Category: Recipe

XIº Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales de Michoacán: Michoacán’s Eleventh Festival of Traditional Cooks, Part Two

Today's article is the continuation of Mexico Cooks!' report about the Eleventh Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales de Michoacán that took place April 3, 4, and 5, 2014. If you haven't had the chance to look at the May 10, 2014 article about the festival, you might like to jump back a week and read it, too.

The focus of Mexico Cooks!' articles about Michoacán's early April 2014 festival of 'las cocineras' (the cooks) is the presentations given by some of the Purépecha participants, as well as other talks given by professionals in Mexico's culinary and cultural worlds.

Maestra cocinera (master cook) Cecilia Bernabé Constancio, from San Lorenzo, Michoacán, receives her official recognition after giving a talk about how Purépecha women cure (prepare for cooking) clay pots. She told her audience that she learned to cure clay pots from her mother, who learned from her mother before her.

The entrance to San Lorenzo, Michoacán, where both Benedicta Alejo Vargas and Ceci Bernabé live and cook. Click to enlarge the image for a better view. Photo courtesy Panoramio.

Maestra Ceci Bernabé explained that when a woman buys a new olla or cazuela (two types of clay cooking pots), she first puts water in her new pot and puts it on the wood fire at home. If the pot can withstand a full rolling boil for 20 minutes and not break, it's good enough to use for cooking.

Demonstration setup of a new cazuela (shallow cooking dish), coated with cal (builder's lime) paste and ready to be cured. The cazuela is sitting in an anafre (a kind of brazier). The firebox is inside the square metal box under the brazier; the black rectangle is its opening. Unfortunately (or fortunately!) no one was allowed to have a fire under the canvas roof where the audience was seated. If you click on the photo to enlarge it, it is easier to see the thick cal paste.

Maestra Ceci told us that after she smears the cal paste thickly on the outside of the new pot, she asks the fire's permission to cure the cazuela. She then places the pot in the fire and leaves it for 20 to 30 minutes, long enough for the cal paste to harden and burn. She then removes the pot from the heat, cools it, and brushes off the cal. The pot is then ready for use.

Whole fish frying in a well-used cazuela. Foreigners sometimes buy these clay pots as souvenirs and are nervous about using them on a gas stove. Remember that the heat of the wood-fired kiln where the pot was made is higher than the heat of your stove. Try it, the clay gives a flavor depth to your food that metal can't offer. A clay pot that is glazed like this one, without colorful paint, contains no lead.

Newly made wooden cooking utensils like these, made of Michoacán pine, also need to be cured prior to using. Otherwise their strong pine scent can leach into the food you are preparing. Although you will see recommendations on the Internet for sanding your utensils and then curing them with oil, Doña Ceci uses a thin mix of cal and water. She places new utensils in the mix and heats them for several minutes, then washes the cal away with clean water.

After giving us these instructions, Maestra Ceci talked to her audience about her early life. She recalled, "I often talked to my abuelo (grandfather) about our ancient Purépecha history. In time, I came to realize that the Earth is my mother, and that all of her elements–air, fire, earth, and water–are necessary to life and worthy of respect. Without them, we don't exist.

"Our traditional diet is very healthy and all natural. Our cooking comes from our ancestors. My grandfather told me that the cabildos (town officials) ate first from the table, ate fish and other meats, and that the rest of us ate with or without meat, depending on what we had. During Lent and especially on Good Friday, we eat a lot of nopales (cactus paddles). The spines of the cactus paddles represent our people in mourning."

A plate of freshly fried charales, small freshwater fish that are fried whole in a cazuela and eaten during Lent and the rest of the year as well.

Maestra cocinera Antonina González Leandro holds a platter of fried uarhashi, the root of the chayote plant. Nothing in the Purépecha kitchen is wasted. After chayote is harvested, its roots are dug up and cooked. The root is a Lenten delicacy in the Purépecha kitchen. It certainly was! Maestra Antonina gave me a small slice to taste; later I ordered a plateful, served in a sauce of tomato and nopales. The Purépecha name of this delicious dish is uarhashi apopurhi.

Next week: Part Three of the Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales de Michoacán. We'll be spending time with copper artist Ana Pellicer and with jefe de cocina Yuri de Gortari and historian Edmundo Escamilla. Don't miss their fascinating points of view.

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10 de May de 2014
XIº Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales de Michoacán: Michoacán’s Eleventh Festival of Traditional Cooks
[youtube=://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vlNbX2ZhbQ&w=420&h=236]
Whether you understand Spanish or not, the video will give you a marvelous feel for the extraordinary XI Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales de Michoacán, which took place in Morelia, Michoacán over the weekend of April 3, 4, and 5, 2014. The festival is known more commonly as the Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán.

Since 2007, Mexico Cooks! has been honored to be part of this conference, Mexico's most remarkable festival of traditional cooking. Affectionately known simply as "Las Cocineras" (the cooks), it's part love-fest, part food-fest, part culture-fest, and entirely about traditional indigenous cooking in the west-central Mexican state, Michoacán.

Because of its enormous popularity, the Las Cocineras will have two editions in 2014. The first, celebrated during 2014's Lenten season, took as its theme "Sabores de Cuaresma" (Lenten Flavors). A committee from the artisan town Tzintzuntzan decorated the stage as if it were a traditional Altar de Dolores, an altar dedicated to Our Lady of Sorrows. The second edition this year will take place on October 4, 5, and 6. Click on any image to enlarge it for a better view.

Left to right: Cynthia Martínez Becerril, president of the festival organizing committee; Ana Compeán Reyes Spíndola, representative of the national Secretary of Tourism offices (SECTUR) in Morelia; and Francisco José de la Vega Aragón, Director General de Innovación de Producto Turístico de la SECTUR Federal, immediately following the formal inauguration of the April festivities.

In November 2010, UNESCO awarded its Intangible cultural heritage designation to Mexico's cuisine: Traditional Mexican Cuisine – Ancestral, Ongoing Community Culture, The Michoacán Paradigm. The title is based in large part on this annual event and the manner in which it reflects Michoacán's culinary and cultural heritage. Due to the undisputed and unique importance of this festival to Mexico as a whole, representatives from Mexico's state and national tourism offices were present all weekend.

Now let's celebrate!

Maestra cocinera (master cook) Benedicta Alejo Vargas from San Lorenzo, Michoacán, indubitably the best-known Purépecha cook in the world, is giving a demonstration of the preparation of corundas de siete picos (seven-pointed corundas) while her granddaughter, nearly-four-year-old Imelda, watches.

To the far right of the photo you can see a bundle of oak twigs that are used at the base of the steamer to keep the corundas out of boiling water during the steaming process. In front of maestra Benedicta is a bowl of masa and another bowl of dough balls ready to be wrapped in leaves. To the far left in the photo, that tall object is dried corn leaves, wrapped with a cord for storage. Dried corn leaves are reconstituted for use during the season when fresh leaves are not available.

Corundas, a Purépecha-region specialty, are in this case corn tamales shaped like pyramids, wrapped in long corn leaves (center in the photograph above), and steamed. They can have three, five, or seven points–but popurlar opinion is that maestra Benedicta is the only person capable of consistently making them with seven points!

Maestra Benedicta's corundas con verduras (with vegetables), topped with col de árbol and tzirita. Corundas can be prepared as tontas (corn masa without filling), made with finely chopped vegetables incorporated into the masa (in this case, corn dough) as pictured above, or stuffed with chile strips and cheese.

When I met maestra Benedicta and most of the other traditional cooks, they did not speak Spanish, were shy and retiring, and were generally afraid to speak in public. Today, Benedicta and many of the others are internationally known, speak both Purépecha and near-fluent Spanish. The Encuentro's benefits to these women, most of whom live in distant rural outposts of Michoacán, include the self esteem that comes from being recognized and valued for their enormous contribution to their communities, their state, and their country.

Maestra Benedicta recently told a story of a woman who was standing in the long line at her Encuentro stand. She suggested that the woman buy food from the cocinera at the next stand, saying, "Her food is just like mine. We are making similar things." The woman shook her head. "The other cocinera doesn't speak Spanish." The maestra answered, "But the food speaks for itself."

This small representation of the Virgin Mary, ensconced in a flower-adorned niche at the top of Benedicta's stand, is dressed in typical Purépecha clothing, all made by Benedicta. Notice that her apron is hand-embroidered with typical clay jugs. In 2012, this Virgin traveled to the Vatican with a delegation of artisans and officials from the state of Michoacán, including Benedicta. She and a team of assistants prepared a typical Purépecha dinner for 900 people, including Pope Benedict XVI. Maestra Benedicta was thrilled to cook for her tocayo (namesake). Maestra Benedicta recently laughed as she told a group, "I never thought that I would leave my home in little San Lorenzo, but now–now I feel like a swallow, flying here and there."

Maestra cocinera Juanita Bravo Lázaro from Angahuan, Michoacán gave a fascinating talk about the nixtamal-ization of corn. Among her points were:
- the importance of choosing the very best mazorcas (ears of dried cacahuatzintle corn)
- taking the dried corn from the cob using a lava stone
- processing the corn in a new clay pot that has been freshly cured with cal (builder's lime)
She also elaborated on the use of ceniza (wood ash) and a bit of cal in the corn's cooking water and the carefully watched 20-30 minute time that the corn simmers over a slow wood fire. She emphasized the yellow color that the corn takes on during its cooking and the importance of washing, rinsing, and overnight soaking of the finished nixtamal to remove all traces of both cal and wood ash.

Maestra Juanita mentioned that five liters of prepared nixtamal renders approximately 100 small corundas. In advance of weddings and other important fiestas, townswomen gather and together prepare many hundreds of corundas.

As part of her talk, Maestra Juanita shared some of her experiences in Nairobi, Kenya, during November 2010, when Mexico was a contender for the UNESCO Intangible cultural heritage designation. She talked about how difficult it was for her to leave her home and family and travel halfway around the world to a place she had never seen and had barely heard about. She said, "I hated to leave my family behind. I knew that there would be very few of us Mexicans at the event in Africa, and I knew I would not be able to understand much of the language used there. I was nervous about flying all that distance. But I wanted to be there, in case my country received the prize. So I set aside my fears and took the chance.

"I was standing with a group of people, trying to figure out what the dignitaries were saying–but I couldn't hear much or understand what was going on. Suddenly I heard a huge shout, people were screaming and clapping. 'What? What happened?' I kept asking." Finally someone who spoke Spanish said, 'You won the award! Mexico WON!' And then I felt so proud, so happy to be part of it all. It was a joyous day and I was so happy to be there, representing my town, my state, and my country in Africa."

Next week, we'll continue our exploration and celebration at the XIº Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales de Michoacán. There are many stories left to tell and a lot more to enjoy.

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3 de May de 2014
Comida Mexicana para La Cuaresma: Special Mexican Food for Lent

Ash Wednesday, which marks the beginning of Lent, was March 5, 2014. The following article has been very popular as a reference since it was first published on Mexico Cooks! in 2009. So many people want to know what we eat in Mexico when we're not eating meat! Enjoy…and buen provecho!

Tortitas de papa (potato croquettes, left) and frijoles negros (black beans, right) from the south of Mexico are 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 on the Fridays of 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.

Ash Wednesday, February 22, marked the beginning of Lent in 2012. 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, is in season at this time of year. Although it looks a little like rosemary, its taste is relatively sour, more like verdolagas (purslane).

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.

Tortita de calabacita (little squash fritter) from the sorely missed Restaurante Los Comensales in Morelia, Michoacán. Mexico Cooks! featured the restaurant (the name means 'The Diners') in October 2009. Less than a year after our interview with her, Señora Catalina Aguirre Camacho, the owner of Los Comensales since 1980, became too elderly and incapacitated to continue to operate her wonderful restaurant. This dish is wonderful for a Lenten supper.

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 in Morelia in December 2008. The dish would be ideal for an elegant Lenten dinner.

Capirotada (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!

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.

CAPIROTADA

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, 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.

Cool the capirotada at room temperature. Do not cover until it is cool; even then, leave the top ajar.

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

A positive thought for the remainder of Lent: give up discouragement, be an optimist.

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22 de March de 2014
Adobo de Cerdo Huasteco, from Verde Blanco y Rojo by Ricardo Muñoz Zurita

Originally published in October 2011, this illustrated recipe for Adobo de Cerdo Huasteco is a perfect meal for February's cold weather. Mexico Cooks! celebrates its seventh anniversary of publishing with this delicious meal to warm body and soul. Enjoy!

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 months 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 new and 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.

Serving-size pieces of maciza de cerdo (lean, fresh pork leg) simmering with onion and garlic.

My wife 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 had 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 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 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.

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
6 tsp salt
8 chiles guajillo
5 large chiles ancho
3 large tomatos, 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 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. 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 turn black, 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 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 two tablespoons of salt. 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.

Serves 12.

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 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 Restaurante Azul/Condesa.

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8 de March de 2014
Mexico’s Home-Made Hash: Deliciously Spicy Picadillo for Your Winter Table

Originally published in June 2013, this recipe for really scrumptious picadillo (pee-cah-DEE-yoh) looks complicated but is really very simple. It makes enough for about six generous servings when paired with steamed white rice. It's a delicious addition to your winter recipe rotation.

Elisabeth Lambert Ortiz (1915-2003), a proper British woman married to Mexican diplomat César Ortiz Tinoco, learned Mexican cuisine in Mexico City, her husband's home town. She published her wonderful The Complete Book of Mexican Cooking in 1967, which introduced the English-speaking world to some of the regional cuisines of Mexico. I've cooked from this ever more raggedy, taped-together, yellowing, food-stained, still-magical paperback edition since the middle 1970s, starting years before I moved to Mexico. The first truly Mexican recipe I ever prepared was picadillo, from Elisabeth Lambert Ortiz's book. It's Mexico's traditional home-style hash.

The ingredients for picadillo are available in almost any supermarket. Starting with the bowl of ground beef and pork at lower left in the photograph and moving clockwise, you see the raw meat, Mexican cinnamon sticks, bright orange carrots all but hidden in the dish, chiles serrano, Roma tomatoes, white potatoes, a Red Delicious apple, raisins and dried cranberries, freshly dried hoja de laurel (bay leaves), a whole white onion, and, in the little dish in the right-center foreground, freshly dried Mexican oregano. I dried the bay leaves and the oregano myself, but you can make substitutions: use ground cinnamon rather than the cinnamon sticks, store-bought bay leaves, and the oregano you normally use instead of the Mexican type; the rest of the ingredients are commonplace.

Minced chile serrano and diced white onion.

Hash of all kinds is one of the most comfortable of comfort foods, and the hash called picadillo (the word means 'a little something chopped-up') is simply Mexico's slightly more rambunctious cousin. This picadillo recipe is always forgiving, always flexible. Prepare it with ground beef, ground pork, or a combination of the two meats. Use more potatoes, fewer carrots, an extra tomato (or two, if the ones you have are quite small). Don't care for olives? Leave them out. But by all means do try picadillo: it's a far cry from your mother's canned corned beef hash.

More ready-to-cook raw ingredients, left to right: diced tomatoes; peeled, diced apple; peeled, diced carrots. For size comparison's sake, the knife blade is 10.5" long.

Ingredients
1 kilo (2.2 lbs) ground pork, ground beef, or a combination of the two
3 large, ripe Roma tomatoes, diced
3 fresh chiles serrano, minced (Use less chile if your tolerance for picante (spiciness) is low.)
1 clove garlic, minced
1 medium-large white onion, peeled and diced
4 medium carrots, peeled and diced
1 or 2 large Red Delicious apples OR 1 or 2 large, ripe Bartlett pears OR one of each, peeled and diced
4 medium white potatoes, peeled and diced
1 cup large green olives, with or without pimento, sliced
3/4 cup raisins, a combination of yellow and dark
1 tsp dried oregano, Mexican if you have it
3 large bay leaves
2" piece of Mexican cinnamon stick OR big pinch of ground cinnamon
1 dried clove, pulverized
Freshly rendered pork lard OR vegetable oil, as needed
Sea salt to taste
Beef, chicken, or pork stock, or water, as needed

Sliced large green pimento-stuffed olives. Each of these olives measures a bit more than one inch long prior to slicing. Slice them in thirds or quarters.

Equipment
A large pot with a cover. I use a 4-quart enameled casserole.
Cutting board
Sharp knife
Large wooden spoon

Preparation
Heat 3 Tbsp lard or vegetable oil in your cooking pot until it shimmers. Add the onion and chile and sauté over medium fire until the onion is translucent. Add the ground meat and continue to sauté over medium fire until the meat is no longer pink. Break the meat into bite-size chunks as it sautés. Add the rest of the ingredients.

After sautéeing the onion, chile, and meat, add the rest of the solid ingredients to the pot and stir to incorporate them all. Then add stock or water; the liquid should come to about 1/3 of the way up from the bottom of the pot. Enlarge any photo for a bigger view; you'll be able to see that I used a combination of raisins and dried cranberries. I had about a quarter cup of dried cranberries on hand; a neighbor loaned me the raisins to make up the difference in measurement. The section at the bottom of the photo is blurred due to rising steam.

Cover the pot, leaving the cover just slightly ajar. Lower the heat to its lowest. Set your kitchen timer for 30 minutes and go do something else! When the timer rings, check the pot for liquid. If the picadillo has absorbed most of the original liquid, add the same amount again. With the cover ajar, continue to cook over a very low flame for another 30 minutes and correct for salt. Voilá! It's picadillo, ready to serve!

Picadillo, ready to serve after an hour's cooking. This amount of picadillo will serve 6 to 8 hungry people when served over steamed white rice or Mexican red rice. I like to prepare the picadillo recipe, serve it as our main meal, and save the rest to re-heat and serve the next day. If anything, it is even better after a night's rest–but then, aren't we all? After the second day, whatever picadillo is left freezes beautifully.

Delicious, spicy picadillo, served over rice. You and your family will love this traditional Mexican meal. By all means let me know how it goes over at your house. A huge thank you to Elisabeth Lambert Ortiz.

Provecho! (Good eating!)

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15 de February de 2014
Tamaliza (Tamales Feast) with Dear Friends on February 2: El Día de la Candelaria

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.

Several years ago, mutual friends introduced Mexico Cooks! to Edmundo Escamilla and Yuri de Gortari. Within minutes, we realized that we were 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, my wife and I are honored to count Mundo and Yuri among our dearest friends. We don't see one another as often as any of us would like–they're busy, we're 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, my wife and 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.

This rectangular, flat tamal de cazón is filled with flaked baby shark meat. 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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8 de February de 2014
A Feast for February 2: Tamales, Tamales, and Tamales!

Tamales in the tamalera (the steamer) at Tamalería (tamales shop) Méndez, on the street at the corner of Av. Baja California and Av. Insurgentes, Colonia Condesa, Distrito Federal. You can see that the tamalera is divided into three sections. Each section can hold a different kind of tamal (that's the word for ONE of a group of tamales). In this case, the tamales at the bottom left of the photo are Oaxaqueños (Oaxaca-style). On the right of the divider are tamales rojos (with a red chile sauce) and tamales de mole (both with pork meat). The third section of the tamalera holds just-out-of-sight tamales verdes (with chicken, in green chile sauce) and tamales con rajas y queso (with cheese and strips of chile poblano).

Older than an Aztec pyramid and fresh as this morning’s breakfast, a pot of newly-steamed tamales whets Mexico City’s appetite like nothing else in town. Dating to pre-Hispanic times—most historians say tamales date to the time before the Christian era—the tamales of New Spain (now Mexico) were first documented in the Florentine Codex, a mid-16th century research project crafted by Spanish Franciscan monk Fray Bernadino Sahagún.

Traditionally, tamales are made by hand, not by machine. At first, they seem to be exhaustingly labor-intensive and difficult. Just as with most wonderful food, once you learn the techniques and tricks of making the various styles, they're not so hard to prepare–and they are so worth the time and effort! Here, Carmen Titita Ramírez Degollado, owner of Mexico City's Restaurante El Bajío, preparaes masa cocida (cooked corn dough) for her special tamales pulacles from Papantla, Veracruz.

The ancients of the New World believed that humankind was created from corn. Just as in pre-history, much of Mexico’s traditional and still current cuisine is based on corn, and corn-based recipes are still creating humankind. A daily ration of corn tortillas, tacos, and tamales keeps us going strong in the Distrito Federal, Mexico’s capital city of more than twenty million corn-craving stomachs.  Tamales are created from dried corn reconstituted with builder’s lime and water. The corn is then ground and beaten with lard or other fat into a thick, smooth masa (dough). Filled with sauce and a bit of meat or vegetable, most tamales are wrapped in dried corn husks or banana leaves and steamed, to fill Mexico City’s corn hunger and keep her hustling.

Tamal-to-be: cut the banana leaf to the size and shape of the tamal you're making, then lightly toast each leaf. On the banana leaf, place a layer of masa, a strip of hoja santa (acuyo) leaf, and a big spoonful or two of cooked, shredded chicken in a sauce of chile guajillo, onion, and garlic.

Every year on February 2, Mexico celebrates el Día de la Candelaria (Candlemas Day) with tamales on the table. Tradition dictates that if your Three Kings Day slice of the rosca de reyes contains the figure of the Niño Dios (Christ Child), you are in charge of throwing the tamales party on Candelaria. Late in January, there are festivals and fairs in Mexico devoted to the multiple kinds of regional tamales available all over the country. From southernmost Oaxaca with its flat tamales wrapped in hoja de plátano (banana leaves) to Sinaloa's tamales barbones stuffed with shrimp, Candelaria means tamales!

Mexico’s capital city makes it easy to buy tamales any time the craving hits you. Every day of the week, nearly five million riders pack the Metro (the city’s subway system) and are disgorged into approximately 200 Metro stations. At any given Metro stop, a passenger is likely to find a tamales vendor. Her huge stainless steel tamalera (tamales steamer) hisses heartily over a low flame until the tamales are sold out. Each steamer can hold as many as two hundred tamales, and the vendor may preside over two or three or more of these vats.

Titita folds the tamal so that the banana leaf completely wraps the masa and filling.

Hungry students on the way to and from classes, office workers with no time to eat breakfast at home, construction workers looking for a mid-morning pick-me-up: all line up at their favorite vendor’s spot on the sidewalk closest to a Metro exit. Near the vibrant Chilpancingo Metro station at the corner of Av. Insurgentes and Av. Baja California, Sra. María de los Ángeles Chávez Hernández sells tamales out of two huge pots. “Qué le doy?”  (‘What’ll you have?’) she raps out without ceremony to every hungry comer. The choices: rojo  (with pork and spicy red chile); verde (with chicken and even spicier green chile); rajas con queso (strips of chile poblano with melting white cheese); mole (a thick spicy sauce with a hint of chocolate); some Oaxaca-style tamales wrapped in banana leaves; and dulce (sweet, usually either pineapple or strawberry). The stand sells about 200 tamales a day. Sra. Chávez’s father, Ángel Méndez Rocha, has been selling tamales on this corner for more than 60 years. Even at age 80, he alternates weeks at the stand with his brother, selling tamales by the hundreds.

The masa and filling are centered in the banana leaf. Titita is simultaneously pressing the masa toward the middle of the leaf and folding each end of the banana leaf toward the middle.

The pair of tamales in the center of the photo are filled with chicken and chile guajillo sauce. The tamal closest to the bottom is made with black beans crushed with dried avocado leaves. Avocado leaves give a delicious anise flavor and fragrance to the beans. These tamales are ready to be steamed in the tamalera.

The tamal de chile guajillo, fresh out of the tamalera and unwrapped on my plate.

A specialty breakfast, unique to Mexico City, is the guajolota: a steaming hot tamal, divested of its corn husks and plopped into a split bolillo, a dense bread roll. Folks from outside Mexico City think this combo is crazy, but one of these hefty and delicious carbohydrate bombs will easily keep your stomach filled until mid-afternoon, when Mexico eats its main meal of the day. When I asked Sra. Chávez Hernández about the name of the sandwich, she laughed. “Nobody knows why this sandwich is called guajolota—the word means female turkey. But everybody wants one!”

If you'd rather take your tamales home to eat them, Sra. Chávez of Tamalería Méndez or her employee, Sra. Lucina Montel, will gladly wrap them in paper and send them along in a bag.

For steaming tamales, the bottom portion of a tamalera is filled with water. Add a coin to the water and put the tamales vertically into the steamer, atop the perforated base that rests just above the water. When the water boils, the coin will rattle. When the rattle slows or stops, add more water.

Tamales can be a massive guajolota to eat on the street or the most delicate, upscale meal in a restaurant. These, prepared by chef Gerardo Vázquez Lugo of Restaurante Nicos, are a degustación (tasting) at the Escuela de Oficios Gastronómicos operated by online magazine Culinaria Mexicana, where chef Vázquez recently offered a workshop teaching the history, ingredients, and preparation of tamales. From left to right, the four tamales are: carnitas de pato en salsa de cítricos y chile chipotle (shredded duck confit in a citrus and chile chipotle sauce), tamal de tzotolbichay (with the herb chaya), tamal de mole negro (black mole),and tamal de frijol (beans).

Chef Gerardo Vázquez Lugo of Mexico City's Restaurante Nicos.

In addition to being daily sustenance, tamales are a fiesta, a party. In Mexico City and every other part of Mexico, Christmas isn’t Christmas without tamales for the late-night family feasting on Christmas Eve. Gather the women of the family together, grab the neighbors, and the preparation of tamales becomes a party called a tamalada. Mexico City chef Margarita Carrillo tells us, “Mexican grandmothers from time immemorial say that the first ingredient for great tamales is a good sense of humor.  Tamales like it when you sing while you prepare them, they love to hear a little friendly gossip while you work, and if you make tamales in the good company of your family and friends, they’re sure to turn out just the way you want them: with fluffy, richly flavored corn dough on the outside and a delicious filling on the inside.”

A small and elegant tamal de chocolate for dessert, prepared by Restaurante Nicos for the tamales workshop.

Señora Elia Rodríguez Bravo, specialty cook at the original Restaurante El Bajío, strains masa cocida for tamales. She gently shook a wooden spoon at me as she proclaimed, “You can’t make tamales without putting your hands in the masa (corn dough). Your hand knows what it feels. Your hand will tell you when the masa is beaten smooth, when the tamales are well-formed in their leaves, and when they have steamed long enough to be ready to eat. Your hand knows!”

Señora María de los Ángeles Chávez Hernández (left) and her longtime employee Señora Lucina Montel (right) sell tamales at the street booth Tamalería Méndez seven days a week. They and Sra. Chávez's staff prepare hundreds of tamales every night, for sale the next day.

Let's go on a Mexico City tamales tour! Let Mexico Cooks! know when you're ready, and we'll be on our way.

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25 de January de 2014
Qué Rico! Caldo de Pollo: Chicken Soup, Mexican Style

First published about four years ago, this is by far the most popular of Mexico Cooks!' nearly 400 archived articles. Caldo de pollo is especially popular during the winter months, but anytime is the right time for a steaming, delicious bowlful. There's just something wonderful about comfort food, no matter what culture prepares it.

Seasoning ingredients for preparing the caldo (broth) for Mexican caldo de pollo (chicken soup). Clockwise from top right in the photo: unpeeled carrots, white onions, chiles serranos, garlic, fresh bay leaves, cilantro, and thyme. I also added a big sprig of fresh hierbabuena (mint)and a small sprig of fresh epazote (wormweed). If you can't find fresh epazote, leave it out. The dried variety adds no flavor to any of your recipes.

There are few meals more undeniably Mexican than delicious, home-made caldo de pollo (Mexico's marvelous take on chicken soup with fresh vegetables). During the winter, when the temperature is chilly, what better to warm us from the inside out than Mexico's traditional, rich, delicious caldo de pollo (chicken soup)? You who live in even colder countries will love it as much as we do. Nothing could be simpler to prepare. The ingredients are easy to obtain, the broth all but cooks itself, and the final preparations are a snap.

This beautiful chicken weighed approximately 5.5 pounds before cooking.

Mexico's chickens are perfectly suited to caldo de pollo. Yellow skin and pink flesh create a fragrantly savory stock. If you've traveled to Mexico and visited our markets, you may have wondered why our recently sacrificed raw chickens look so…so chicken-y, so golden and inviting. They're fed ground marigold petals along with their feed! The bright golden color of the flowers is transmitted not only to their skin and flesh, but also to the yolks of their eggs, which sit up high and bright in your breakfast skillet. Several years ago, a shall-remain-nameless neighboring country to the north imported some of its frozen chicken to our supermarkets: gray, lifeless whole chickens and lumps of breast and leg meat lay in freezer compartments waiting to be purchased. Mexican housewives looked at these icy products and recoiled. Little of it sold and I currently notice that no imported frozen chicken is available either at my neighborhood tianguis or in the supermarkets I visit from time to time.

Mexico Cooks! prefers to remove as much fat as possible from the chicken before cooking, leaving only a little to give body and flavor to the broth. The skin stays on, both for color and flavor.

In the pot: the chicken back and legs, along with the seasoning ingredients and water, ready to cook.

Caldo de Pollo (Mexican Chicken Soup)

For the broth
1 whole chicken, approximately 5-6 pounds
1 1/2 white onions, peeled
2 large cloves garlic, peeled
2 large carrots, peeled and cut in half
2 chiles serranos, sliced from tip to stem end
2 bay leaves
6 stems cilantro
Large sprig fresh hierbabuena (mint)
Small sprig fresh epazote (wormweed), optional. If you can't get it fresh, leave it out.
Large pinch of thyme
Sea salt to taste
Water
Stock pot

Procedure
Remove as much fat as possible from the raw chicken. Remove the bag of menudencias (heart, gizzard, liver, etc). Mexico Cooks! prefers to separate the entire breast and wings from the back and legs, using the back and legs for preparing the broth and reserving the breast and wings for later use.

Put the skin-on chicken back and legs and all seasoning ingredients except the salt into the stock pot. Add approximately 12-14 cups cold water. Bring to a boil, lower to simmer. Skim the broth once. Simmer, partially covered, for approximately 1.5 hours. Cool slightly and add sea salt to taste. Remove all vegetables, herbs, and the chicken back and legs from the pot. Chill the broth overnight and peel off any congealed fat.

Because my wife and I prefer to eat breast meat, I often shred the cooked leg and back meat to be used in other recipes. However, when I made this batch of caldo de pollo, I took large chunks of the dark meat and added them to the broth.

Ingredients for the final preparation of the caldo de pollo, to cook in the broth just before serving. Clockwise from top right: calabacitas (tender zucchini, about 3" long), peeled carrots, chicken breast, fresh green beans. Potatoes, ready to be peeled, are in the foreground.

To finish the caldo de pollo:

Ingredients
1/2 pound fresh green beans, broken in thirds
4 carrots, peeled and cut into 2" lengths
4 to 6 calabacitas (tiny zucchini will do), cut into 2" lengths
2 or 3 large potatoes, cut in eighths
2 half chicken breasts, cut into three pieces each
2 chicken wings, pointed end sections removed

About an hour before mealtime, bring the broth to a simmer. Add all of the above ingredients to the broth. Simmer for half an hour, or until the chicken and vegetables are done.

During the half hour that the vegetables and chicken are cooking in the caldo de pollo, prepare a pot of traditional Mexican rice. In a couple of tablespoons of vegetable oil, sauté the amount of rice you want (I usually use 1 or 2 cups of raw rice) until the rice is uniformly golden brown. Add 2 cups of tomato water for every cup of rice, bring to a boil, cover the pot and lower the heat to simmer until the rice is fluffy, about 20 minutes.

Tomato Water for Rice
3 raw Roma tomatoes
1/3 white onion, roughly chopped
1 small clove garlic, peeled
2 cups water
Salt to taste

Add all ingredients to your blender and whiz until smooth. Strain through a fine colander and use for cooking rice.

The finished product, steaming and delicious any time!

At meal time, have the following on the table: a large bunch of fresh cilantro in a glass of water; a plate of halved limones or limes, a dish of sea salt; and a cooked (not raw) or bottled table salsa of your choice. Plenty of hot-from-the-griddle corn tortillas round out your meal.

Mexico Cooks! favorite bottled salsa: Cosecha Purhépecha Salsa Casera de Chile Perón (Home-style sauce made of chile manzano, known as chile perón in Michoacán). It's made in Chilchota, Michoacán, and I keep a big stash of it in my Mexico City pantry.

To serve your caldo de pollo, add a large spoonful or two of steaming hot rice to each diner's bowl. Next, add chicken and a good amount of vegetables. Fill each bowl with hot, fragrant broth. Each person can then add a pinch of sea salt, some cilantro leaves, a squeeze or two of jugo de limón, and salsa to his or her own taste.

Makes four to six servings with a lot of rich broth left over for other uses. I strain the broth and then freeze it in gallon ziplock freezer bags.

Provecho!

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11 de January de 2014
2013 in Retrospect :: 2013, Una Mirada Hacia Atrás

In January, we took our shopping bags and some of you to the Mercado de Jamaica, one of Mexico Cooks! favorite Mexico City markets. Not only is the produce section of this wonderful market home to a huge variety of delightful signs (this one, referring to the price for tomate verde (tomatillos), means, "Lady, don't even talk about it!"), but the main part of the Mercado de Jamaica is the city's wholesale flower market. Seasonal changes in the flowers we see there include gorgeous nochebuenas (poinsettias) at Christmas, cempazúchitl (enormous marigolds) for Day of the Dead in November, and roses of every color all year long.

For the Día de La Candelaria (Candlemas Day) on February 2, the Mercado de la Merced offers a huge selection of Niños Dios (Holy Child) figures and the clothing to dress them. This particular outfit depicts El Santo Niño Doctor de los Enfermos (the Holy Child, Doctor to the Sick), with his stethoscope, his doctor's bag, and his white uniform. There are hundreds of other costumes for Him as well. Each year, February 2 marks the official ending of the Christmas season; the Baby Jesus, dressed in his new clothing, goes to church to be blessed. He is then either stored away until the following Christmas or he's placed on his own golden throne in a private home.

In March 2013, we prepared chilaquiles con huevo (chilaquiles with egg), a simple, home-style breakfast classic much eaten at Mexico Cooks!' house. Whether you want a filling breakfast or a simple comida (midday meal), these few ingredients make a tasty and popular combination.

Rajas de chile poblano con crema (strips of poblano chiles with cream) was our traditional dish for April. These large, beautiful chiles are generally not particularly spicy, but their flavor packs a terrific punch for a different kind of side dish for your table. If you haven't tried them yet, the recipe is simple and your family will love it.

May 2013 took you and Mexico Cooks! all over Mexico City. One of our favorite pastimes is giving Mexico Cooks! readers glimpses of daily life in this huge city and letting you see things that will broaden your vision of Mexico. This mariachi member is the vihuela (a stringed instrument) player along the canals of Xochimilco.

In June, dichos de la cocina (kitchen sayings) took center stage. Here in Mexico, there's a saying to fit any situation, and sayings from the kitchen are no exception. Each of them has at least two meanings, the literal and the not-so-literal. One of my favorites is Guajolote que se sale del corral, termina en mole. The turkey that gets out of the yard ends up in mole.

Ricardo Muñoz Zurita's restaurant Azul/Condesa called out to us in July–not to mention several other times during the course of 2013. This dish, buñuelos de pato rostizado con mole negro (small crunchy fried dough filled with roast duck and drizzled with black mole), is on the menu as a main course, but we often share it among three or four diners as an appetizer.

During three weeks in August, Mexico Cooks! focused on Oaxaca. These three articles were a down-memory-lane look at a wonderful trip dating to June 2011.

In September, we featured the ultimate taste of Mexican pork: these are tacos al pastor (marinated pork, grilled to order on the trompo (vertical spit). The meat is cut from the spit and knife-flicked into warm tortillas, along with a sliver of roast pineapple, for delicious tacos. This fellow, cooking on Calle Uruguay in Mexico City's Centro Histórico, loves what he does!

October found us in a most unusual place: an international dog show, right here in Mexico City. This little wire-hair terrier named Thor really captured my heart, and his picture gave everyone who saw it a big smile. Such a cheery guy!

Early November brings Noche de Muertos (Night of the Dead) to all of Mexico. This spiritual calling-home of those who have gone before is particularly lovely in the state of Michoacán. Mexico Cooks! was fortunate to be invited on a private tour of small cemeteries, accompanied by dear friends.

To close out the year, we re-visited Doña Lolita and learned a lot about the joy of making (and breaking!) piñatas. We loved visiting her and hearing her tell the traditions of her long life as a piñatera (piñata maker).

Mexico Cooks! will be on the go again in 2014. Of course YOU are always welcome to join us on a tour especially designed for your personal needs. Let us know what we can offer you!

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4 de January de 2014
10th Annual Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán: Festival of Michoacán’s Traditional Cuisine

The look on nearly every face at the 10th annual Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán was the same grin sported by Mexico Cooks!' long-time friend Gayla Pierce. An inveterate lover of Mexico and its food, Gayla hails from San Diego, California. This was Gayla's first year to attend the festival and it's easy to see how she felt about it: two thumbs up and exactly what the sign says: I LOVE Michoacán! The young man holding the sign above Gayla's head was one of a team that roved this year's festival eating area with several different signs.

For the first time this year, the stage was set as a typical Michoacán kitchen, this one in the style of Tzintzuntzan. Some of the festival judging took place on stage, with one or another of the home cook contestants talking to the crowd about their dishes. In addition, the this stage was also the backdrop for the festival's invited speakers. Click on any photo to enlarge it for a better view.

The left-hand corner of the kitchen. On the table are typical fruits and vegetables from Michoacán, and on the shelf you see the regional pottery of Tzintzuntzan. In this case, the design is light and dark brown, with a swan in the middle of each plate. Tzintzuntzan is also famous for black and green pottery with similar designs, and cream-colored pottery with dark brown figures drawn onto it.

Foreground, 2013 festival judge Carmen 'Titita' Ramírez Degollado, guiding hand behind Restaurante El Bajío in Mexico City. Behind her and to the left is one of Michoacán's greatest home cooks, Antonina González Leandro of Tarerio, Tzintzuntzan, Michoacán. Titita is tasting Antonina's competition preparation of traditional calabaza en tacha (winter squash cooked in heavy syrup).

Here's another of Antonina's dishes: these are charales (tiny fish, about the size of your little finger). In this case, they are fried whole and eaten with a sauce. Mexico Cooks! confesses to not being a fan of charales, but most everyone else in Mexico loves them.

These two Purépecha women, both masters of their regional cuisine, prepare fresh, hand-made tortillas for the hordes that lined up at their booths. The 55 women who came to cook at the festival broke attendance records this year, receiving more than 20,000 people over the course of the 3-day event.

This, readers, is a regional sweet atole made from burned corn silk. It's called atole de chaqueta and it is meant to be thick and black, just as it is in the photo. Atole is a hot drink made from either milk or water, thickened with corn masa (dough), and flavored with seasonal fruits or vegetables. Sweet atole is normally drunk either for breakfast or for supper, accompanied by pan dulce (Mexican sweet bread), but there are also savory atoles that are wonderfully rich and delicious. My particular favorites are atole de guayaba (guava) and atole de habas (fava beans), one sweet and the other savory. Or wait, maybe my favorites are atole de zarzamora (blackberry) and this atole de chaqueta. Or…I left out atole de tamarindo (made of tamarind pulp)! The list goes on!

Just a portion–and a small portion, at that–of the crowds of people who showed up for the Saturday of the 10º Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán. As far as the eye could see, people were lined up for big plates of regional Michoacán food, hundreds were sitting at every available table, and more people kept coming through the gates. The festival does not charge admission and it's not the sort of place where you get just a taste of this or that. Here, the marvelous cooks serve full meals on real pottery dishware with real silverware. You buy tickets to exchange for your meal(s); if you have tickets left over at the end of the weekend, take them back to the ticket booth to exchange for money.

The woman in the photo is Sra. Jovita Gil Arácuaro from Patamban, Michoacán. She is grinding wheat, not corn, to make a mole de trigo y lentejas (mole made of wheat and lentils). You can see that the freshly ground wheat falls into a batea (wooden bowl) in front of the grinding stone. Sra. Gil told me that she is 78 years old–and still grinding wheat on the metate (the three-legged volcanic stone grinder with its metlapil, volcanic stone rolling pin). Younger women kneel on the petate (woven reed mat) in front of Sra. Gil, but a woman her age sometimes sits on a low chair to grind corn, seeds, spices, cooked beans, or toasted chocolate beans. The work requires enormous upper body strength and a lifetime of practice.

This was Mexico Cooks!' year to try new dishes at the Encuentro. The meat and sauce are birria, in this case, a long-cooked preparation of beef. I've frequently eaten birria de chivo (made of goat) and birria de borrego (made of lamb), but this style beef birria was new to me. Sra. Esperanza Galván of Zacán, Michoacán prepared this according to her mother's recipe. The dish is sweet, salty, spicy, and just redolent with fragrance and flavor. Sra. Galván has realized her most cherished dream: she and her daughters have opened their own restaurant in Zacán. I'd go to Zacán just to have another plate of this birria. It's served here with blue corn tortillas and two corundas: small unfilled tamales, another Michoacán regional specialty.

For several years, our housekeeper in Morelia occasionally asked me if I'd like her to bring me an iguana from the rancho (farm) to cook. No, thank you. No? Umm..no. For all that time, I was guilty of contempt prior to investigation. On the Saturday of the Encuentro, Sr. Eloy Velázquez López told me he'd have freshly prepared iguana in his booth the following day and I would surely want to try it. Umm…thank you so much for the offer. On Sunday afternoon, friends and I had eaten our meal and were sitting at our table enjoying the passing scene–and suddenly Sr. Velázquez was standing in front of me! "How would you like your iguana, Señora? In mole, or in caldo (broth)? This time, there was no escape. I chose the caldo, so as not to mask the flavor of the animal with a heavy sauce. My friend Gayla and I swore we would at least taste it, so as not to offend Sr. Velázquez. Lo and behold, iguana is delicious–really delicious–and it tastes (I swear to you) like chicken. What you see in the soup plate is the hind-quarters of the animal, accompanied by caldo, a chile güero, some carrots, and a piece or two of chayote. I'd eat it again any time, and I'm sorry I let so many iguanas slip through my fingers in years gone by.

Pozollilo is similar to the more-familiar pozole. The major difference is that this pozolillo is made from fresh corn kernels; pozole is made from nixtamal-ized dried maíz cacahuatzintle–dried field corn that is soaked and simmered in water and cal (builder's lime) to remove each kernel's hard covering. The nixtamal-ization process allows the corn to soften and 'flower' (expand to a popcorn-size kernel) and allows the human body to access corn's vital nutrients during digestion.

Beautiful fresh Michoacán trout sizzles in a clay cazuela (multi-purpose cooking dish) over an open flame.

My very dear Morelia friend Alma Cervantes Cota and I, just after Alma's excellent conference, Michoacán: Flavors with a Story. Each of the 2013 conferences was filled with fascinating information about little-known, recently researched aspects of Mexico's cuisine. Alma spoke about nearly-forgotten aspects of Michoacán's regional cuisine. Ricardo Muñoz Zurita spoke about his research into all but unknown varieties of chiles.

Rosalba Morales Bartolo (left) won honorable mention for her Ceremonial Fish for Holy Week. Sra. Rosalba receives her award from Lilia Malandra, on the right in the photo. The theme of the 2013 Encuentro was El Platillo Cuenta una Historia: The Dish Tells a Story.

Sra. Amparito Cervantes of Tzurumútaro, Michoacán, receives a lifetime achievement award. Doña Amparito, now nearly 90 years old, said, "My mother taught me all she knew of culinary arts and I've always loved the kitchen. Since I'm from the country, I married–and well, you have to know how to cook, but you also have to know how to sow crops, and cultivate them, and harvest them. Doing that, you just get grabbed by the pleasure of it. Now, I teach others how to do it." Sra. Cervantes still loves to come to the Encuentro to cook for all of the attendees. To her right in the photo is Michoacán's Secretary of Tourisim, Roberto Monroy, García, who presented the award to doña Amparito.

Michoacán, the soul of Mexico. We look forward to seeing you at the 11th Annual Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán. Don't miss it: the dates are October 3, 4, and 5th, 2014. Mexico Cooks! would be happy to guide you through the festival, explain regional ingredients and food preparation for you, and introduce you to a world of wonder in beautiful Morelia, Michoacán.

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

9 de November de 2013