Author: typepadtowordpress

Albóndigas de Pollo en Salsa Verde :: Chicken Meatballs in Green Sauce, doña Yola Style

Several years ago, Mexico Cooks! was thrilled to meet doña Yolanda Rodríguez Orozco. At the time, she was working at a now-defunct buffet restaurant in Morelia, Michoacán. In Mexico, 'doña' is an honorific indicating true respect for a woman (it's don for a man). Affectionately known to one and all as doña Yola, she cooked with tremendous love as the primary seasoning for whatever she put on the table.

One of the most delicious items on the menu at that restaurant was Albóndigas de Pollo en Salsa Verde (chicken meatballs in green sauce). Because I promised that I would share the recipe with all of you, doña Yola graciously shared her amazingly easy recipe with me. Simple to prepare and marvelous to taste, these meatballs instantly made it to star status on our dining table.

A chicken vendor grinds fresh chicken breast to order at the weekly tianguis (street market) in our neighborhood. You can ask the butcher at your supermarket to grind the breasts for you.

Gorgeous dark green vitamin-rich spinach, ready to chop for the albóndigas.

Fresh hierbabuena (mint) grown in a pot on our terrace or available at any market, along with beautiful fresh local eggs.

Albóndigas de Pollo en Salsa Verde Estilo doña Yola
Chicken Meatballs in Green Salsa, doña Yola's Way

Ingredients for the meatballs
1 kilo (2.2 lbs) freshly ground chicken breast
100 grams (more or less 1/4 lb) raw fresh spinach (stems removed), finely chopped
1 small white onion, finely minced
1 clove garlic, finely minced
1 Tbsp fresh mint, finely minced
1 chile serrano, finely minced
1/2 cup cooked white rice
3 eggs, lightly beaten
1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
Sea salt to taste
Freshly ground pepper to taste
1 tsp cornstarch or as needed

Ground chicken, spinach, onion, garlic, mint, and chile serrano, ready to mix with cooked rice.

Procedure
Lightly mix the first seven ingredients together. Beat the eggs and Worcestershire sauce together and mix by hand into the mixture. Add sea salt and ground black pepper to taste. Add cornstarch until the mixture holds together well when you form a small amount into a ball. Form the mixture into balls approximately 2" in diameter. Makes 20 albóndigas. Plate the meatballs in a single layer (Mexico Cooks! likes to re-use well-washed biodegradable meat trays from a supermarket for holding the albóndigas), then cover and refrigerate until ready to cook.

Tomates verdes (you probably know them as tomatillos) and chiles serranos for preparing salsa verde. Remove the tomatillos' papery husks and wash the sticky tomatillos thoroughly.

Ingredients for Salsa Verde
10-12 tomatillos (known in Mexico as tomate verde), husks removed
3 or 4 whole chiles serranos
1 bunch fresh cilantro, largest stems removed
Sea salt to taste

Procedure
In a large pot of water, bring the tomatillos and chiles to a full rolling boil. Boil just until the tomatillos begin to crack; watch them closely or they will disintegrate in the water.

Using a slotted spoon, scoop the cooked tomatillos and chiles into your blender jar. There's no need to add liquid. Cover, hold the blender cap on, and blend until smooth. Be careful not to burn yourself, this is a hot mixture and tends to react like lava in the blender. Don't ask me how I know this.

While the blender is running, remove the center of its cap and, little by little, push the cilantro into the whizzing sauce. Blend just until smooth; you should still see big flecks of dark green cilantro in the lighter green sauce. Add sea salt to taste and stir.

Pour the salsa into a 2-quart pot. Add the meatballs and bring to a simmer. Cover and allow to simmer for about 30 minutes. Mexico Cooks! prepared six meatballs for our comida (main meal of the day), but two meatballs apiece were plenty for the two of us. We ate the leftovers (and another two meatballs) the following day. We froze twelve raw meatballs without salsa for subsequent meals.

Albóndigas de pollo en salsa verde, plated with white rice cooked with carrots, Mexican style.

Mexico Cooks! is so grateful to doña Yola for sharing her recipe with us. These albóndigas de pollo are not only easy to prepare and very healthy (with high vitamin K and beta carotene content and no added fat), but they are also absolutely delicious.

Provecho!

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24 de July de 2021
A Few of Mexico’s Old Favorite Herbs–and Some You Might Not Have Met Yet

Fresh hierbabuena (mint) growing in a Morelia friend's garden.

The cuisines of Mexico–and you know that there are many different regional cuisines–are a fantastic amalgam of indigenous corn-based food preparations with an overlay of Spanish ingredients, a strong influence of Moorish flavors, and a lagniappe of French artifice from the mid-to-late 19th Century. There is no one cuisine in this big country, although some popular dishes are found in every region. Not every cook prepares enchiladas with the same list of ingredients; tacos, although ubiquitous in Mexico, can be different at every crowded taco stand.

Mexico Cooks! stores garlic in this 3" diameter wire basket, hanging from a cup hook on the side of a cupboard. Circulating air keeps the garlic fresh for quite a while.

Mexican canela (cinnamon), for sale in a Oaxaca market. Mexican cinnamon sticks (actually grown in Sri Lanka and imported to Mexico) are usually about two feet long and, unlike the short, hard, nearly flavorless cinnamon sticks sold outside the country, are easily broken into the length piece you need for a recipe. Grind it into horchata (usually a chilled rice drink), use it to flavor a comforting, sweet and hot atole (a thick corn drink), or use it for traditional seasoning in arroz con leche (Mexican rice pudding). Naturally there are many other Mexican recipes that require canela.

Many of the herbs and spices that you use in your own kitchen are also used in the Mexican kitchen. Garlic, cinnamon, oregano, and thyme are in widespread use here. Cumin, cloves, and mint show up frequently. Lemon grass, which we usually think of as an ingredient in Thai or Vietnamese dishes, is commonly grown in many parts of Mexico and is used to make tea.

A good part of the differences in the regional cuisines of Mexico is each region's use of herbs. Some of those herbs are completely unknown to those of us whose familiarity with Mexican food stops with Pepe's Taco Hut on Main Street, USA. Pepe, whose mother's family emigrated to the USA from the Mexican state of Hidalgo, prepares the restaurant's platillos fuertes (main dishes) from recipes passed down from his abuelita (grandmother), who lived for 97 years in the same Hidalgo village. He's adapted those recipes to include the ingredients he can find in the States and to the palates of his customers.

This herb, a large-leafed, strong-flavored, and fuzzy variety of oregano called orégano orejón (big-ear oregano), is unusual even in Mexico. Mexico Cooks! once had a pot of it, but the plant has unfortunately gone to the great beyond. I'd love to have another pot of it.

Standard oregano is quite common in Mexican cooking. It can be used either fresh or dried. A small pot of oregano in a sunny spot of your kitchen garden will usually be plenty for all your cooking needs. If you live in a place where the growing season is short, harvest oregano periodically through the summer, tie the stems in small bunches, and hang upside down in a dark place to dry. It dries very fast and retains most of its aroma and flavor. Discard the stems and store the crisp leaves in an airtight, lightproof containers.

Because the growing season in many parts of Mexico is almost year-round, I can always cut a fresh sprig of oregano or two to use when making spaghetti sauce, pescado a la veracruzana, (fish prepared in the style of Veracruz) or other tomato-based sauces. I wash the sprigs and either strip off the leaves into the pot or put the entire sprig into the sauce for seasoning.

In Mexico, albahaca (basil) is used primarily in Italian restaurants and pizza shops, although Genovese basil is all but unknown here. However, Mexican basil is widely grown and used in an unusual way: many small businesses put a pot of growing basil just outside the front door to their shops. Why? The creencia (belief) is that a flower pot filled with an albahaca plant will draw clients and money to the business.

Romero (rosemary). This non-native herb is used very little in Mexico's cuisines. However, some 'modern Mexican' chefs are making cold rosemary infusions to be drunk either before or with a meal.

The Mexican kitchen uses a wide range of other herbs. The Spanish names read like a mysterious litany: epazote, estragón, hoja santa, hierbabuena; comino, clavo, and romero. In English, they are (in order) wormseed, tarragon, holy leaf, mint, cumin, cloves, and rosemary.

Epazote grows wild all over Mexico and in parts of the United States. Several months ago I paid ten pesos (approximately 50 cents USD) at a tianguis (street market) for a pot of it to plant in my garden. As I was carrying the pot home, my neighbor, doña Mago, saw me and exclaimed, "Porque compraste eso?" ("Why did you buy that?").

"Well, you know" I answered, "I like it to cook in my beans, to make quesadillas, for the flavor—"

"No, no, no, amiga!" she cried (always looking out for me), and pointed a finger toward the corner. "It grows up through the cracks in the sidewalk just down the street. You should have asked me to show you where to find it. You could have saved your money. When I want some, I just go over there and cut a piece." It's true. When I was out for a walk the next day, I noticed for the first time the epazote plant she had mentioned.

Regardless of my profligate waste of ten pesos, I do like to cook a big sprig of epazote in a pot of beans. The herb is originally from Mexico and Central America. The indigenous language name that was given to epazote is derived from the Nahuatl words 'epti' and 'zotle': the combined word means 'skunk sweat'. As you can imagine, the herb has a very strong and distinctive flavor. According to Mexican kitchen lore, epazote also has anti-flatulent properties, which is why it might be smart to add it to the boiling bean pot.

Veracruz-style tamal ready to wrap in its hoja de plátano (banana leaf)–the leaf is the flat, dark green part under the masa (corn dough). Carmen Titita Ramírez Degollado, owner of the El Bajío restaurant chain in Mexico City, was giving me instructions on how to make this style tamal.

Banana leaves are used for wrapping meats to prepare barbacoa (southeastern Mexican barbecue, cooked in a pit) and for wrapping and flavoring tamales from Veracruz and Oaxaca, in southeastern Mexico. Another plant used to give uncommon seasonings to Oaxacan cuisine is hoja de aguacate (avocado leaf). You won't be able to run right out to your nearest Safeway or HEB store to find either of these. If you live in an area where there's a large Asian population, you'll find packages of frozen banana leaves in any well-stocked Asian food market. As for avocado leaves—well, the only avocado leaf that gives anise flavor to a dish is aguacate criollo, a kind of avocado native to Mexico and doesn't grow elsewhere. Unfortunately there's no seasoning substitute for them; the standard Hass avocado leaf has no flavor.

Hoja santa (holy leaf) is also known as acuyo.

Hoja santa is used extensively in Mexican cooking. It's a large, heart-shaped leaf that comes from a tall, bushy plant—a plant that will take over the garden space that it's planted in and then some, if you let it. It's a native of Mexico and has medicinal properties as well as seasoning uses. The flavor of hoja santa is reminiscent of anise, and it combines exceptionally well with fish or chicken.

As you can see, Mexican home cooking is far more than tacos and enchiladas. The more unusual kitchen herbs of Mexican cuisine add intense flavor without adding that blast of spiciness that we have so often mistaken for the only seasoning of Mexico.

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17 de July de 2021
What’s in Season in Mexico’s Markets This July?

At the Mercado de Sonora in Mexico City, this gigantic freshly cut squash looks more like a huge flower. The squash, an extremely hard-shelled variety known as calabaza de Castilla (Castilian squash), was approximately two feet in diameter! Behind it are plátanos machos (plaintains). The squash, carefully cut in half to show its beautiful flesh and seeds, is resting on taro root rhizomes.

Those of you who live somewhere outside Mexico and are enjoying seasonal fresh fruits and vegetables right now might be surprised to learn that even in Mexico, where the growing season can be year-round, there are times when it's the season for (insert name of item here) and we all rush to buy what's new in our markets. Whether Mexico Cooks! shops at a tianguis (street market), at an enclosed municipal market, or at a modern supermarket, seasonal fruits and vegetables are must-haves–otherwise, they won't be back in the markets till next year.

The most recently arrived seasonal fruit for summer 2021 is the tuna (prickly pear cactus fruit). Available by the ton from late June until sometime in September, the tuna is considered to be Mexico's national fruit. It even appears on Mexican flag! You can see how it grows: that's a nopal cactus paddle, with tunas growing around the outside edge. More are piled up in the boxes. The spiny, thick green peel encloses a marvelous fruit.

Here's a tuna that I just peeled. Peel-and-eat, seeds and all. Cut the ends from the tuna, make a lengthwise slit down one side of the skin, and with your fingers, simply pull the skin away from the flesh. Chilled, the sweet, crisp tuna flesh is as refreshing as watermelon–and similarly textured. A longtime friend of mine, don Baldomero (QEPD), used to tell me, "Cristina, chickens eat little stones to help their digestion. We Mexicans eat tunas!"

Can you even believe it? The cool, refreshing rainy season in central Mexico means wild mushrooms! The season is just beginning. I bought these glorious fresh morels at a municipal market where I often take touring foodies. Women from small towns in mountainous areas around Mexico City forage for these and other mushrooms (chanterelles and lobster mushrooms, anyone?) and sell them at local markets. These morels were so inexpensive (80 pesos the kilo–about $4.00USD) that I bought a kilo (2.2 pounds) and gave half to my neighbor.

What you may know as lobster mushrooms (Hypomyces lactifluorum) are called trompa de puerco (pig snout) here in central Mexico. Contrary to its mushroom name, this is actually a fungus that attacks a kind of wild white mushroom, deforming it into the delicacy you see in the picture. These do sometimes appear at farmers' markets in the USA, but prepare to pay through the snout for them: upwards of $30.00USD per pound. Here, they're a tenth that price.

These enormous just-cut flor de calabaza (squash blossoms) appear in Mexico's markets as the plants are setting their fruit. The Purépecha indigenous woman in the photo has brought her flowers to sell on the street in Paracho, Michoacán. Tidbit of information: only the male blossoms are cut for eating; the female flowers, notable by the spherical beginning of a squash at the base of each flower, are left on the vine to bear fruit.

Mangos! It's still mango season in Mexico, and the varieties are many. These are Paraíso (aka Hayden): about five inches long and plump as can be, the flesh is tender, sweet, and incredibly popular as a snack. Mangos are the most-cultivated fruit in the world, with India leading the way in mango cultivation!

Here's a ready-to-eat mango-on-a-stick, offered by a street vendor in Pátzcuaro, Michoacán. Spritzed with a little jugo de limón (juice of the Key lime), sprinkled with a big pinch of salt, and dusted with crushed, dried, red chile–absolutely marvelous. People in Mexico look forward all year long to the several months of mango season.

July is also papaya season. This variety, the usual one that we see in Mexico, is the Carica papaya–otherwise known as the Maradol. Ranging in size from about eight inches long to a jumbo-size foot and a half, the Maradol papaya has very thin orange skin, meaty, deep orange flesh and usually a zillion firm black seeds, each about half the size of a small pea. Eat this fruit any time: diced for breakfast, in a smoothie, or accompany your comida (main meal at midday) with a refreshing agua fresca de papaya–a papaya fruit water.

Limón criollo: Mexico's small spherical 'native' limones are known in the United States as Key limes. These limones aren't really native to Mexico; they originated in Asia and were brought here by the Spanish nearly 500 years ago. Available all year and used ubiquitously for everything from squeezing onto fresh fruit to squeezing into your bowl of caldo de pollo (chicken soup) to spritzing onto your hands for slicking down your head of unruly hair, these green to greenish-yellow limones are available all year long. July is their peak season, though. Their flavor is completely different from either the lime OR the lemon; oddly enough, neither Persian limes (the large oval green ones) nor Eureka lemons (the large oval yellow ones) are grown for the fresh fruit market in Mexico. Once in a great while we see them imported.

Last, the sandía (watermelon). Available all over Mexico and in season right this minute, the sweetness of the fruit is as refreshing as a cool shower. Native to somewhere in Africa–there's lots of controversy about where–and over 5000 years old, Mexico's watermelon is grown primarily in this country's western and eastern coastal states.

Fresh mango, papaya, and watermelon, ready to be seasoned just the way you like them.

Here in Mexico, many tropical fruits are eaten sprinkled with salt, crushed, dried red chile pepper, and a squirt or two of limón. If you've never tried it this way, you'll be surprised at how this multi-level flavor combination changes a standard sweet fruit experience to a rush of OH MY GOODNESS! in your mouth. Many years ago, when my elderly mother visited me in Mexico, I presented her with an already-seasoned breakfast plate of fresh ripe-picked pineapple from Veracruz, ripe-picked strawberries from Michoacán, ripe-picked papaya from Chiapas, and field-ripened cantaloupe from Mexico's west coast. Always an adventurous eater, she gobbled it right down and sighed in contentment. She said, "Cristina, I've never really understood tropical fruit before. It needs all those seasonings to make it just perfect." My mother was right.

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10 de July de 2021
The Perfect Ending to Your Meal :: Gelatina, the Most-Eaten Dessert in Mexico

Three-dimensional flowers made of gelatin, by my friend Irene Martínez. Irene creates these flowers inside a square or circular shape–each petal formed by injecting a gelatin of a different color into the main shape. Her work is almost too beautiful to eat!

Whether you're having a midday meal at a traditional Mexican restaurant anywhere in the República or celebrating at a private party at the home of Mexican friends, you can be almost 100% sure that a prominent item on the dessert menu will be gelatins. Outside a schoolyard, students on break line up for a gelatin snack. As you browse the produce at any town's tianguis (street market) or elbow your way through the crowds at a fiesta patronal (patron saint's celebration), you'll see vendors selling plastic cups and glasses of—you guessed it, jewel-colored gelatin desserts. Gelatina is a shimmering sweet fact of life in Mexico, popular with young and old alike.

What is this Mexican obsession with a food that smacks of 1950s Middle America? Delight in gelatin desserts has been prevalent in Mexico for years; marketing experts here report that it's eaten daily in nearly 90% of Mexican homes. Mexicans consume more gelatin desserts than any other country in the world—three times the quantity of gelatin consumed in the United States alone. In restaurants, the dessert tray will almost always include a variety of gelatin desserts. When Señora Fulana (Mrs. So-and-So) is invited to a party at the home of her best friend, it's very traditional for her to take along a gelatin dessert, all fancied-up and ready for the admiration of the rest of the attendees. At a birthday party, the dessert of preference is rarely cake and ice cream. It's almost always a plate of cake and a jiggling serving of gelatin, which requires no refrigeration to maintain its shape.

There are far more ways to prepare gelatin desserts in Mexico than your mother's Jell-O™ mixed with fruit cocktail or shredded celery and carrots. Some of the desserts are prepared with water, some with milk, and some are prepared as a layered combination of both. Some are major productions involving hours of labor intensive preparation time.

My friend Sra. Abundis prepared this clear gelatina. It's approximately 15" in diameter and stuffed with fresh red and green grapes, canned pineapple, and peaches.

Sra. Abundis and Cristina prepared and painted this marvelous tiger gelatina for a child's birthday party.

Several months ago it was my task to prepare individual serving cups of gelatin for a two-year-old neighbor's birthday party—it seemed like I made hundreds. I thought it would be a complicated and difficult project, but it turned out to be quite a lot of fun. After asking another neighbor's advice, I learned that it's possible to buy powdered gelatin at any dulcería (candy store) or grocery store. The variety of available flavors is amazing: in addition to the ordinary strawberry, lime, and orange, I also found pistachio, almond, tamarindo, peach, and, of all things, sherry.

While I could have kept my project simple, I decided to get fancy. No single-flavor cups of gelatin for this party! I read the directions printed on each bag and learned to prepare this flavor with water, that one with milk. I combined a layer of strawberry (prepared with water) with a layer of pistachio (prepared with milk). Recklessly, I disregarded the instructions to use water to prepare the peach flavor and used milk instead, combining an opaque peach-flavored layer with a clear orange-flavored layer.

Commercially made in Guadalajara for sale in supermarkets, this three-layer single-serving gelatina includes a fruit layer (complete with a prune and its pit), a milk-based layer, and a clear layer. The gelatina comes with its own tiny yellow plastic spoon. These 200 gram gelatins are prepared with preservatives and artificial coloring. Each one costs 7.1 pesos, or 65 cents US.

Home-made layered gelatin prepared by Amanda Caputo, especially for Pride Month 2021!

It's so simple. Of course you can do this at home, even North of the Border. Just buy two different flavors of your favorite brand of gelatin dessert powder, some four-ounce plastic glasses, and have at it. Prepare one flavor and fill each glass to the half-way point. Refrigerate and allow that flavor to set. Prepare the second flavor, using either milk or water, pour it on top of the already jelled flavor, and refrigerate until set.

One traditional recipe is for Mousse de Rompope (eggnog-flavored gelatin dessert). It is so delicious that it bears repeating now.

Rompope (rohm-POH-pay) Mousse with Strawberry Sauce

The mousse:
2 envelopes of unflavored gelatin
1/4 cup water
1 cup heavy cream
2 cups rompope (Mexican eggnog flavored liqueur)
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 egg whites

In a small bowl, sprinkle the gelatin onto the water and let stand until absorbed, about five minutes. Meanwhile, heat the cream slightly in a small saucepan. (Do not boil.) Remove from heat and stir in the gelatin, mixing well to dissolve. Strain into a bowl; add the rompope and vanilla and mix well. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat the egg whites until they form stiff peaks. Fold in the eggnog mixture, and then pour into a lightly greased 1.5 quart ring-mold, bowl or specialty pan. Refrigerate at least four hours, preferably overnight.

Strawberry Sauce:
1 pound strawberries, stems removed
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon almond extract, anisette or Frangelica (hazelnut flavored liqueur)

Place strawberries, sugar and flavoring in a bowl and let stand for two hours. Purée in a blender, strain and set aside.

Just before serving, remove the mousse from its mold and drizzle with strawberry sauce. Garnish with slightly sweetened whipped cream. If desired, the mousse can be molded with a graham cracker crust.

The preparation of gelatin desserts has been raised to a fine art in Mexico. Special classes in gelatin preparation fascinate housewives and give rise to thriving cottage industry here. Recipes metamorphose from the relatively simple preparations in the preceding recipes to the most elaborate of flavor and design combinations. Recently, the craze for making individual clear gelatin desserts which contain flowers also made of gelatin has hit Mexico like a bombshell.

Flower gelatins like this one, made and copywrited by the Abundis family, are called gelatinas encapsuladas. The flowers are made with a syringe. Neither Sra. Abundis nor Cristina took classes in making the flowers, although many handicrafts schools and individuals offer those courses.

This week I was fortunate to spend some time with Sra. Abundis and her daughter, mi tocaya (my namesake) Cristina, who operate a small home-based business in Guadalajara. The Abundis family invited me to come watch and take pictures as they prepared special gelatinas for a child's birthday party. Mother and daughter have worked together for the last two to three years, preparing made-to-order gelatins for birthdays, baptisms, girls' fifteenth birthday parties, baby showers, engagement parties, and weddings.

The gelatina personality of the day was Spiderman. Cristina explained that the gelatin for the Spiderman mold and many more are milk-based, while other gelatins are water-based. Milk gives the gelatina a more nutritious aspect than does plain water and also makes Spiderman's features show up better after they're painted.

In the Abundis kitchen, Spiderman is fresh out of the mold. A selection of milk ingredients is lined up behind him, along with a small plate full of individual-serving Spiderman heads.

Sra. Abundis showed me the basic ingredients for the dessert; once the basics are assembled, they're flavored with vanilla. Spiderman is prepared with powdered milk. Other gelatinas are made with sweetened condensed milk or with evaporated milk. The Abundis family uses pure cane sugar and unflavored gelatin for its desserts. No preservatives are added. These home-prepared gelatinas must be consumed within 48 hours of their preparation.

Many fancy gelatinas are painted once they're chilled and set. Spiderman is no exception. The paints are special vegetable food coloring gel, manufactured here in Guadalajara.

Sra. Abundis watches closely as Cristina paints Spiderman's red base coat.

While Cristina painted, Sra. Abundis told me that when her relatives moved from Mexico City to Guadalajara in 1940, there was no gelatina in the city. Finally the relatives found a source–one stall at the Mercado Corona in Guadalajara's Centro Histórico sold it.

Cristina starts the initial work with black gel food coloring, outlining Spiderman's eyes. She holds a licenciatura (bachelor of arts) in graphic design from the University of Guadalajara.

"The gelatina has to be very cold in order to paint it," Cristina commented. "If it's not as cold and firm as possible, the paint will run." Spiderman stayed briefly in the freezer between coats of food coloring gel.

Spiderman's intricate thread work is complete.

I asked Sra. Abundis and Cristina which molds are most popular for parties. "Right now, Spiderman is the one all the kids want. Of course they also like Buzz Lightyear, Sponge Bob, all the Disney princesses, and Barbie. The old favorites like Winnie the Pooh, Mickey Mouse, and Tweetie Bird are always popular."

Josua Isai Abundis Linares, Cristina's nearly six year old nephew, participated eagerly in the time I spent with his family. He and I both anticipated our dessert: one of the individual Spiderman heads.

Cristina added, "For adult parties like weddings and baby showers, people want gelatinas encapsuladas, the ones with the flowers, to accompany their special cakes. And it's funny, the kids gobble down their gelatinas, but the adults want to save theirs. The flowers are so beautiful."

Cristina shows off the finished product: Spiderman in person! Sra. Abundis painted the blue base. The cost of this fantastic super hero is 130 pesos, approximately $11.50 USD.

"The people who ordered this Spiderman for their child's party will pick it up late this afternoon. The party is tomorrow." Cristina was happy that she finished the painting with no smears.

For dessert after your midday meal, for a snack or for a light supper, sweet wiggly gelatina satisfies every time. Cooling and slithery, a gelatina is just the ticket when you need a little something, but you don't want too much.

They knew what they were talking about, way back then, when they said, "There's always room for…"

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3 de July de 2021
Sanctuary of Jesus the Nazarene (Santuario de Jesús el Nazareno), Atotonilco, Guanajuato

The facade of the mid-18th Century Jesuit church in Atotonilco is simple. The interior of the church is astonishing. Built between 1740 and 1776, the Santuario is still visited and revered by religious pilgrims as well as by some visitors. Just a few kilometers from San Miguel de Allende, it's an easy day trip to stop in Atotonilco to view this church and then go to Dolores Hidalgo for more Mexican Independence history (and for the incredible range of ice cream flavors you find there!).

Several years ago, while Mexico Cooks! visited San Miguel de Allende, we took advantage of some free time to go to Atotonilco to visit the Santuario de Jesús el Nazareno (Sanctuary of Jesus the Nazarene), one of the best-kept secrets of central Mexico. In 1996, the church was added to the World Monuments Fund, and in July of 2008, UNESCO named the Santuario to its list of World Heritage sites.

The main altar in the Calvary Chapel, the largest in the church. Religious figures important to Christ's Passion give visual impact to the meditations of the faithful. A reliquary rests on the red cloth.

The Santuario is a mixture of European Baroque and New World Mexican decoration. It consists of a large church, and several smaller chapels, all decorated with oil paintings by Rodríguez Juárez and mural paintings by Miguel Antonio Martínez de Pocasangre. Inspired by the doctrine of St. Ignacio de Loyola, the founder of the Companía de Jesús (the Company of Jesus, otherwise known as the Jesuits), the glowing paintings and murals in the church served in the evangelization of Nueva España, where the indigenous spoke their own languages but could neither read nor write, and where the Spanish conquistadores knew little if any of the multiple languages they heard spoken in the new land.

St. John the Baptist pours baptismal waters over Jesus as a dove, symbol of the Holy Spirit, hovers above them. In the 18th Century, the Santuario also served as a retreat house for the Jesuits. Pilgrims still make week-long retreats at this church, praying in a chapel reserved just for their needs.

Judas Iscariot betrays Jesus with a kiss. Note the demon monkey on Judas's back. Every inch of the Santuario walls is covered with paintings of the many details, Biblical and apocryphal, of Jesus's life. Nearly all (or perhaps all–stories vary) of the murals were painted by Miguel Antonio Martínez de Pocasangre, a native of the area. He worked for thirty years painting the murals.

St. Cristopher carries the infant Jesus on his shoulder. Captain Ignacio Allende, for whom San Miguel de Allende is named, married María de la Luz Agustina y Fuentes in this church. It was here, on September 16, 1810, that Padre Miguel Hidalgo took up the standard of Our Lady of Guadalupe and bore it into battle at the beginning of the Mexican Revolution.

This side chapel, one of several at Atotonilco, is dedicated to Nuestra Señora del Rosario (Our Lady of the Rosary). The mirrors that surround the figure of Our Lady are painted with oils, probably by Rodríguez Juárez.

Detail of the chapel window.

Detail of the Marian litany in the Lady Chapel.

The Santuario has been in the process of restoration since 1997. Scaffolding still fills the church but detracts very little from the amazing paintings.

Off the beaten tourist track, the Santuario de Jesús el Nazareno will fill your eyes and heart with wonder. Let's plan a visit to see it together.

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26 de June de 2021
Caldo de Res, Otherwise Known As Cocido

A big pot of cocido, simmering last week in the Mexico Cooks! kitchen.

Nearly 40 years ago, long before the website Mexico Cooks! was a possibility–when I was just beginning to learn Spanish and some simple things about the totally-new-to-me Mexican kitchen, I would occasionally hear the word cocido from friends in Tijuana. I looked it up in my dictionary. I learned that cocido was the past participle for the verb cocer, to cook, or to boil. The dictionary gave this example: "Estoy a dieta, solo puedo comer pollo cocido." (I'm on a diet, I can only eat cooked [boiled] chicken.) OK! That was easy. But no, cocido isn't chicken. Back to the drawing board. For literally years I thought that cocido was a mystery dish that I would never see, understand, or taste.

About 20 years ago, I was looking at a homestyle restaurant menu and the lightbulb finally went on in my brain. I asked the waiter for a bowl of caldo de res (beef and vegetable soup), and he nodded as he wrote the order–and said, "Cocido para usted, señora." Wait! What? He smiled and said, Sí, cocido. O como dijo usted, caldo de res." ('Yes, 'cocido', or as you said"–well, you get it.) Like many things in Spanish, this is an example of their being more than one word for the same thing. Part of cultural literacy is learning what is colloquially used as a name for something that also has a more formal name.

Now that I knew what cocido is, I found someone to teach me how to make it, and today–if you don't know how already–I'm going to teach you. It's the simplest thing in the world, very healthy, and truly a Mexican home staple. An all-but-boiling bowlful is just the ticket for a warming meal in the winter, or conversely, a cooling meal when the weather is hot.

Cocido (Caldo de Res) from Michoacán

Ingredients
Medium white onion, coarsely chopped
1/2 head of garlic (sliced horizontally across the head, skin and all)
1 medium bay leaf
2-3 Tbsp sea salt
4-5 liters cold water
1 kilo (2.2 pounds) meaty, bone-in chambarete (beef shank), cut across the bone
1 kilo chuck meat, in large cubes
.5 kilo (1 pound) bone-in costilla de res (meaty beef ribs), cut into 2" to 3" pieces

3 or 4 medium carrots, peeled and cut into rounds
250gr green beans, ends removed and each bean cut or broken in half
3 or 4 large potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks or thick slices
1 middle-size chayote, cut into eighths, seed and all
1 small chile serrano, slit from tip almost to the stem end (optional)
4 small calabacitas (or zucchini), cut into thick slices
A quarter kilo (half pound) white cabbage, coarsely cut into chunks
A good-size fistful of cilantro, stems and all
5 or 6 sprigs of fresh hierbabuena (mint, and optional but you will love the flavor it adds)
2 or 3 ears of fresh corn, each ear cut into thirds (optional)

Special equipment
A 12-to-14 liter lidded pot
Long wooden spoon

Bring 4 or 5 liters water, the onion, the half garlic head, the salt, and the bay leaf to a boil. Turn the heat down to a simmer. When the meat begins to produce foam on the surface of the water, scoop out and discard the foam. This will clarify your beef broth.

A portion of the beef and its trimmings, rinsed, patted dry, and ready to go in the pot.

One piece at a time, quickly add the beef to the boiling water. In just a minute or two, the beef will take on a deep brown color. After skimming away the foam, allow the beef to simmer for about two hours.

Remove the ends of the green beans and cut or break each one in half.

Carrots and calabacita (zucchini), ready to go in the pot.

When you're ready to chop the chayote, try to pierce the skin with your fingernail. If it pierces easily, there's no need to peel the chayote, just chop it skin and all. The seed is flat, round, white and soft. The whitest part of the already cut chayote in the photograph is the seed–your knife will slide right through it, no need to remove it and cut it separately. Now, let's chop the other half of this chayote!

Coarsely chop the white cabbage, or leave it in narrow wedges, as in the photograph above.

Peel and cut up the potatoes. These are the standard white potato in Mexico: the papa Alfa. I started with three and added another. You can use a different kind of potato: russet, Yukon Gold, Red Bliss, whatever potato you prefer will be delicious.

For the tomato seasoning for the broth: put the coarsely chopped tomato, the 1/4 onion, a clove of garlic, and the chile serrano (if you're using it) into your blender. Add the 2 cups water. Cover and blend until smooth. Pour this mixture into the boiling pot.

Add all of the vegetables, including the cilantro, to the pot. Allow the pot to return just to a boil, then lower the heat to simmer and cover, leaving the cover slightly ajar. After 15 minutes cooking, stir the pot–the vegetables will have softened enough to be completely under water. Simmer for approximately 45 minutes.

Correct the salt to taste.

Prior to serving, remove the cilantro and the mint from the pot.

Freshly patted tortillas, toasting on a clay comal (griddle). They're supposed to inflate as they toast!

An all-but-overflowing bowlful of cocido. The house smelled delicious as it cooked, and the cocido itself was wonderful. And there's plenty left for the next few tomorrows!

Serve with limón (Key limes) to squeeze into the broth, hot tortillas, with corn tostadas, or with toasted bolillos (white flour, super-dense Mexican rolls).

Serves 6 to 8 as a main dish.

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

19 de June de 2021
WE’RE BACK! It’s Time to Take a Tour with Mexico Cooks! :: Book NOW for the Dates You Want.

Tourism to Mexico is definitely back! After over a year of waiting for tourism to be possible again, Mexico Cooks! has recently booked and completed three tours and has more in the works. If you'd like to visit Mexico this summer or in early fall, contact me ASAP to save the dates you'd like to travel with me. We can tour in Michoacán–off the beaten path and fabulous–in Oaxaca, in Guadalajara, or in Mexico City: each of those cities and their surrounding towns has the GREEN LIGHT for visitors! Make plans now so I can reserve your tour dates. And PS–as of April 28, 2021, I am fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

A market tour in Pátzcuaro, Michoacán. I'm holding a mamey fruit. The mamey's scientific name is poutería sapote. I've never seen a mamey in the USA or in Canada, have you? Ask me about its dark-brown seed…

One of the great pleasures of my life is the number of tours Mexico Cooks! gives to lots of excited tourists. Small, specialized tours are a joy to organize: the participants generally have common interests, a thirst for knowledge, and a hunger for–well, for Mexico Cooks!' tour specialties: street and municipal markets, food and the preparation of food–and of course eating! Touring a food destination (a street market in Michoacán, an enclosed market in Guadalajara, a crawl through some Mexico City street stands, or meals in a series of upscale restaurants) is about far more than a brief look at a fruit, a vegetable, or a basket of freshly made tortillas.

A Pátzcuaro street vendor holds out a partially unwrapped tamal de trigo (wheat tamal). It's sweetened with piloncillo (Mexican raw sugar) and a few plump raisins, wrapped in corn husks, and steamed. Taste? It's all but identical to a bran muffin, and every tour participant enjoyed a pinch of it.

This is the single best dish I have eaten in 2021. Aguachile de ribeye (frizzled leeks, locally grown avocado, and mildly spicy aguachile atop a large, perfectly cooked ribeye, at my favorite restaurant in Morelia, Michoacán. Order it as an appetizer to share, or as your personal main dish. The owners say it won't be on the menu for long, so come the minute you can and we'll have our tour's opening dinner there. Honestly, you'll crave it when you get back home! (And no, those aren't beans on the plate–it's the knobby texture of the plate!)

A tour planned to your specifications can lead you to places you didn't know you wanted to go, but that you would not have missed for the world. Here, Donna talks with the man who makes these enormous adobe bricks. He let her try to pick up the laden wheelbarrow. She could barely get its legs off the ground! He laughed, raised the handles, and whizzed away with his load.

Several times in recent years, small groups wanted to tour traditional bakeries in Mexico City. The photo shows one tiny corner of the enormous Pastelería La Ideal in the Centro Histórico. Just looking at the photo brings the sweet fragrances back to mind. And never mind the taste of the delicious pastries!

Ramon and Annabelle wanted an introduction to how ordinary people live and shop in Guadalajara. We spent a highly entertaining morning at the Tianguis del Sol, a three-times-a-week outdoor market in Zapopan, a suburb of Guadalajara. Our first stop was for breakfast, then we shopped for unusual produce, fresh spices, and other goodies that they don't often see in their home town. Annabelle said she felt right at home because so much of the style and flavor of this market was similar to what she experienced in the markets near her home town in the Philippines.

We went for comida (main meal of the day, at around 3:00PM) to the original location of Guadalajara's Karne Garibaldi. The restaurant does one thing–carne en su jugo (meat in its juice)–and does it exceptionally well. The food is plentiful, delicious, and affordable. The place is always packed, and usually has a line to get in!

Ramon wanted to try tejuino, a regional drink specialty in the Guadalajara area. Mixed when you order it, the refreshing, barely fermented drink is thickened with a bit of masa de maíz (corn dough) and served with a pinch of salt and a small scoop of lemon ice.

Pillars of nopal cactus paddles, each pillar taller than a man, at Mercado de la Merced, Mexico City.   La Merced is the largest retail market in Mexico, if not in all of Latin America. It's the ultimate market experience and just a partial tour takes the better part of a morning. Comfortable walking shoes are a necessity–let's go!

A more intimate, up-close-and-personal Mexico City market tour takes us through the Mercado San Juan. The San Juan is renowned for its gourmet selection of meats, fish and shellfish, cheeses, and wild mushrooms–among a million other things you might not expect to find.

Pepitorias are a sweet specialty of Mexico's capital city. Crunchy and colorful obleas (wafers) enclose sticky syrup and squash seeds.  Mexico Cooks!' tour groups usually try these at the Bazar Sábado in San Ángel.

Lovely and fascinating people and events are around almost any Mexican corner. The annual Festival Internacional de Música de Morelia opens every year with several blocks of carpets made of flowers. Residents of Patamban, Michoacán work all night to create the carpets for the festival. This piano is made entirely of plant material. Enlarge any picture for a closer view.

Entire flowers, fuzzy pods, and flower petals are used to create the carpets' ephemeral beauty and design; these carpets last two days at most.

In November 2012, one of Mexico Cooks!' tours was dazzled by a special Morelia concert given by Tania Libertad. With Tania is Rosalba Morales Bartolo, a fabulous traditional cook from San Jerónimo Purenchécuaro, Michoacán, who presented the artist with various handcrafted items from the state–including the lovely coral necklace and rebozo (shawl) that Tania is wearing.

What in the world is THAT? A tour at a major Mexico City market offered this laugh to my clients: me swinging a cow tail! No matter where we start our tour and no matter what we plan together for your itinerary, a Mexico Cooks! tour always includes a terrific surprise or two, special memories to take home, and the thirst for more of Mexico.

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

12 de June de 2021
Adobo de Cerdo Huasteco :: Pork in Huasteca Adobo Sauce), from “Verde, Blanco, y Rojo” by Ricardo Muñoz Zurita

Roasting roma tomatoes and onion quarters on a comal (in this case, a cast iron griddle). That little tomato on the right looks downright happy to be toasting.

Several years ago, Mexico Cooks! was thrilled to receive a copy of Chef Ricardo Muñoz Zurita’s newest recetario (cookbook), titled Verde, Blanco, y Rojo en la Cocina Mexicana. Due to the pressures of moving and settling into a somewhat more frenetic life in Mexico City, the very attractive book sat patiently in the kitchen bookshelf with its 150 or so brother and sister cookbooks, waiting to be chosen. ‘Choose me, choose me!‘ it whispered each time I passed by the shelf. And finally I listened.

Fairly large pieces of maciza de cerdo (lean, fresh pork leg) simmering with onion and garlic.

My friends and I are very fond of traditional Mexican cuisine. Like most people, we have our favorite dishes. And like most people, I have a hard time breaking habits and wading into a new cookbook: it means learning a new format, a new organization of ingredients, and a new dish that I have never prepared.

The first task was reading the recipe all the way through to the end to make sure that I had all of the ingredients and utensils on hand prior to starting to cook and that I understood the order of cooking. It’s really no fun at all to start the preparations and discover at the time of need that oops, there is no garlic in its basket and ouch, that one bowl I really wanted to use is full of last night’s stew. You’ll want to organize yourself and prepare your mise en place well before you turn on the stove.

Differentiating between dried chiles ancho and chiles mulato, which look similar on the outside, can be confusing. If you open a chile ancho and hold it up to the light, it looks from the inside like red stained glass. The mulato, on the other hand, looks brown when held to the light. It’s immediately apparent which this is.

Adobo de Cerdo Huasteco
Serves 12

Ingredients
2 kg (approximately 4.5 pounds) lean pork meat, cut into serving-size pieces
1 white onion, cut into quarters
1 head of garlic, split in half
4 liters water
4 tsp salt
8 chiles guajillo
5 large chiles ancho
3 large tomatoes, roasted
1/2 white onion, quartered and roasted
5 garlic cloves
2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp dry Mexican oregano, crumbled
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
4 cloves
3 Tbsp pork lard (you can substitute oil if you can’t get real rendered lard)
1/2 cup white vinegar


Toasting the chiles ancho on the comal.

Utensils
Comal or griddle
Mesh strainer
Several small or medium-size mixing bowls
Mixing spoons
Heavy-bottom pot with lid
Blender

Toasting the chiles guajillo on the comal.

Procedure
Put the pork, onion, and split-open head of garlic in a large pot. Cover with water, add 4 tsp salt and bring to a boil. Lower the heat until the water is simmering and cook until the pork is tender, about an hour to an hour and a half. Remove the pork from the water, drain the liquid into a bowl, and reserve both the meat and the cooking liquid for later use.

Remove the stems, seeds, and veins from all of the chiles and discard them. Lightly toast the chiles on the comal, being careful not to burn them. If they burn, they will be bitter. Soak the toasted chiles in four cups of the reserved cooking liquid from the pork.

Blend the soaked chiles with enough of the cooking liquid to make a smooth, somewhat liquid paste.

Roast the tomatoes, onions, and remaining five cloves of garlic on the comal, then blend them until they make a very smooth sauce. If necessary for blending, add just a little of the reserved meat cooking liquid. Using the wire mesh strainer, strain and reserve.

Grind the cumin, the oregano, the pepper, and the cloves together until they are powdered. Set aside for later use.

Over a high flame, heat the lard or oil in a heavy-bottomed pot until it smokes slightly. Add the ground chiles (splatter alert!) and fry for about 15 minutes or until the mixture is reduced by about one-fourth. Add the blended tomato mixture, the spices, and salt to taste. When the mixture comes to a boil, lower the fire and allow to simmer until the sauce has reduced a little.

Add the meat, the vinegar, and three cups of the reserved meat cooking liquid. Correct the seasonings and cook with the lid ajar over low heat (or bake covered in a 350° oven) for about an hour. The finished sauce should be thick enough to cover the meat without sliding off the pieces. Correct the salt and serve.

The finished recipe also freezes very well.  Mexico Cooks! served half the recipe as comida for six and froze the rest for a later meal.

Both types of toasted chiles then soaked for a few minutes in some of the freshly cooked hot pork broth.

The mix of various seasonings (foreground), the blended and strained chiles (left rear) and the blended tomato/onion/garlic mixture (right rear).

The pork now needs to simmer in the adobo for an hour or more, either in the oven or over a very low fire. The fragrance will drive you crazy, it is so tantalizing.  Mexico Cooks! prepared this recipe on top of the stove using the cast iron comal as a heat diffuser.

Adobo de cerdo huasteco, ready to eat! Serve the dish with steamed white rice, the green vegetable of your choice, and plenty of hot-off-the-comal corn tortillas.

The wonderful Spanish-language Verde, Blanco, Rojo en La Cocina Mexicana, by my friend Chef Ricardo Muñoz Zurita of the three Mexico City Restaurantes Azul.

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

5 de June de 2021
High on the Hog :: Mexico’s Longtime Love Affair with Pork

Cochinita pibil from the Yucatán (seasoned pork, slow-cooked and then shredded), a specialty of Ricardo Muñoz Zurita's Restaurante Azul/Condesa. Served in a banana leaf with a topping of pickled red onion, it's delicious.

Mexico is one of the largest producers and consumers of pork in the world, second only to China. In spite of the 'swine flu' crisis several years ago, Mexico continues to eat pork at a record-breaking pace and, every year, to export millions of tons of pork to other countries. (FIRA)

From the growers' farms to a rastro (slaughterhouse) is a speedy ride along one of Mexico's super-highways. A truck like this one, loaded with pigs, is an everyday sight throughout Mexico. Photo courtesy ROTOV.

Mexico is not nearly as squeamish as the United States in seeing where its carne de cerdo (pork meat) comes from. In fact, a stroll through just about any city market or tianguis (street market) will give ample evidence that meat–including pork meat–comes from an animal, not from a sterile, platic-wrapped styrofoam meat tray at a supermarket.

Every part of the pig is used in Mexico's kitchens. The head is ordinarily used to make pozole, a rich stew of pork meat, nixtamalized dried corn, spices, and condiments.

No pork existed in Mexico until after the Spanish conquest; in fact, no domestic animals other than the turkey (native to Mexico) and the xoloitzcuintle dog were used for food. (The ancient Maya used the xolo for warmth in bed at night, because of its high body temperature, and also for food.) The only sources of animal protein were fish, frogs, and other water creatures, wild Muscovy-type ducks, the javalí (wild boar), about 200 varieties of edible insects, and wild doves, all native to what is now Mexico.

Mexico has been cooking head-to-tail since long before that notion came into international vogue.  Pig tails are used here for roasting–look for recipes for rabo de cerdo asado (roast pig tail).|

No matter that just below these jolly mariachi pigs at Mexico City's Mercado de Jamaica, their once-live counterparts lie ready for the butcher's knife. These fellows play on!

Chicharrón (fried pig skin), just pulled from the cauldron where it was prepared, is made fresh every day by butchers whose specialty is pork. The darker brown squares are meat that has been left on the skin and scored. In my opinion, it's the best part of chicharrón. Nothing goes to waste.

Just about any Mexican butcher worth his stripes can custom-cut whatever portion of the pig you need for meal preparation. In case you're not 100% familiar with the names of Mexican cuts, here are two pork cut charts, first in English and then in Spanish for comparison.

Pork cuts chart in English. Click to enlarge the image for better viewing.

Pork cuts chart in Spanish (for Mexican users). Even in Spanish, many cuts have different names depending on which country names them. Again, click to enlarge the image for a better view.

These suckling pigs were butchered at 6 weeks to 3 months old. Known in Mexico as lechón, roast suckling pig is a delicacy by any name. Many restaurants specialize in its preparation.

One of the most common and popular (and really delicious) kinds of street tacos is tacos al pastor (shepherd style tacos). Marinate thinly sliced pork meat in a sauce made of chiles guajillo, vinegar, and tomato. Next, layer the slices on a vertical spit so that they form the shape of a spinning top. At the top of the meat, place a pineapple without skin. Light the fire in the grate behind the spit and allow a portion of the meat to cook until slightly caramelized on the edges and tender within. Slice into very thin pieces, using them to fill a tortilla warmed on the flattop. With your sharp knife, flick a small section of the pineapple into the taco. Add the salsa you prefer, some minced onion and cilantro, and ahhhhh…the taste of Mexico!

Manitas de cerdo: pickled pigs' feet. The well-scrubbed feet are cooked in salted water, then added to vegetables cooked in a pickling solution of vinegar, chile, vegetables, and herbs. In Mexico, manitas de cerdo can be eaten as either a botana (snack) or a main dish.

One of my personal favorite pork dishes: carnitas from Michoacán! These carnitas in particular are the best I've ever eaten: large hunks of pork are boiled in lard until crispy on the outside, succulent and juicy on the inside. Chopped roughly and served with various salsas, they're the best tacos I know. Find them at Carnitas Aeropuerto, in Zamora, Michoacán.

Adobo huasteco, another deliciously spicy pork dish. It's been a while since this last appeared on our table–and it's high time I prepared it again. I'll post the recipe for you next week (June 5, 2021).

Last but not least, here's a rosy bouquet of pig heads for sale at the Mercado de Jamaica in Mexico City.

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

29 de May de 2021
Mexico’s Markets :: Heads, Heads, and More Heads

If you've been reading Mexico Cooks! for long, you know that I photograph a lot of ripe and colorful fruits, vegetables, and other edibles in Mexico's markets. This gorgeous turkey, for example, was tethered with some others at the Thursday weekly market in Zaachila, Oaxaca. He didn't know it, of course, but he would soon be purchased and…well, you can imagine. This is a food market, after all.

In the interest of early and full disclosure, the rest of the photos in this article might just gross you out. It turns out that for reasons unknown even to myself, I have, in addition to taking lots of market photos of benign and lovely fruits and vegetables, made lots of head shots. Disembodied heads of animals, and mostly heads of pigs. Be warned.

This Mexico City butcher saw me approaching with the camera and obligingly sat the pig head up straight for a portrait. He's shaving the head, which was to be sold either whole or in parts for making Jalisco-style pozole. Better he should shave it than you should have to do it!

That's a goat head at the left of the photo. To the right is a container of chinicuiles (red maguey worms). The goat head is for preparing birria, the chinicuiles are for roasting and eating as a snack. It took me years to get up the gumption to try one, but I swear to you that they are delicious.

I think this is the first pig head picture I took, years ago at Guadalajara's Mercado Libertad. All the pigs' heads I've seen have had that same charming little smile.

See what I mean? This fellow looks downright happy to have given his all for your bowl of Guerrero-style pozole.

Doña Martha has taken a cooked pig head out of the broth to remove its bones and teeth. At this point, the pozole is almost-but-not-quite ready to serve.

Admit it, you would have taken this picture, too. How could I resist?

You might want to click on this photo to enlarge it, for a better view. It's barbacoa de res (beef barbecue, Mexican style), wrapped in penca de maguey (cactus leaves) and cooked for hours in a pit. You can still see the teeth in the jaw (center).

A raw beef head, hung upside down in the butcher shop.

Here's another beef head with the skin and fur removed from the top of the head. The butcher's gloved thumb is just about to pull the skin off the nose.

Anyone for bouillabaise? It's been a long time since I prepared this delicious French fish stew, but Mexican markets always have the ingredients. Like pozole, bouillabaise starts its broth with heads–in this case, fish heads.

Chicken heads. I don't have a recipe nor do I know of a recipe, but someone must: here is a bowlful for sale in the Mercado de San Juan, Morelia, Michoacán. If you do have a recipe, please let me know!

You'll be glad to know that this is the last pig head for this article. This one, thoroughly cleaned, shaven, and ready for the pot, is merely waiting for a customer. The ears, snout, and tongue are delicacies in Mexico. If that's how you like your pozole–with a little of everything–ask for your serving surtido–with an assortment of meats–as opposed to maciza, which includes only leg meat.

Has this photo essay driven any of you into the vegetarian camp? Here's a vegetarian head: cabbage, of course.

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

22 de May de 2021