Category: Mexican Tourism

Delicious Mexican Pork in Some of Its Infinite Varieties!

This young butcher at a local market is packing longaniza (a type of spicy Mexican pork sausage) into its casings.

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, reconstituted dried corn, spices, and condiments.

No pork existed in Mexico until after the Spanish conquest; in fact, no domestic animals other than the xoloitzcuintle dog were used for food. The 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, doves and the turkey, 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). In addition, when a butcher is preparing pork carnitas, tails, ears, snouts, tongues, and indeed, everything but the squeal goes into the cazo (enormous cooking cauldron used to boil carnitas in lard).

A carnitas taco from Quiroga, Michoacán.

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

Chicharrón (fried pig skin) is prepared fresh every day by butchers whose specialty is pork. Nothing goes to waste. In fact, a large percentage of the pig skins used to make chicharrónes are imported to Mexico from the United States, where the market for pig skin is relatively small.

Just about any Mexican butcher worth his apron 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. 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 in Mexico 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). This preparation comes from Mexico City. 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 we prepared it again. Click on the link for the recipe.

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.

13 de April de 2019
Pan Dulce in Mexico :: Take Two, They’re Small

Steaming hot café con leche (espresso coffee mixed with a generous portion of hot milk), served with a basket of Mexico's pan dulce (sweet bread).

When my mother, may she rest in peace, first visited me here in Mexico, one of her dearest wishes was to visit a Mexican bakery. For more than 40 years, Mother baked every crumb of bread that she and anyone visiting her consumed: white, rye, whole wheat, pumpernickel, sourdough, French baguette, and esoteric ethnic loaves that she just had to try. Mother wanted to see how bread was made in Mexico. At my suggestion, she even brought her baking apron for her stay here, hoping to push her floury hands deep into some yeasty dough.

In those years, there was a tiny and excellent bakery just a block from my house. In a room to the side of his house, through a semi-secret door at the back of his garage, don Pedro turned out hundreds of pieces of pan dulce every day. Shortly after Mom's arrival, I took her to meet don Pedro, the master baker, and his helpers.

Don Pedro spoke no English and my mother spoke no Spanish, but I interpreted between them and they discovered that they were soul mates. For two hours, don Pedro and my mother swapped bread stories—conversation about oven temperatures, yeast, flour densities, and tales of experiments, successes and failures. The day before Mother was to leave for home, she asked to go back to the bakery to say goodbye to don Pedro. They both wept because she was leaving and insisted that pictures be taken before they exchanged farewell hugs. Such is the bond of bread. Don Pedro and my mother have both passed away, and I hope they've had a chance to hug one another again in the más allá (the great beyond).

Bread fresh from the oven: the evocative aroma brings back timeworn memories of Mom's kitchen, filled with the yeasty perfume of twice-raised, golden-crusted hot bread. Here in Mexico, that redolent scent wafts through the air from bakeries scattered like hidden treasures through many neighborhoods. At certain hours of the early morning and mid-afternoon, local ovens disgorge mountains of pan dulce destined for tiny corner mom-n-pop stores or for sale hot from the ovens to individuals who know just when to arrive.

For a few pesos, an early breakfast of this hot, slightly sweet bread served with milk, juice, hot chocolate, or coffee gets Mexico up and off to work or school. For a few pesos more, the same sort of late supper rocks Mexico to sleep.

In the history of the world, bread has its own record and development. The making of wheat bread has evolved with the progress of world civilization. Particularly in gastronomic Mexico, bread has deep roots in the evolution of the República. The Spanish brought the flavors and recipes of all Europe with them to the New World. The 1860s era of Emperor Maximilian and his French wife, Charlotte, imposed a giddy 19th Century French influence—with puff pastries, whipped cream fillings, and sticky glazes—on the already extensive assortment of Mexican breads.

If you've never visited a Mexican bakery—a bakery where the breads are baked right on the premises, not brought in from a central bakery—you have a real treat in store. One of my favorite bakeries is owned by the Rojas family in Ajijic, Jalisco. When the bolillos (crusty, dense, white rolls) come out of the oven in the early mornings and again when the roles (cinnamon rolls—they're addictive) are ready at about 12:30 PM, you'll find lines of locals waiting to carry home a bag of hot, fresh goodies.

The Rojas brothers, long-time bakers at Panadería Rojas in Ajijic, Jalisco. Photo courtesy Semanario Laguna.

At the Rojas bakery, the bakers will help you select the breads you want–if you don't know the bread by name, you just point and tell them how many. There are no bakers' shelves at Rojas, and the selection of items is usually small. Most of the breads are delivered to shops and stores shortly after they're taken from the ovens.

Larger Mexican bakeries can be a little intimidating when you first push that front door open and enter a warm, fragrant world of unfamiliar sights and intoxicating yeasty, sugary smells.

One of my favorite bakery excursions was to Panadería Pan Bueno, located at Avenida Vallarta #5295 in Guadalajara. The owner, Sr. Roberto Cárdenas González, graciously allowed me to take photographs with the assistance of his employee, Edith Hernández González.

When you go inside Pan Bueno, take a minute to look around first to orient yourself. Right there by the door are the big metal trays and the tongs you need to gather up the breads you want to buy. With tray and tongs in hand, let's take a tour of the racks of pan dulce.

Very lightly sweetened biscochos are similar to biscuits.

Tasty sugar-swirled conchas are ubiquitous throughout Mexico.

During the Mexican Revolution, soldiers from every region of Mexico came to know the foods of states far from their homes. When they returned to their own areas after the fighting, they took the recipes and flavors of other regions home with them. The south of Mexico incorporated northern bread recipes into its repertoire, the west took from the east, the north from the south.

Today, most panaderías (bakeries) in Mexico prepare similar assortments of pan dulce, along with a sampling of their own regional specialties.

Puerquitos (little pigs, on the right) taste very much like gingerbread.

It's been said that Mexico, of all the countries in the world, has the broadest and most delicious selection of breads. As a result of the mixture of cultures and regional flavors, today in Mexico you will find more than 2000 varieties of breads, and all will tempt your palate.

Pan dulce is just one variety, but there are hundreds upon hundreds of different sub-varieties. The great mosaic of Mexican bread making, inventiveness, and creativity is such that every variety of pan dulce has a name, usually associated with its appearance. That's why you'll see names of animals, objects, and even people gracing the breads on bakery shelves. Puerquitos (little pigs), moños o corbatas (bowties or neckties), ojo de buey (ox eye), canastas (baskets), conchas (seashells), cuernos (horns), chinos (Chinese), polvorones (shortbread), hojaldres (puff paste), empanadas (turnovers), and espejos (mirrors): all are names of specific and very different sweet breads. My current favorite name for a pan dulce is niño envuelto (it means wrapped-up baby and it looks for all the world like a slice of jellyroll).

Niño envuelto on the left, besos on the right.

The loaded shelves at the Panadería El Resobado, in Coatepec, Veracruz. On this trip, my companions and I bought quite a bit of pan dulce and even though it had been highly recommended to us, we decided we really didn't care for it. The bread is baked in wood-fired ovens and tasted extremely heavily–and unpleasantly–of wood smoke. What a disappointment!

Mexican Wedding Cookies (Polvorones de Nuez). Photo courtesy Storethisnotthat.

Here's a familiar and delicious recipe for a traditional Mexican sweet bread.

Polvorones de Nuez

Mexican Wedding Cookies

Preheat oven to 275 degrees.

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups (3/4 pound) butter (room temperature)
3/4 pound powdered sugar
1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup finely chopped almonds or pecans
3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

Procedure
Beat the butter until it is light and fluffy. Then beat in 2 tablespoons of the powdered sugar, the egg yolk, vanilla, and your choice of nuts. Gradually add the flour, beating after each addition to blend thoroughly. Pinch off pieces of dough the size of large walnuts and roll between your palms into round balls. Place the dough balls 1 1/2 inches apart on un-greased baking sheets. Flatten each ball very slightly.

Bake in a 275 degree oven until very lightly browned (about 45 minutes). Allow to cool on the baking sheets until lukewarm.

Sift half the remaining powdered sugar onto a large sheet of waxed paper. Roll each cookie gently but firmly in the sugar. Place cookies on wire racks over wax paper. Allow the cookies to cool completely and again dust generously with more powdered sugar.

If you make these cookies ahead of need, store them in airtight containers, layered between sheets of waxed paper, for up to three days.

Makes approximately three dozen cookies.

As Edith and I made the rounds of the bakery, I asked her if she knew the origin of any of the names for pan dulce. With a charming smile, she admitted that they were just traditional inventos—made-up titles. When I asked her if she ever got tired of eating these sweet breads, she shook her head emphatically. "Oh no, señora, we always love the pan." Here, Edith is holding a huge rosca de reyes, the bread eaten on January 6, the Feast of the Three Kings.

You will always love the pan as well. And now, if you'll excuse me, a slice of niño envuelto is calling to me from my kitchen. How could I have resisted buying a pan dulce or two as I made the bakery tour? All right, it was four—but who's counting?

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

6 de April de 2019
Visit a Market in Paris–Yes, France–and Another in Mexico City. Celebrate the Similarities, Celebrate the Differences

A few Springs ago, Mexico Cooks! traveled to Paris–yes, that Paris–with a specific mission: to compare markets in the French capital with markets in Mexico City, Mexico’s capital. As for the photo above, well…you know what that is!

Prior to traveling to Paris, Mexico Cooks! had arranged a Parisian meeting over dinner (mais oui, what else!) with California foodie expat Randy Díaz. Randy invited several of his friends to join us and we had a marvelous evening at Le Casse Noix.

The lovely and tremendously knowledgeable French Market Maven (Marie Z. Johnston) at the incomparable Graineterie du Marché, a small shop on the square occupied by the Marché d’Aligre, Paris. Loui Franke and the peripatetic Mr. Pidds, whose attention was grabbed by an operatic canary, were along as well.

One of Randy’s friends at our dinner was the delightful Marie Z. Johnston. She very generously offered to take me shopping at her favorite Paris market. Oh joy! My first thoughts were, what will I see that compares with the tianguis (Mexican street market) where I shop every week? And what will I see that I’ve never seen in Mexico?

The Mexican tianguis is simply a moveable market. In my Mexico City neighborhood, three separate tianguis occur every week. In Paris, we visited the Marché d’Aligre, which sets up in the same square six days a week and also has a brick-and-mortar building alongside the square. Many fruits and vegetables are the same in both Paris and Mexico City, but for the rest–vive la difference!

In Mexico, we are limited to one or at most two varieties of tomatoes. But there is really NO limit to the kinds of fresh and dried chiles we can buy! The plum tomatoes in the photo above are accompanied by (from the far left, top shelf) fresh, tiny orange chile habanero, long thin green chile de árbol, fatter chile jalapeño, smaller and spicier chile serrano, and (at top right) yellow-orange chile manzano. The chile manzano, just a bit bigger than a golf ball, is nearly as hot as the habañero, which is considered by many to be the world’s hottest chile. It is the only chile in the world with black seeds.

At the Marché d’Aligre, this whole box was filled with different kinds of tomatoes, including some heirloom varieties. But there wasn’t a chile to be had.

At my tianguis: to the left, standard round, large Mexican rabanitos (radishes), which in Mexico are eaten out of hand or are thinly sliced and sprinkled as a condiment in certain kinds of hot soup. To the right, a bunch of huauzontle, a pre-hispanic vegetable that looks just a little like broccoli. It’s completely unknown in France and the rest of Europe.

At the Marché d’Aligre, a crate of tender and beautiful red and white French radishes–often eaten with a smear of butter and a sprinkle of salt.

Flor de calabaza (squash blossoms) are sold by the large bunch in Mexico. They can be cut up in soups, stuffed and fried, or used in several other ways. Trivia tidbit: only the male blossoms are cut and sold, the female blossoms are allowed to develop into a zucchini-like squash.

At the Marché d’Aligre, I had to ask what this was. Even after reading the sign, I was puzzled. It’s wild asparagus! And behind the wild version, the ubiquitous thick, white French asparagus. ‘Twas the season, and asparagus was everywhere. We only occasionally see fresh asparagus in Mexico, and when it is available it costs el ojo de la cara (the eye out of your face)-the Mexican version of “an arm and a leg”.

Fruits in Mexico can be completely different from fruits in Paris. For example, on the top shelf of my neighborhood tianguis fruit stand are small cups of granada china (pomegranate) seeds, already removed from the fruit and ready to eat with one of those little pink spoons. On the bottom row are large cups of cut up sandía (watermelon), fresh, sweet, already-peeled tunas (cactus fruit), and a mixed cup of mango, melón (cantaloupe), papaya, and fresas (strawberries).

At my tianguis, a typical display of (foreground) fresh Mexican papaya, bananas (top left), jícama, mangos, and peel-on tunas (bottom right).

In Paris, a number of Marché d’Aligre vendors offered Cavaillon melon, similar to cantaloupe but with a definite panache and a fame of its own. The green-striped melons look so beautiful in their bright-red tissue paper.

It was cherry season in France–look at these beauties! We sometimes see black bing cherries in Mexico, but the yellow and red cherries on the right in the photo are unheard of here. In France, I bought a kilo of the addictive black cherries for 5€ (about $6.00USD). In Mexico, I recently saw them offered for 20 pesos (about $1.50USD) for a tiny bagful. But as I said: addictive. I had to buy some.

Unknown in France, considered a plague in the United States, and prized as a delicacy in Mexico: huitlacoche (corn fungus). It’s sometimes called the Mexican truffle.

These are unknown in Mexico, but coeurs-de-boeuf (beef heart) tomatoes are much sought-after in France. What a color, what a shape, and what a flavor!

These tomatoes are endemic to Oaxaca. Called jitomate riñón (kidney-shaped tomatoes) they are smaller than the French coeurs-de-boeuf variety but bear a strong resemblance to it.

Peonies and primroses at the Marché d’Aligre. We do see primroses in Mexico, but peonies do not grow here.

Wild orchids grow on trees in Mexico’s mountains–and I am not certain, but I suspect that there are none at all in Paris.

Isn’t the diversity of our world wonderful? As I said before, vive la difference! Viva la diferencia! Long live our differences!

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

30 de March de 2019
Touring with Mexico Cooks :: An Unforgettable Experience, Stories That Live in Your Mind and Heart

This little boy's mother and I thought he would be terrified by the pig heads hung up in one of the pork stands at a Mexico City market. On the contrary, he was fascinated! Two seconds after I took the picture, he leaned over and kissed the snout. We all laughed, even the vendors.

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 specialty: food and its preparation. 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, Michoacán, 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.

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, a tour participant 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 Canova 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 the Canovas 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) 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 specialty in the Guadalajara area. Mixed when you order it, the refreshing, lightly fermented drink is thickened with masa de maíz (corn dough) and served with a pinch of salt and a small scoop of lemon ice.

Pillars of nopal cactus paddles, 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 best 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, in the name of the state, presented the artist with various handcrafted items–including the lovely coral necklace and rebozo (shawl) that Tania is wearing.

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. Marvey Chapman had a wonderful time! By all means come and enjoy a tour!

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

16 de March de 2019
Special Lenten Foods in Mexico :: Lent (Cuaresma), March 6 Until April 18, 2019

One year during Lent in Chiapas, Mexico Cooks! ate tortitas de papa (potato croquettes, left) and frijoles negros (black beans, right), ideal for a Lenten meal.

Catholic Mexicans observe la Cuaresma (Lent), the 40-day (excluding Sundays) penitential season that precedes Easter, with special prayers, vigils, and with extraordinary meatless meals cooked only on Ash Wednesday and during Lent. Many Mexican dishes–seafood, vegetable, and egg–are normally prepared without meat, but some other meatless dishes are particular to Lent. Known as comida cuaresmeña, many of these delicious Lenten foods are little-known outside Mexico and some other parts of Latin America.

Many observant Catholics believe that the personal reflection and meditation demanded by Lenten practices are more fruitful if the individual refrains from heavy food indulgence and makes a promise to abstain from other common habits such as eating candy, smoking cigarettes, and drinking alcohol.

Atole de grano, a Michoacán specialty made of tender corn and licorice-scented anís, is a perfect cena (supper) for Lenten Fridays.

Lent began this year on Ash Wednesday, March 6. Shortly before, certain food specialties began to appear in local markets.Vendors are currently offering very large dried shrimp for caldos (broths) and tortitas (croquettes), perfect heads of cauliflower for tortitas de coliflor (cauliflower croquettes), seasonal romeritos, and thick, dried slices of bolillo (small loaves of white bread) for capirotada (a kind of bread pudding).

This common Lenten preparation is romeritos en mole.  Romeritos, an acidic green vegetable, are in season at this time of year. Although romeritos look a little like rosemary, their consistency is soft and their taste is relatively sour, more like verdolagas (purslane).

Here are raw romeritos that I saw recently at the Mercado de Jamaica in Mexico City.You can see that they do look like rosemary, but the thin leaves are soft, more like a succulent.

You'll usually see tortitas de camarón (dried shrimp croquettes) paired for a Friday comida (midday meal) with romeritos en mole, although they are sometimes bathed in a caldillo de jitomate (tomato broth) and served with sliced nopalitos (cactus paddles).

During Lent, the price of fish and seafood in Mexico goes through the roof due to the huge seasonal demand for meatless meals. These beautiful huachinango (red snapper) come from Mexico's Pacific coast.

Chef Martín Rafael Mendizabal of La Trucha Alegre in Zitacuaro, Michoacán, prepared trucha deshuesada con agridulce de guayaba (boned trout with guava sweet and sour sauce) for the V Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán held annually in Morelia. The dish would be ideal for an elegant Lenten dinner.

Capirotada (kah-pee-roh-TAH-dah, Lenten bread pudding) is almost unknown outside Mexico. Simple to prepare and absolutely delicious, it's hard to eat it sparingly if you're trying to keep a Lenten abstinence! This photo shows capirotada as served by Carmen Titita Ramírez Degollado at the El Bajío restaurants in Mexico City.

Every family makes a slightly different version of capirotada: a pinch more of this, leave out that, add such-and-such.  Mexico Cooks! prefers to leave out the apricots and add dried pineapple. Make it once and then tweak the recipe to your preference–but please do stick with traditional ingredients.

A huge pile of piloncillo for sale at the Mercado de Jamaica. On the left are large cones of light brown piloncillo, in the middle are small cones, and on the right are large cones of dark brown piloncillo. You choose which you want!

CAPIROTADA (Mexican Bread Pudding)

Ingredients

*4 bollilos, in 1" slices (small loaves of dense white bread)
5 stale tortillas
150 grams pecans
50 grams prunes
100 grams raisins
200 grams peanuts
100 grams dried apricots
1 large apple, peeled and sliced thin
100 grams grated Cotija cheese
Peel of one orange, divided for two uses
*3 cones piloncillo (Mexican brown sugar)
Four 3" pieces of Mexican stick cinnamon
2 cloves
Butter
Salt

*If you don't have bolillo, substitute slices of very dense French bread. If you don't have piloncillo, substitute 1/2 cup tightly packed brown sugar.

A large metal or clay baking dish.

Preparation

Preheat the oven to 300°F.

Toast the bread and spread with butter. Slightly overlap the tortillas in the bottom and along the sides of the baking dish to make a base for the capirotada. Prepare a thin syrup by boiling the piloncillo in 2 1/2 cups of water with a few shreds of cinnamon sticks, 2/3 of the orange peel, the cloves, and a pinch of salt.

Place the layers of bread rounds in the baking dish so as to allow for their expansion as the capirotada cooks. Lay down a layer of bread, then a layer of nuts, prunes, raisins, peanuts and apricots. Continue until all the bread is layered with the rest. For the final layer, sprinkle the capirotada with the grated Cotija cheese and the remaining third of the orange peel (grated). Add the syrup, moistening all the layers little by little. Reserve a portion of the syrup to add to the capirotada in case it becomes dry during baking.

Bake uncovered until the capirotada is golden brown and the syrup is absorbed. The bread will expand as it absorbs the syrup. Remember to add the rest of the syrup if the top of the capirotada looks dry, and reserve plenty of syrup to pour over each serving.

Cool the capirotada to room temperature. Do not cover until it is cool; even after it is cooled, leave the top ajar.

Try very hard not to eat the entire pan of capirotada at one sitting!

A positive thought for this Lent: give up discouragement, be an optimist.

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

9 de March de 2019
Joy from Pre-Hispanic Mexico :: Alegrías, An Ancient Treat for Today

Mexico Cooks!' homemade alegrías, freshly turned from the parchment-lined baking sheet onto the cutting board and ready to cut into pieces.

Lots of people are like Mexico Cooks! when it comes to cookbooks. We own hundreds of them, but actually cook from very few. For over a year, I've read and sighed with delight over the stories and recipes in Fany Gerson's My Sweet Mexico–and last week I finally prepared alegrías from her recipe. Fany calls them 'amaranth happiness candy'. Why? Happiness or joy are the English meanings of the Spanish word alegría.

A couple of weeks ago, friends at the superb web page Cocina al Natural invited Mexico Cooks! to a wonderful comida casera (main meal of the day at their home). For dessert, they proudly carried a big tray of alegrías to the table. "They're home made!" they proclaimed. "No way!" we remonstrated. Well, yes, güey, it was the absolute truth. The alegrías were beautiful, professional, delicious, and prepared from Fany Gerson's cookbook, which is actually in my kitchen library. We joyfully crunched these delicacies down.

According to Ricardo Muñoz Zurita, legendary Mexico City food historian, chef and author of the Diccionario Enciclopédico de Gastronomía Mexicana (Encyclopedic Dictionary of Mexican Gastronomy), among other books, alegrías are the oldest candy in Mexico. In pre-Hispanic times, before sugar cane had been introduced to New Spain (now Mexico), the amaranth candy was sweetened with maguey cactus syrup. In that long-ago era, this candy had a highly religious meaning. Shaped in the form of a cookie or cracker, it was utilized for communion in indigenous rituals and also was made into huge sculptures of pre-Christian gods. Because these god-figures appeared so horrible to the Spanish, they outlawed the use of this candy after the conquest. But in the 16th century, a Spanish monk had the idea to mix amaranth with bee honey. Rejoicing over the return of the right to eat this sweet treat, the ancient inhabitants of Mexico named it what they felt: 'alegría'–joy.

The topping mixture for the alegrías–raisins and lightly toasted pecans, peanuts, and pepitas (pumpkin seeds), spread onto the parchment-paper lined baking sheet.

The following week, Betty Fussell, my wonderful friend, invited us once again to visit her in Tepoztlán, just south of Mexico City. The light bulb went on: alegrías would make a great gift to take to Betty!

The recipe for alegrías is simplicity itself. Here's the recipe, taken straight from My Sweet Mexico.

Alegrías (Happiness Candy)

Ingredients
1/2 cup chopped toasted pecans
1/2 cup chopped toasted peanuts
1/2 cup toasted pepitas (pumpkin seeds)
1/2 cup dark raisins
8 ounces chopped Mexican piloncillo (coarse brown sugar) or standard dark brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup honey
1/2 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon or lime juice
4 ounces puffed amaranth seeds

Equipment
Large bowl
Large spoon
15" X 10" X 1/2" baking sheet
Parchment paper
Medium sauce pan
Cutting board
Sharp knife

Preparation
Line the baking sheet with parchment paper. Combine the pecans, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, and raisins in a bowl and then spread them on the prepared pan.

Piloncillo, honey, and lemon juice in the pot.

Combine the piloncillo, honey, and lemon juice in a medium pot over medium heat and cook until the piloncillo has melted and the mixture has thickened slightly, about 5 to 10 minutes.

Squeezing the jugo de limón (lemon juice) into the mixture is simplicity itself if you are using a Mexican esprimador (lime squeezer). You can find one in metal or plastic at your local Latin market. The green fruit in the photo is a limón criollo (native limón)–you probably know it as Key lime. It's the most common lemon-limey citrus in Mexico, with a bright, acid taste. If you can find it in your market, try it rather than the ordinary yellow lemon. You'll love the extra tang. Just cut the limón in half, turn each cut side toward the holes in the squeezer, and squeeze the handles together.

Note to the cook: a plastic esprimador is probably cheaper to buy, but it will break. Metal will last forever. Mine–the one in the photo–is about 30 years old and going strong.

Remove the syrup from the heat and add the amaranth seeds, stirring quickly to mix everything well.

Mixing the cooked and thickened piloncillo, honey, and lemon juice mixture with the amaranth seeds.

The amaranth mixture, patted firmly into the parchment-lined baking sheet. Remember that the nuts and raisins are the topping–they're on the other side of the alegrías. Once this rectangle is completely cool, it will be firm and you will easily be able turn it over onto a cutting board.

Pour the amaranth mixture into the baking pan with the nuts, seeds, and raisins, and carefully press down with slightly dampened hands (so you don't burn yourself) to compact the mixture.

Allow to cool completely, 30 to 40 minutes at least, then invert onto a cutting board. Cut the mixture into the desired shapes with a sharp knife. If your mixture seems to be sticking to the knife, simply dip the knife into hot water, dry, and continue cutting.

Freshly made alegrías, ready to travel!

Mexico Cooks!' alegrías turned out overly crispy and difficult to cut, so instead of battling with the knife, I simply broke them into reasonable-size pieces and packed them in a tightly sealed container to travel the next day.

Were the alegrías a hit? They definitely were! Five of us crunched down almost all of them. We left all but a couple of the remaining pieces with Betty and her daughter, but we had to bring a little bit home. Minimal ingredients, minimal cooking, and maximal enjoyment: what more can you ask for from pre-conquest Mexico! Your family will love them and you can send a big thank you to Fany Gerson at My Sweet Mexico–and to Mexico Cooks!.

If you don't have your copy of the book yet, look over on the left-hand sidebar and just click on the book cover. That click will take you to My Sweet Mexico's Amazon.com page. Grab the book today and make your family a sweet Mexican treat as soon as it's in your kitchen.

And by all means visit our friends at Cocina al Natural. Their website and their videos are marvelous.

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

2 de March de 2019
San Judas Tadeo (Saint Jude Thaddeus) in Mexico City :: Searching for a Way Out of the Impossible

Mexico City's Templo San Hipólito, built starting in 1559 to commemorate the 1520 victory of the Mexica (later known as the Aztecs) over the Spanish invaders in a battle that became known as la Batalla de la Noche Triste (the Battle of the Sad Night), one of the worst defeats the Spanish suffered at the hands of the people they subsequently conquered. The church was finished late in the 17th century.

The church location has been a major influence in Mexico City since those early times. San Hipólito was the first patron saint of Mexico's capital city. Prior to the building of the church, the first mental hospital in the Americas, founded by Fray Bernardino Álvarez, stood on this corner. Today, Mexico City has a psychiatric hospital named for Fray Bernardino and located in Tlalpan, in the southern part of the city.

A prayer card image of St. Jude Thaddeus, patron saint of difficult or impossible causes. Your Catholic mother or grandmother–or maybe you yourself–might have an image like this tucked in your wallet or into a Bible.

Not your grandmother's version of St. Jude. Photo courtesy Tattoomuch.com.

Today, Templo San Hipólito is the site of enormous devotion to Saint Jude Thaddeus, known in Spanish as San Judas Tadeo. The most venerated statue of the saint in Mexico is here, and Mexico is deeply devoted to him and to his image. San Judas's feast day is celebrated on October 28 each year, when as many as 100,000 faithful converge on the small church. The huge number of faithful who visit their beloved saint–starting with the first Mass celebrated at midnight–inevitably cause chaotic traffic jams at the corner where the church is located, one of the busiest junctions in Mexico City.

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoEsO7rDFoA&w=420&h=315]
The video will give you an idea of Mexico City's tremendous devotion to the patron saint of impossible causes. That devotion to San Judas in Mexico City is so great that his feast day is celebrated not only on October 28 each year, but also on the 28th of every month. My first visit was one July 28, when a friend and I visited the saint on his day.

Merchandise sold by vendors around the perimeter of the church–merchandise like these rosaries–is often colored green, white, and gold, the traditional colors of San Judas's clothing.

My companion and I arrived at Templo San Hipólito relatively early, but people had been pouring into the church for each Mass of the day; on the 28th of every month, Masses are said on the hour, all day. This view, from outside the church entrance, did not prepare us for the packed sanctuary.

Once we entered the sanctuary, we were unable to advance beyond the half-way point due to the enormous number of people already inside. At the top middle of this photo, you see a very large statue of the Virgin Mary. Below her is San Judas.

Unlike predominately female crowds at Masses in other churches or at prayer services devoted to other saints, the majority of this crowd is male. While women are certainly present, you can see in the photo that the people in front of us were almost all male.

Custom here is to wrap a figure of San Judas in scarves, scapulars, beads, and medals. When I asked this woman, seated on a bench along the inside of the church, if I might take a picture of her statue, she said yes, but bowed her head to show him, not herself. It's also customary to take small gifts, such as the candy this woman is holding, to share with others at the church.

St. Mar
tín de Porres is also much-venerated in Mexico. This life-size statue of him, holding a real broom, is at one side of the San Hipólito interior. Notice that much of the broom straw has been broken off and taken by the faithful as mementos. Click on the photo (and any photo) to enlarge it.

This young man gave me permission to photograph him and his statue.

Many faithful parents dress their babies in the green, gold, and white colors of the saint. Usually they have made a vow to St. Jude to do this in thanks for a favor granted; oftentimes, the favor granted is the birth of a healthy child after a prolonged period of difficulty conceiving, or after complications of pregnancy.

The man who carried this elaborately wrapped statue during the entire Mass set it on a stone wall so that I could photograph it.

Vendors along the sidewalks sell every kind of St. Jude-related goods. People carry these candles into the church to be blessed, and then carry them home to light their personal altars dedicated to the saint.

We visited many of the booths selling figures of San Judas. The sizes range from about six inches high–like the ones at the left in the front row–to life size or larger. The seated figure just right of center represents Jesús Malverde, an 'informal' saint (one revered by the people but not a saint in the church). Jesús Malverde, a Sinaloa legend, is also known as the 'narco saint', the 'angel of the poor', or the 'generous bandit'. The green sign refers to the copitas (little goblets) filled with San Judas's seeds of abundance just above it. Each goblet with seeds costs 10 pesos. That's approximately 60 US cents, at today's exchange rate.

Feeling like your world is standing on its head and pulling yourself together is impossible? You might want to try a chat with St. Jude.

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

23 de February de 2019
Back to Restaurante Pasillo de Humo :: Two Years Old and Stronger Than Ever

Restaurante Pasillo de Humo, Mexico City: casa llena (full house) recently at midday. The name of the restaurant means "hall of smoke"; it's borrowed from the name of an iconic section of the 20 de noviembre market in the city of Oaxaca. In that section–the pasillo de humo–one chooses fresh meat from any of a number of butchers, who grill it for you on the spot, along with tail-and-all bulb onions. The "hall of smoke" is always smoky, and always delicious; vendors sell wonderful side dishes, the seating is in booths that line the hall's sides, and the diners' spirits are always alegre (joyful). The Mexico City restaurant, just over two years old, isn't filled with smoke, of course, but it's almost always filled with joyful eaters at every meal: desayuno (breakfast), comida (Mexico's midday main meal of the day), and cena (supper).

One butcher's grill in Oaxaca's Mercado 20 de noviembre, pasillo de humo.

Mexico Cooks! was at Restaurante Pasillo de Humo for comida with the above group on November 2018–easily the 50 or 60th meal I've eaten there during the year since the restaurant opened. Clockwise from bottom left: Mexico Cooks!, (standing) Rafael Mier, founder of the 330,000+ member strong Facebook group Tortilla de Maíz Mexicana, chef Alam Méndez Florián, Lourdes Rosas, and (seated) Alondra Maldonado, Nayarit-based author of the cookbook Sabores de Nayarit (Flavors of Nayarit) who also teaches Mexican cooking classes. The restaurant serves day in and day out what I consider to be the best food in Mexico City. Given that there are plus or minus 15,000 restaurants in this enormous city, that's really saying something.

Our group of four ordered four appetizers to share. The first to come to table were these Oaxacan molotes, small spheres of very ripe, sweet plantains, mashed and formed into spheres. The spheres are then stuffed with queso fresco (light, fresh cheese); the indentation for the cheese is covered with a smear of plantain pulp, and the spheres are fried until light golden brown, just as you see them in the photo. These are plated in a thin pool of delicious mole, scattered with queso fresco, and topped with thin watermelon radish slices and sprouts.

The second of our four appetizers: this is a fresh chile de agua ('water' chile, brought fresh from Oaxaca to Pasillo de Humo), slightly pickled, split open, and stuffed with marvelously seasoned shredded beef, then topped with pickled white onions.

Fresh chiles de agua for sale in a Oaxaca market. Their color range is from pale green to bright red, as you see in the photo.

Alam David Méndez Florián, the young chef at Pasillo de Humo, has been immersed since birth in a world of traditional Oaxacan cooks, their superb old-time recipes that continue to thrill our palates, and their determination to maintain the food legacy passed to them from their elders. His parents, Fidel Méndez Sosa and traditional cook Celia Florián, opened their family's restaurant Las 15 Letras in the city of Oaxaca more than 25 years ago, when little Alam was only two years old. He started helping in the restaurant when he was scarcely as tall as the broom he used to sweep and all but stood on a box to reach the sink where he washed dishes. He says, "When I was about 11 years old, I started doing more: I could make the agua fresca del día (the day's fresh fruit water) or a salsa. I realized then that I really, really liked the kitchen."

Mexico Cooks! with Celia Florián, chef Alam's mother and the inspiration for Restaurante Pasillo de Humo. Señora Florián is one of the most kind and loving people I know. Everyone who knows her considers her their dear friend, and I'm privileged to be in that group. She has two enormous gifts that anyone who knows her would tell you: that of truly being present to the person to whom she is speaking–and truly loving her native Oaxaca and its food and traditions.

Among other ingredients that grow or are made best in Oaxaca, chef Alam brings these jitomates riñon (kidney-shaped tomatoes), several kinds of special chiles, dried corn to be nixtamal-ized and made into tortillas in the restaurant, meats such as thinly sliced tasajo (seasoned beef) and cecina (seasoned pork) for tlayudas (large, thin Oaxaca corn tortillas stuffed with quesillo (Oaxaca cheese), made in Oaxaca, special herbs, asiento (a kind of deeply flavored pork lard that is smeared onto the tlayuda), and many other items that are impossible to find in Mexico City's markets–even those that carry the most exotic items. It's hard to write this paragraph–my mouth keeps watering!

We ordered four platillos fuertes (main dishes) to share. Delicious, tender, perfectly cooked roast chicken breast in a pool of el rey de los moles (the king of moles): Oaxaca mole negro (black mole), made with chile chilhuacle negro (dried black chile chilhuacle), brought to the restaurant from Oaxaca.

Premium first class chile chilhuacle in a Oaxaca market. The name on the sign is a spelling variation for this chile.

One of my very favorite dishes at Pasillo de Humo: the chef calls it an albóndiga, but meatball it's not. The crust is crushed corn and amaranth. Inside, it contains huahuazontle (a prehispanic vegetable similar to amaranth), quesillo (aka Oaxaca cheese), and slightly spicy chile. The almost tennis-ball size albóndiga is deep fried until golden and served in a dish of Oaxacan mole verde with fresh, still-crisp green beans, fresh snow peas, slices of chayote, and little edible sprouts. Be still my heart.

Third came pulpo en huaxmole (tender octopus in a chile costeño mole thickened with ground guaje seeds and served with tiny halved potatoes. Garnished with very thin watermelon radish slices and sprouts, this dish is perfectly prepared every time.

The long green pods are guajes (pronounced WAH-hehs), endemic to Oaxaca–and from which Oaxaca got its name. The seeds are removed for for thickening huaxmole. In the other dish? Tiny roasted chapulines (grasshoppers).

Chef Alam told me that in addition to his lifelong experience cooking with his mother, grandmother, and other family members, he studied professionally at the Instituto Culinario de México in Puebla, collaborating with chef Ángel Vázquez in the restaurant "Intro" for three years. Later, he competed as part of the National Junior Culinary Olympic Team, in Germany. When he finished his courses at the Instituto, he worked at the fabled two-Michelin-star restaurant Can Fabes in Barcelona, Spain and then at Arzak, in San Sebastian, which at the time had three Michelin stars.

In May 2014 chef Alam won "Most Promising Young Chef" in the competition Gastronómica Rivera del Duero, which took place in Mexico City. Later he worked as sous chef in the Hotel Santa Cruz Plaza in Chile. Sometime later he developed the kitchen and the menu for restaurant Don Porfirio in Guatemala and continued as its executive chef during its first year of operations. Following that, he was
production chef with Rosío Sánchez in her taco shop Hija de Sánchez in Copenhagen, just prior to starting Pasillo de Humo.

Just recently, he was nominated for "Most Promising Chef" in the 2017 Gourmet awards, as "up and coming chef" in Food & Travel México's 2017 Reader Awards, and as semifinalist in the San Pellegrino Young Chef 2018.

In addition to his work at Pasillo de Humo, chef Alam and a team of investors and assistants have just opened the new restaurant Urbano 116 in Alexandria, Virginia. But be assured that the deliciousness continues at Pasillo de Humo! Chef Alam and his mother, cocinera tradicional Celia Florián, are still "in the house" here in Mexico City: Alam one week, then a week of off-site supervision, then Sra. Florián for a week. I've been several times since mid-December and am here to tell you it's just as fantastic as always.

Chef Alam has become enormously accomplished in his relatively short career. It's a joy to see that he continues to credit his parents and his beginnings at home for so much of his success.

Some people say, "If it's dessert, it has to be chocolate." This tamal de chocolate definitely filled that bill. Plump and rich with Oaxacan chocolate, these tender, fluffy tamales are steamed in corn husks and served still hot. This was to have been our only shared dessert, paired with three flavors of house-made ice cream (a small scoop each of vanilla with chile, burned milk, and poleo (a Oaxacan herb), but suddenly the kitchen brought two extra desserts–oh, poor us!

Our second dessert: a traditional flan, about to be included in the menu at Pasillo de Humo. Creamy, made with cream cheese and not quite as light as the standard custard-style flan, this one knocked all our socks off.

This new dessert, coming soon to the menu at Pasillo de Humo, is an exquisite blend of crunchy, chewy, juicy, sweet, tart, and is fabulous. Chef Alam created it and named it xoconostle en tacha. He nixtamalizes the xoconostle, a tart and sour relative of Mexico's seasonal tuna (sweet cactus fruit), to firm up its texture; then he slowly cooks it in a piloncillo (Mexican raw sugar cones) and canela (cinnamon) flavored thick syrup until the sour fruit is permeated with the intensely sweet syrup. On the plate, he combines the now-sweet, slightly chewy xoconostle with juicy slices of pink and yellow grapefruit, crunchy "tierra" (the crumbly, buttery base), a bit of queso fresco, some crisp butter cookies, and a scoop of helado de guayaba (guava ice cream). Don't ask, okay? I could have licked the plate, and you'll want to as well.

Recently harvested xoconostles. You can easily see where the needle-sharp thorns have been removed from the fruit's skin.

In addition to wonderful food, Oaxaca (and Pasillo de Humo) are also renowned for mezcal, an alcoholic beverage distilled from earthen-oven baked maguey cactus. Before or after your meal, ask for the mezcal cart–a repurposed diablito (hand truck). Your server will pour you little sips of any mezcal you'd like to taste. When you choose the one you prefer, your serving will be bigger!

Provecho! You're going to fall in love with Restaurante Pasillo de Humo. Look around for me, it would be a pleasure to meet you.

Restaurante Pasillo de Humo
Upstairs at Parián Condesa
Av. Nuevo León 107, near the corner of Calle Michoacán
Colonia Hipódromo Condesa
Mexico City, Mexico
Telephone (from outside Mexico) 011-52-55-5211-7263
Reservations necessary and can only be made by phone.
Hours:
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday 9:00AM to 10:00PM
Thursday, Friday, Saturday 9:00AM to 11:00PM
Sunday: 9:00AM to 7:00PM

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

16 de February de 2019
The Traditional Mexican Kitchen :: Is It Authentic, or What?

I wrote and first published this article in 2010, in response to inquiries from readers who were confused about other authors' articles about "What is authentic Mexican food?" The subject has come up again and again, most recently in comments and queries from readers and food professionals about Mexican and other cuisines. I still stand behind what I wrote nearly 10 years ago.

"Real" Mexican chile relleno (stuffed, battered, and fried chile poblano), caldillo de jitomate (thin tomato broth), and frijoles negros (black beans). Notice that the chile is not suffocated with globs of melted cheese.

More and more people who want to experience "real" Mexican food are asking about the availability of authentic Mexican meals outside Mexico. Bloggers and posters on food-oriented websites have vociferously definite opinions on what constitutes authenticity. Writers' claims range from the uninformed (the fajitas at such-and-such a restaurant are totally authentic, just like in Mexico) to the ridiculous (Mexican cooks in Mexico can't get good ingredients, so Mexican meals prepared in the United States are superior to those in Mexico).

Much of what I read about authentic Mexican cooking reminds me of that old story of the blind men and the elephant. "Oh," says the first blind man, running his hands up and down the elephant's leg, "an elephant is exactly like a tree." "Aha," says the second, stroking the elephant's trunk, "the elephant is precisely like a hose." And so forth. I contend that if you haven't experienced what most writers persist in calling "authentic Mexican", then there's no way to compare any restaurant in the United States with anything that is prepared or served in Mexico. You're simply spinning your wheels.

It's my considered opinion that there is no such thing as one definition of authentic Mexican. Wait, before you start hopping up and down to refute that, consider that in my opinion, "authentic" is generally what you were raised to appreciate. Your mother's pot roast is authentic, but so is my mother's. Your aunt's tuna salad is the real deal, but so is my aunt's, and they're not the least bit similar. And Señora Martínez in Mexico makes yet another version of tuna salad, very different from any I've eaten in the USA.

Carne de puerco en salsa verde (pork meat in green sauce), a traditional recipe as served at the restaurant Fonda Margarita in Mexico City.

Carne de puerco en salsa verde from the Mexico Cooks! home kitchen. The preparation looks similar to that at Fonda Margarita, but I tweak a thing or two that make the recipe my personal tradition, different from the restaurant's.

As you can see, the descriptor I use for many dishes is 'traditional'. We can even argue about that adjective, but it serves to describe the traditional dish of–oh, say carne de puerco en chile verde–as served in the northern part of Mexico, in Mexico City, in the Central Highlands, or in the Yucatán. There may be big variations among the preparations of this dish, but each preparation is traditional and each is considered authentic in its region.

I think that in order to understand the cuisines of Mexico, we have to give up arguing about authenticity and concentrate on the reality of certain dishes.

A nearly 200-year-old tradition in Mexico that shows up every September: chiles en nogada (stuffed chiles poblano in a creamy sauce made with fresh (i.e., recently harvested) walnuts. It's the Mexican flag on your plate: green chile poblano, creamy white walnut sauce, and red pomegranate arils. But hoo boy–there are arguments to the death about the "authentic" way to prepare these chiles: battered or not battered? Put up your dukes! (I fall on the not-battered side, in case you wondered. God help me.)

Traditional Mexican cooking is not a hit-or-miss let's-make-something-for-dinner proposition based on "let's see what we have in the despensa (pantry)." Traditional Mexican cooking is as complicated and precise as traditional French cooking, with just as many hide-bound conventions as French cuisine imposes. You can't just throw some chiles and a glob of chocolate into a sauce and call it mole. You can't simply decide to call something "authentic" Mexican x, y, or z when it's not. There are specific recipes to follow, specific flavors and textures to expect, and specific results to attain. Yes, some liberties are taken, particularly in Mexico's new alta cocina mexicana (Mexican haute cuisine) and fusion restaurants, but even those liberties are based, we hope, on specific traditional recipes. As Alicia Gironella d'Angeli (a true grande dame of Mexico's kitchen) often said to me, "Cristina, you cannot de-construct a dish until you have learned to construct it." Amen.

In recent readings of food-oriented websites, I've noticed questions about what ingredients are available in Mexico. The posts have gone on to ask whether or not those ingredients are up to snuff when compared to what's available in what the writer believes to be more sophisticated food sources such as the United States.

Deep red, vine-ripened plum tomatoes, available all year long in central Mexico. The sign reads, "Don't think about it much–take home a little kilo!" At twelve pesos the kilo, these Mexico-grown tomatoes, brought to market red-ripe, cost approximately 75 cents USD for 2.2 pounds.

Surprise, surprise: most readily available fresh foods in Mexico's markets are even better than similar ingredients you find outside Mexico. Foreign chefs who tour with me to visit Mexico's stunning produce, fish, and meat markets are inevitably astonished to see that what is grown for the ordinary home-cook end user in Mexico is fresher, riper, more flavorful, more attractive, and much less costly than similar ingredients available in the United States.

Chicken, ready for the pot. The chickens raised in Mexico for our food are generally fed ground marigold petals mixed into their feed–that's why the flesh is so pink, the skin so yellow, and why the egg yolks are like big orange suns.

It's the same with most meats: pork and chicken are head and shoulders above what you find in North of the Border supermarkets. Fish and seafood are direct-from-the-sea fresh and distributed by air within just an hour or two from any of Mexico's long coastlines.

Look at the quality of Mexico's fresh, locally grown, seasonal strawberries–and the season starts right now, in February. Deep red to its center, a strawberry like this is hard to find in other countries.

Nevertheless, Mexican restaurants in the United States make do with the less-than-superior ingredients found outside Mexico. In fact, some downright delicious traditional Mexican meals can be had in some north of the border Mexican restaurants. Those restaurants are hard to find, though, because in the States, most of what has come to be known as Mexican cooking is actually Tex-Mex or Cal-Mex cooking. There's nothing wrong with Tex-Mex and Cal-Mex cooking, nothing at all. It's just not traditional Mexican cooking. Tex-Mex is great food from a particular region of the United States. Some of it is adapted from Mexican cooking and some is the invention of early Texas settlers. Some innovations are adapted from both of those points of origin. Fajitas, ubiquitous on Mexican restaurant menus all over the United States, are a typical Tex-Mex invention. Now available in some of Mexico's restaurants, fajitas are offered to the tourist trade as prototypically authentic.

Pozole blanco (white pozole) with delicious clear broth that starts with a a long-simmered whole pig's head, nixtamalized native white cacahuatzintle corn, and lots of tender, flavorful pork meat. Add to the pot some herbs and spices. Then add hunks of avocado at the table–along with a squeeze or two of limón criollo (you know it as Key lime), some crushed, dried Mexican oregano, crushed, dried chile de árbol, and, if you like, a tablespoon or two of mezcal. Traditional and heavenly!

You need to know that the best of Mexico's cuisines is not found in restaurants. It comes straight from somebody's mama's kitchen. Clearly not all Mexicans are good cooks, just as not all Chinese are good cooks, not all Italians are good cooks, and so forth. But the most traditional, the most (if you will) authentic Mexican meals are home prepared.

Diana Kennedy, UNAM 2011. Mrs. Kennedy was at the Mexican National Autonomous University to present her book, Oaxaca Al Gusto.

That reality is what made Diana Kennedy who she is today: she took the time to travel Mexico, searching for the best of the best of the traditional preparations. For the most part, she didn't find them in fancy restaurants, homey comedores (small commercial dining rooms) or fondas (tiny working-class restaurants). She found them as she stood facing the stove in a home kitchen, watching doña Fulana prepare desayuno (breakfast), comida (the midday main meal of the day), or cena (supper) for her family. Ms. Kennedy, an English woman, took the time to educate her palate, understand the ingredients, taste what was offered to her, and learn, learn, learn from home cooks before she started putting traditional recipes, techniques, and stories on paper. If we take the time to prepare recipes from any of Ms. Kennedy's many cookbooks, we too can take advantage of her wealth of experience and can come to understand what traditional Mexican cooking can be. Her books will bring Mexico's kitchens to you when you are not able to go to Mexico. But please: do follow the recipes, or your dish will come out different from what it is supposed to be.

My dear friend Abigail Mendoza, cocinera tradicional (traditional home cook) from Teotitlán del Valle, Oaxaca, prepares a vat of mole negro (black mole, the king of moles) for a large party she invited me to attend at her home.

In order to understand the cuisines of Mexico, we need to experience their riches. Until that time, we can argue till the cows come home and you'll still be just another blind guy patting the beast's side and exclaiming how the elephant is mighty like a wall.

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

9 de February de 2019
The Feast of La Candelaria :: Time for Tamales!

I wrote this article in February, 2014. Today I republish it in memory of my dear friend, Edmundo Escamilla Solis, so loved by so many, and whose knowledge of all things Mexico had no bounds. He lived and breathed the history of this country in all of its aspects, he was a magnificent and educated eater, and he went on before us on December 13, 2018. Missed beyond measure.

Mexico Cooks!' dear friends Edmundo Escamilla Solís (L) and Yuri de Gortari Krauss. Between them, Yuri and Mundo know more about Mexico's history and its cuisines than most of the rest of our friends put together. I can't imagine that anyone would disagree. Photo courtesy wradio.com.mx. All photos by Mexico Cooks! unless otherwise noted.

A number of years ago, mutual friends introduced Mexico Cooks! to Edmundo Escamilla and Yuri de Gortari. Within minutes, it was obvious that I was in the presence of two of Mexico's treasures. Far from being museum pieces or distant ruins, these men are a vibrant, living storehouse of this country's past and present. Today, I am honored to count Mundo and Yuri among my very good friends. We don't see one another as often as any of us would like–they're busy, I'm busy–but the moments we spend together are precious.

The double stairway into the Escuela de Gastronomía Mexicana (Esgamex, School of Mexican Gastronomy), Colonia Roma, Distrito Federal. Since 1990, Yuri and Mundo have dedicated themselves to an in-depth study of Mexico's gastronomy; after running a restaurant and catering company, they founded the school in 2007. Esgamex is unique among culinary schools in Mexico, teaching not only Mexico's regional and national cuisines, but also teaching Mexico's history, art, and culture. Although the school offers no program leading to a culinary degree, it continues to attract students who want to learn traditional recipes from the best teaching team in the city.

A few weeks ago, I received an invitation from Yuri and Mundo–please come share our tamaliza (tamales party) on the night of February 2, el Día de la Candelaria (Candlemas Day). An intimate circle of friends gathered in homage to a close friend of our hosts, who had passed away. In her honor, we ate tamales–and more tamales–five varieties in all.

First were tamales de cambray, from Chiapas. These corn masa (dough) tamales, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed, were savory and delicious.

Tamal de cambray unwrapped. Each tamal was small enough to leave us hungry for the ones that followed.

The tamal de cambray cut open to show its savory filling.

Why tamales on this particular date? Tradition in Mexico has it that if your slice of the rosca de reyes–Three Kings cake, eaten on January 6, the Feast of the Epiphany–has a wee Niño Dios (Baby Jesus) in it, you must give a party on February 2, the Feast of the Candelaría. On the menu? Tamales! Tamales for everyone who was at the party for the Kings, when you bit your slice of cake and oops! A mouth full of Baby Jesus!

This rectangular, flat tamal de cazón is filled with flaked and seasoned baby shark flesh. It's a specialty of the state of Campeche.

A marvelously spicy salsa made with chile habanero accompanied the tamal de cazón.

The next three varieties of tamales looked almost identical to one another. Each was wrapped in corn husks and steamed–but despite appearances, each was very different from the other. The first variety was a tamal de pollo, frutas, y verduras (chicken, fruit, and vegetables) from the state of Sinaloa. The second was our first sweet tamal of the evening. A tamal from the state of Colima, its masa is prepared with mixed corn and rice flours as well as dried coconut. The sweet filling is a mix of various dried and crystallized chopped fruits.

The last (but definitely not the least!) tamal was a tamal de almendra (almond). The masa contains not only corn and rice flours and sugar, but also blanched, peeled, and finely ground almonds. The almonds both sweeten and give texture to the masa. And sweet surprise!, the tamal is filled with sweet crema pastelera (pastry cream). If we had had one inch of space in our stomachs, we each would definitely have eaten two of these!

[youtube=://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HonJ3sz8HOw&w=420&h=220]
Here's Yuri de Gortari, teaching the proper way to prepare tamales de almendra. Even if you don't understand all of the Spanish-language instructions, you'll be fascinated by his teaching manner as well as his techniques. And his lovely speaking voice is simply hypnotizing.

When our group finished eating, we stayed for hours in the sobremesa–the after-dinner conversation that is frequently as delicious and nourishing as the food itself. What better way to enjoy an evening than in the company of precious friends, sharing ideas, feelings, and loving laughter? Next year, have a tamaliza at your home on February 2, invite your friends, and deepen your love and appreciation for one another–and of course for the marvelous cuisines of Mexico.

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2 de February de 2019