Dutch oven with the onion, garlic, and salt. Cover with
cold water and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Skim off any foam
that collects on the surface. Lower the heat and allow the water to
simmer about 45 minutes, until the meat is just tender. Take the pot
off the stove and let the meat cool in the broth. Remove the pieces of
meat and finely shred them.

Warm
the oil in a large, heavy skillet and sauté the onion and garlic over
medium heat until they turn a pale gold. Stir in the shredded meat and
cook for five minutes. Add the cinnamon, pepper, and cloves, then, stir in
the raisins, the two tablespoons of chopped walnuts. Add the chopped pear,
apple, and potato, and mix well. Add the tomatoes and salt to taste,
and continue cooking over medium-high heat until most of the moisture
has evaporated. Stir often so that the mixture doesn't stick. Let cool,
cover, and set aside. The picadillo may be made a day or two in advance.

Make a slit down the side of each chile, just long enough to remove the seeds and veins. Keep the stem end intact. Drain the chiles, cut side down, on paper towels until completely dry. Cover and set aside. The chiles may be prepared a day in advance.

At
least three hours in advance, put the walnuts in a small pan of
boiling water. Remove from the heat and let them sit for five minutes.
Drain the nuts and, when cool, rub off as much of the dark skin as
possible. Chop into small pieces. Place the nuts, cream cheese, crema,
and salt in a blender and purée thoroughly. Stir in the optional sugar,
cinnamon, and sherry until thoroughly combined. Chill for
several hours.

Preheat the oven to 250ºF. When ready to serve, reheat the meat filling and stuff the chiles until they are plump and just barely closed. Put the filled chiles, covered, to warm slightly in the oven. After they are thoroughly heated, place the chiles (cut side down)
on a serving platter or on individual plates, cover with the chilled
walnut sauce, and sprinkle with the cilantro (or parsley) and
pomegranate seeds.

This dish may also be served at room temperature, or it may be served chilled. It is rarely if ever served hot.

Photos 2, 3, 4, and 5 courtesy of Jesús Guzmán Moya, M.D., of Puebla, Puebla, México. Enjoy more of Dr. Guzmán's lovely photos here. Gracias, amigo Chucho!

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4 de September de 2010
San Francisco Pichátaro: Michoacán Ferias y Fiestas Pueblerinas 2010 :: Small-town Michoacán Fairs and Festivals 2010

At the 2010 XI Feria del Mueble Rústico y Textil Bordado (Eleventh Annual Rustic Furniture and Embroidered Textile Fair) in San Francisco Pichátaro, Michoacán, Hugo the canary is ready to hop out of his colorful cage to pull an envelope with your particular fortune out of a box filled with hundreds of others. Hugo and Luis's owner said that we should read the wee paper folded inside the envelope and then burn it–but don't tell a soul what it says or "tu suerte no se haga realidad" (your fortune won't come true). Canarios de la suerte (fortune telling canaries) have been popular in Mexico for long, long years.

Just outside the atrium wall of Pichátaro's Templo de San Francisco de Asís (Church of St. Francis of Assisi), the carnival rides await the evening's crowd.

A finely cross-stitched guanengo, the blusa típica (traditional blouse) worn by Michoacán's Purhépecha women. This guanengo was for sale, but we didn't ask the price.

Hand-carved wooden angels play the harp and lute.

A baúl (chest) sits on its matching stand. All of the furniture pieces pictured in this article were awaiting judging in the annual concurso (competition).

Detail of chest of drawers, San Francisco Pichátaro 2010.

These hand-made plastic mice, for sale by their creator Apolinar Aguilar Bovadilla, are filled with candy and cost 10 pesos apiece.

Three cuates (buddies) from Michoacán sell blankets, belts, and cacahuates (peanuts) by the bag.

Miguel Martínez has been selling home-made cocadas (coconut candy) for the last eight years. He laughed when I asked if they were made in his home. "No, but they're made in somebody's home!" The yellow cocadas at the top of the photo are flavored with rompope (similar to eggnog); the white and brown cocadas are flavored with vanilla and cajeta (similar to butterscotch); the cocada in the foreground is sweetened and flavored with one of Mexico's dessert-making standbys: La Lechera sweetened condensed milk.

Pichátaro's Templo de San Francisco de Asís, interior. Photo by Mexico Cooks! from the 2009 fiestas; the crowd was so densely packed this year that we could not see inside the church.

In the churchyard, St. Francis patiently awaits the burning of the castillo (set-piece fireworks), pictured in part at the left. The paper tubes are filled with gunpowder. The men who were putting the finishing touches on the castillos said they would be burned at about eleven o'clock at night–nearly twelve hours from the time we arrived at the fiestas. Much as we wanted to wait, we had to leave.

We watched part of the two-hour concurso de tallado en vivo (live competition for woodcarving) for a while. Hands, tools, and chips flew as the young men worked their designs.

This double bed headboard and its two accompanying nightstands riveted the attention of everyone who saw the pieces. Titled "Siembra" (Sowing), the set was carved by Maurilio Morales Goche. While Mexico Cooks! was talking with the artist's mother, the fabulous bedroom set was deservedly honored with the first place ribbon in the 2010 carving competition. Enlarge any of the photos for a close-up look.

"Siembra" headboard detail with mature ears of corn and bird.

"Siembra" headboard detail with flowers, corn leaves, and hummingbird.

A slice of pastel de fiesta (fiesta cake) is essential to make the party complete. Always dyed in garish colors (Mexico Cooks! is partial to the florescent pink), the cake is layered with thick atole (in this case, made stiffer than pudding and dyed in colors to contrast with the cake). The beautiful little girl in the background is Flor García Aparicio, age three, daughter of the vendor.

Next year you'll have to come along with us to San Francisco Pichátro for the fiestas patronales (patron saint's feast days). You can't miss the furniture, or the fun…or the cake.

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28 de August de 2010
Mexico Cooks! in Tepoztlán and Cuernavaca…Heaven!

Tepoztlán's Restaurante El Ciruelo is the perfect setting for a leisurely mid-afternoon comida (main meal of the day), for drinks and botanas (snacks), or simply for coffee and dessert with friends.

Betty Fussell, Rondi Frankel, and I spent a warm, sunny Monday morning shopping in Tepoztlán's street market around the main town plaza. We didn't make any major purchases, but we had a terrific time looking at all the clothing and artesanía (arts and crafts) available at the booths. Suddenly all three of us were hot, tired, and more than anything, famished. Betty suggested that we head for Restaurante El Ciruelo, so off we went, praying to San Pascual Baylón (the patron saint of the kitchen) that El Ciruelo was open on Monday. It was!

At El Ciruelo, open every Monday, you will enjoy a beautiful setting as well as a marvelous meal. Our table faced lush green gardens with a backdrop of Tepozteco, Tepoztlán's craggy mountain.

We settled ourselves in the covered central open area of the restaurant and studied the menu. Everything sounded terrific and we wanted it all. Reason prevailed, however, and we limited ourselves to ordering a couple of appetizers, a sopa seca, and a main dish, all served al centro–to share.

In Mexico, there are distinctions between sopas, the literal definition of which is soup: one type sopa is sopa aguada (wet soup), which can be caldo (broth), consomé (consomme), or crema (cream soup). In rare instances, sopa aguada is called just sopa: Sopa Azteca (Aztec soup) or Sopa Tarasca (Tarascan soup) are two examples.

The second type sopa is sopa seca, which, to the foreigner, doesn't seem like 'soup' at all. Sopa seca refers to standard Mexican-style red rice, espagueti o macaroni con crema (spaghetti or macaroni served with cream sauce), or fideos, a thin pasta more like vermicelli than any other kind of pasta.

The three of us shared two appetizers: left, an absolutely delicious quesillo (Oaxaca cheese) wrapped in hoja santa and bathed in a light and subtle lemony sauce and top, pastel de elote (corn cake) served drizzled with crema (Mexican table cream) and sprinkled with rajas de chile poblano (strips of poblano chile).

Clockwise from the left, our platillo fuerte (main dish) included cecina de Yecapixtla (seasoned, grilled beef), served with black beans and slathered with crema and salsa, the sopa de fideos (garnished with sliced avocado) that we ordered separately, and guacamole garnished with squares of chicharrón.

We relaxed at El Ciruelo for nearly an hour after finishing our delicious meal, enjoying the breezes, the view, and one another's company.

Restaurante El Ciruelo
Calle Zaragoza #17
Barrio La Santísima
Tepoztlán, Morelos, México
Tel: 739.395.1203

If you'd like to try preparing sopa de fideos at home, Mexico Cooks! prepares it like this:

Sopa de Fideos Estilo Mexico Cooks!
Serves 3 or 4 as a side dish. It's a great change from rice or potatoes.

Ingredients
200 g pasta de fideos, either long or short (I prefer La Moderna brand, but any brand will do)
1 chile serrano, finely minced*
1/2 small white onion, finely minced*
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
2 cups boiling water
1 Tsp tomato bouillon powder (Knorr Suiza or other)

*Both of these may be omitted if you prefer.

In a heavy medium-size sauté pan, heat the vegetable oil and sauté the minced chile and onion over a medium flame until they are translucent. Add the pasta de fideos and sauté until the pasta is light golden brown.

Add the two cups of boiling water and the tomato bouillon powder. Stir until the powder is well dissolved.

Cover and simmer until the pasta has absorbed almost all of the water. Serve.

One of several elegant and formal terraces at Las Mañanitas.

Rondi Frankel, who grew up in Mexico City and its environs, wanted to introduce me to Hotel and Restaurante Las Mañanitas, a favorite childhood haunt in Cuernavaca. Betty, who had celebrated a birthday at Las Mañanitas just a few days before our visit, was eager to go back again.

A tray of botanas (salty snacks) served with drinks at Las Mañanitas. That's my paloma in the foreground. A paloma is prepared in a tall glass with tequila, jugo de limón (lemon juice), salt, and grapefruit soft drink, over ice. It's such a light and refreshing drink.

Once he realized that we were suckers for his looks, this irresistible beggar ate all of our botanas, first out of our hands and then right out of the dishes on the tray–peanuts, pepitas (squash seeds), and even the potato chips!

The pair of guacamayas (green wing macaws) at Las Mañanitas were much more photogenic than the three of us friends.

A gorgeous arched interior passageway at Las Mañanitas. The precisely manicured grounds, home to exotic birds both feathered and human, are also home to original bronze sculptures by Francisco Zúñiga.

One of the feathered type.

Another view of the gardens at Las Mañanitas. This mid-20th Century hotel has 20 guest rooms or suites, a restaurant a pool, a spa, and many other high-end amenities.

Las Mañanitas
Calle Ricardo Linares #107
Cuernavaca, México 62000
USA Tel: 01.800.789.4988

After more than a couple of hours' relaxation while bewitched by the old-style Mexican elegance that pervades Las Mañanitas, we reluctantly tore ourselves away and headed home to a more modern kind of Mexican elegance at Betty's borrowed heaven-on-earth pied a terre in Tepoztlán. What a blessed life!

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21 de August de 2010
Mexico Cooks! Explores Tepoztlán with Betty Fussell

The view is from an upstairs bedroom at Betty's hideaway. Tepoztlán's jagged cliffs and crags are said to hide the secret birthplace of Quetzalcóatl, the omnipotent plumed serpent god of ancient Mexico. Tepoztlán, just 90 kilometers south of Mexico City, is a popular weekend getaway for harried capitalinos hungry for respite from the big city.

A little while ago, Mexico Cooks!' friend Betty Fussell emailed: "I'll be in Tepoztlán for a few weeks this summer, can you come to visit? Rondi's coming…" Never one to pass up a visit with these marvelous women, I answered instantly: of course! Not only was I eager to spend time with Betty and our mutual friend Rondi Frankel (highly respected wine connoiseur, sommelier, and former public relations director for Monte Xanic winery), I had never been to Tepoztlán. I couldn't imagine better company for my initiation into the mysteries of this enormously popular destination.

Midsummer roses graced a table at the house in Tepoztlán.

We had no sooner arrived and gotten our luggage into the house than we were out the door and up the cobblestone streets to the renowned Tepoztlán Sunday market. Rondi parked the car, we all hopped out–and Tlaloc, the rain god, immediately made his presence felt. What a downpour! We sloshed our way to the market, laughing all the way.

Betty, wet through but undaunted, savors her esquite.

We took temporary refuge from the storm under the lonas (tarps) that almost-but-not-quite cover the outdoor sections of the Tepoztlán Sunday market. While we waited for the downpour to slow, we all devoured delicious esquites–fresh, tender corn (either on or off the cob) simmered in water seasoned with epazote and chile de árbol, then slathered with Tepoztlán's famous crema (thick table cream, very similar to France's creme fraiche), finely grated cheese, and more chile muy picante, this time powdered.

Squash blossom vendor. Photo courtesy Roset Claes.

After picking our way down the crowded aisles of the market, we stopped for another bite. It was too late in the day for tlacoyos (a delicious corn dough-based snack)–all of the market fondas were out of the special masa (corn dough) used to prepare them–so we each ordered a quesadilla. Betty and Rondi had theirs with flor de calabaza (squash flower) and I had mine with papas y rajas (potatoes and strips of roasted chile poblano). After finishing our second tidbit of the afternoon, we gave up our near-swim through the market and headed for dry clothes and the warmth of home.

From the 1530s Codice Borboni: a drawing of Tepoztécatl, god of pulque. A whitewashed pyramid built to honor him sits atop the mountain called Tepozteco.

Tepotzlán is legendary home not only to Quetzalcóatl but also to Tepoztécatl, one of the several gods of pulque (Mexico's prehistoric alcoholic beverage made from the fermented juice of maguey cactus). The town is a land of both mystical and historical significance. Set in rugged mountains nearly 6000 feet above sea level, the area around Tepoztlán is believed to hold deep spiritual powers, concentrated in an energy vortex similar to that said to exist at Taos, New Mexico. Near the town, archeologists have found pottery and other artifacts dating to as early as 1500 BCE.

Today, Tepoztlán is partly a traditional Mexican town and partly a foreign artists' colony. Population is approximately 33,000, swelling enormously as hordes of primarily Mexican tourists arrive for weekends and holidays. Homes ranging from the most humble and tumble-down to the sort featured occasionally in Architectural Digest line the cobblestone streets twisting up and down its hills. Green-leaved sub-tropical trees and glorious flowers create bowers of beauty at every turn.

Tepoztlán's Ex-Convento de la Natividad, founded in the 16th Century by Dominican missionaries.

Local tradition at the Ex-Convento includes a mural on the church's arched entry wall, freshly re-created each year in September by local artists. The mural, made entirely of seeds, depicts symbols of pre-Hispanic history and tradition.

Pre-Hispanic family life, depicted in seeds on the entry wall at the Ex-Convento de la Natividad.

Pre-Hispanic symbol of the rabbit in the moon from the 2009 seed mural.

Broken 18th Century bells, removed from the towers at the Ex-Convento de la Natividad. The weight of the bell on the far right is indicated in arobas [sic], a unit of measure equivalent to approximately 15 kilos. Click on any photo for an enlarged view.

Hats for guests hang on a hall tree at the lovely home where Betty, Rondi, and Mexico Cooks! enjoyed time together.

We three spent part of a hot, sunny Monday browsing through the street stands and shops in Tepoztlán's central market. Clothing from the Mexican states of Oaxaca, Chiapas, Guerrero as well as neighboring Guatemala included Oaxacan and Guatemalan huipiles, regionally-made huaraches, hats, and fine linen or cotton guayaberas from Guatemala for men. As in most of Mexico's tianguis (street markets), merchandise at the market in Tepoztlán ranges from produce and meats to CDs, DVDs, and toys, and from flowers to fondas (food booths serving regional specialties).

Cecina de Yecapixtla, Tepoztlán.

The local meat specialty is delicious and hugely popular cecina de Yecapixtla, a type of thinly-sliced beef. The fresh beef is cut from the legs of steers into long, wide, thin strips. The men who train to cut cecina apprentice for as long as two years to learn the correct method. A single beef strip, properly cut, can measure up to 20 meters long. After cutting, the meat is seasoned with salt, allowed to dry slightly in the sun, and rubbed with pork lard. Cooked over a charcoal fire or briefly sautéed in a frying pan, cecina is tender and extremely flavorful. It's commonly served with black beans and crema.

Other local food specialties are tlacoyos and itacates, both of which we left for our next trip to Tepoztlán. There was only so much time and so much room in our stomachs!

Next week: Lunch at El Ciruelo in Tepoztlán, and a relaxing afternoon with the peacocks at Las Mañanitas in Cuernavaca.

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14 de August de 2010
Templo de Santiago Apóstol: Tupátaro and the Painted Churches of Michoacán

Originally published on April 11, 2009. A few weeks ago, a small tour group of Belgian women asked Mexico Cooks! to take them to visit this fabulous church. I thought you might also like to visit it again.

The simple whitewashed facade of Tupátaro's templo (church) of Santiago Apóstol (St. James the Apostle) belies the intense beauty inside. Note the pale-purple orchids blooming in the tree at the left.

The evangelization of Michoacán's Purhépecha tablelands, where many of the state's largest group of indigenous people live, was realized during the 16th and 17th centuries. Religious and secular orders who came to New Spain during the earliest part of the Spanish Conquest worked ceaselessly to convert the native peoples to Christianity. In the 16th Century, Franciscan and Augustinian priests worked together with the first bishop of Michoacán, Don Vasco de Quiroga, creating 'hospital-towns' all along a route through the mountains and valleys of Michoacán. Today, that route is still known as 'La Ruta de Don Vasco'

Bishop Vasco de Quiroga, an intellectual student of Thomas Moore's Utopia, saw in the area that is now the state of Michoacán an ideal place to put Moore's social theories to work. In Michoacán, Quiroga found a thriving crafts-driven economy, a well-developed and organized community, and the opportunity to lead the indigenous to higher and higher goals of barter and commerce. Although Vasco de Quiroga had already founded a similar 'hospital' in Mexico City, he invested his entire life in perfecting the idea throughout Michoacán's Meseta Purhépecha.

The retablo (altarpiece) in Santiago Apóstol is made of carved wood covered with 23.5 karat gold leaf. The six paintings in the retablo, painted by a single artist in the 17th Century, are oil on canvas.

Michoacán's pueblos hospitalarios ('hospital-towns') were evangelized in a manner unlike that in other regions of New Spain. The term 'hospital-towns' refers to the founding of towns specifically for the purpose of offering hospitality to the stranger and religious education as much as physical care for the sick. Each of the several pueblos hospitalarios was built along similar lines: they included a convent, a church dedicated to a particular patron saint, a smaller chapel dedicated to the Immaculate Conception, and a huatápera (meeting place), which was the actual hospital and travelers' hostel. The huatápera was the heart of the complex and the church was its soul.

Religious architecture in the Purhépecha towns was characterized by the use of adobe brick and mortar walls and carved volcanic stone entryways. The roofs were originally made of tejamanil (thin pine strips) which were later covered with clay tiles. The jewel of the interior of the simple churches was the high ceilings. Either curved or trapezoidal, the entire wooden ceiling was profusely hand-painted by indigenous artists with images of the litanies of Mary and/or Jesus, with angels, archangels, and apostols. They are filled with symbols of medieval European Christianity adapted to the perspective of the native Purhépechas. Serving as decoration, devotion, and education in the faith, these churches and their ceilings, along with their finely detailed carved retablos (altarpieces), are some of the greatest artistic treasures of the region. Today, they are still an important part of the Route of Don Vasco.

El Señor del Pino (The Lord of the Pine), 18th Century crucifix venerated on the altar in Tupátaro.

For years, Mexico Cooks! has been fascinated with the Templo de Santiago Apóstol (Church of St. James the Apostle) in Tupátaro, Michoacán. The tiny church was founded by Spanish Augustinian missionary priests who arrived either with or soon after Don Vasco de Quiroga. Under the careful conservatorship of Mexico's INAH (Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia), Santiago Apóstol is one of the small 16th Century churches in Michoacán that has been restored to its original glory. Frequently called the Sistine Chapel of the Americas, Santiago Apóstol of Tupátaro is one of the most important early churches of Mexico. INAH recently honored Mexico Cooks! with permission to photograph and write about this national treasure.

The highly revered statue of Santiago Apóstol (St. James the Apostle) stands at the left side of the church altar. Built on a platform made to be carried on townspeople's shoulders, the statue processes solemnly through Tupátaro every year on the saint's feast day.

The 500-year-old wood-plank floors, built over crypts, creaked as we entered the church and walked toward the altar.

Rays of sun semi-illuminate the six oil paintings of the retablo (altarpiece): the crowning with thorns, the flagellation, the way to Gethsemane, the prayer in the garden, the adoracion of the Magi, and, high above the rest, Saint James the Apostle on his horse. The angels on either side of Santiago Apóstol have mestizo (mixed race) faces; all six paintings were created by the same hand. The sense of antiquity and reverence are palpable in this early New World church.

Detail of alterpiece sections Santiago Apóstol (St. James the Apostle) and La Adoración (Adoration of the Magi).

The classic baroque carved wood columns of the retablo, covered with 23.5 carat gold leaf, are adorned with bunches of grapes, mazorcas (ears of corn), granadas (pomegranates), and the whole avocados which represent this region of Mexico. In addition, sculptures of four pelicans decorate the altar. The pelican, with its young pecking at its breast until blood flows from its flesh, is an early Christian symbol of Christ who nurtures his church with his blood.

Detail of the life-size pasta de caña crucifix, Templo Santiago Apóstol, Tupátaro. Pasta de caña, unique to the central highlands of Mexico, is made from corn stalk pulp mixed with paste from orchid bulbs. Shaped around a wooden or bamboo armature, the paste is allowed to harden. It's then carved, covered with gesso, and polychromed.

On the right of the altar stand carvings of the four evangelists: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. On the left are four Doctors of the Church: St. Gregory, St. Augustine, St. Jerome, and St. Ambrose.

The wooden bóveda (arched) ceiling, entirely hand-painted by indigenous serfs in the 18th Century, is the most spectacular feature of the church. The paintings include the Passion of Christ, twelve mysteries (stories to meditate) of the lives of the Virgin Mary and Jesus, 33 archangels holding Christian symbols (one archangel for each year Christ lived on Earth), and other religious and secular symbols.

This archangel carries the three nails used to hang Christ on the cross.

Each of the archangels wears distinct clothing, has a unique face, and different wings. Each stands on clouds. In the photographs, you can see that the lower sections of each panel are flat against the wall; the next two or three panels form the beginning of the boveda, and the higher panels curve against the ceiling. Each individual archangel panel measures three to four meters high; together they span both sides of the length of the church, from entrance to altar.

This archangel carries a Christian flag.

This archangel carries a sponge on a pole and a vessel filled with vinegar. When Christ said, "I thirst,", as he hung on the cross, he was given vinegar to drink.

La Anunciación (The Annunciation), one of the mysteries of the life of the Virgin Mary. The angel is telling her that she will be the mother of God.

La Ultima Cena (The Last Supper), a mystery of the life of Christ. The food on the table is food found in this region of Mexico.

La Resurrección (the Resurrection).

The panels showing the mysteries of the life of Christ begin at the front of the church and move toward the altar; the panels showing the mysteries of the life of the Virgin Mary begin at the altar and move toward the front of the church. Watermelons painted on the beams between the panels represent the blood of Christ.

This panel is positioned directly over the altar. In the center is a dove, the symbol of the Holy Spirit.

The ceiling panels and other paintings were painted directly on wood, using tempera paint made with egg yolks. Vegetable and earthen dyes color the 18th Century paints, which have held up very well for nearly three hundred years.

The front panel of the altar, unique in the world, is made of pasta de caña, linen, cotton, and silver leaf. The dedication inside the oval reads, "Se hizo este frontal par al el Santísimo Cristo del Pueblo de Tupátaro a espensas de sus devotos y dando sus limosnas siendo Eusebio Avila año 1765." ("This altar front was made for the Most Holy Christ of the people of Tupátaro at the cost of his devoted followers and giving alms, being Eusebio Avila year 1765.") The panel was recently restored by Pedro Dávalos Cotonieto, a local sculptor who specializes in pasta de caña.

The tiny church has an exquisitely beautiful museum. Juan Cabrera Santana, the church caretaker and our exceptionally knowledgeable guide, showed us its treasures.

Sixteenth century saint, Museo Santiago Apóstol.

La Santísima (The Holy Virgin Mary), fresco, Museo Santiago Apóstol.

Tupátaro, Michoacán town plaza.

Mexico Cooks! is grateful to INAH (the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historio) and to Juan Cabrera Santana for their kind permission and guidance in bringing the Tupátaro Templo de Santiago Apóstol to our readers.

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7 de August de 2010