Category: Tours

Mesamérica 2012: Mexican Gastronomic Summit (Cumbre Gastronómica de México 2012) DAY ONE

Chef Enrique Olvera of highly acclaimed Restaurante Pujol in Mexico City is the founder and guiding light of Mesamérica. Photo courtesy Adam Goldberg.

Mesamérica, highly touted as the Mexican culinary event of the year, opened on July 24 with a gala inaugural dinner at Mexico City's St. Regis Hotel. Forty or so rock-star chefs and other luminaries of the international gastronomic world converged on the city for five days of teaching conferences,food, drink, celebration, and general merry-making.

Chef Ricardo Muñoz Zurita of restaurants Azul/Condesa and Azul/Histórico gave a few opening remarks on July 25.

Chef Alicia Gironella d'Angeli, who together with her husband Giorgio d'Angeli founded Restaurante El Tajín in Mexico City as well as the Slow Food movement in Mexico, spoke from her long perspective as grande dame of Mexico's culinary world during Mesamérica's inauguration. In her talk, she quipped that she was speaking from her juventud acumulada–her accumulated youth.

The Mesamérica 2012 program included chefs from countries as diverse as England, Denmark, Chile, Mexico, and the United States. Names as well-known in Mexico as Diana Kennedy, Javier Plascencia, Mikel Alonso, and Mónica Patiño were among those who gave talks to the huge crowds–as many as 2,000 in attendance for each of two daily sessions. The names of James Casey (editor of SWALLOW magazine), Lars Williams (Nordic Food Labs, Copenhagen), and The Young Turks (Great Britain), which would previously have elicited a "Who?" from me and most of the attending throngs were common currency by the end of the conference.

Chef Javier Plascencia of Restaurante Misión 19, Baja California, along with (below)

Chef Jair Téllez from Restaurante Laja of Baja California and Restaurante MeroToro of Mexico City shared the podium on opening day and together spoke eloquently about the need to invent tradition in Baja California. Chef Javier said, "I am very much inspired by street food, and Tijuana has become a culinary destination. We are living our dream."

ProEpta Mexican baking and tableware shared commercial space with several other culinary arts businesses.

Lars Williams, of Copenhagen's Nordic Food Lab, asked conference assistants to pass around pinches and liquid samples of flavors concocted of insect parts and essences. During his talk, he said that the basic tenet of the Food Lab is–and I quote–"Trying to get gringos to eat bugs". The tiny vial in the photo contains a liquid made from fermented grasshoppers. It smelled and tasted like soy sauce.

Next week, Mexico Cooks! will highlight chefs and other culinary professionals from Mesamérica Day Two. Stay tuned!

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4 de August de 2012
Delicias de Noche en Pátzcuaro: Enchiladas Placeras (Night Pleasures in Pátzcuaro: Plaza-Style Enchiladas)
Over the course of nearly 30 years, Mexico Cooks! has visited Pátzcuaro, Michoacán, one of the most beautiful small colonial cities of Mexico, more times than we can count. Every visit is memorable for 16th and 17th Century architecture, fantastic decorative arts, and food. Food! The regional Michoacán kitchen is incomparably rich and delicious.

Super Pollo Emilio has been famous for 36 years for enchiladas placeras: plaza-style enchiladas, the only item on the menu. The cooks prepare approximately 400 orders of enchiladas every night.

Great quantities of enormous pechugas (chicken breast halves, each large enough to satisfy two people) and piernas (leg/thigh quarters) are simmered early in the day until they're just done. A bit later, preparation continues with vats of tender potatoes and fresh carrots.

The cook fans four tortillas at a time between his fingers and dips them into this enormous pot of house- made salsa para enchiladas (enchilada sauce). The recipe? Mexico Cooks! has wheedled and whined, but Super Pollo Emilio won't give it up.

The cook spreads the salsa-doused tortillas evenly into the sizzling grease in the industrial-strength comal (griddle), flipping them rapidly from one side to the other. The tortillas need to be cooked till they are hot and soft, but not crisp.

He gives each tortilla a dollop of freshly mashed potato. The tortillas are then folded in half: voilá, enchiladas ready for your platter. Each order contains eight enchiladas as well as–well, we'll see in a minute.

While we waited for our supper, we were treated to a serenata (serenade) sung by strolling local musicians. We were quite taken with the multi-colored strings of this big bass fiddle.

Our order. The platter, which looks fairly small in the photo, measures approximately 16 inches from side to side. The two forks are ordinary-size table forks. Each platter contains:
- eight potato-filled enchiladas
- freshly sautéed potatoes and carrots, enough for two or more people
- the amount and kind of chicken you prefer–we normally order a breast portion, which was more than enough for the two of us
- a sprinkle of thinly sliced onion
- large shreds of queso Oaxaca (Oaxaca cheese)
- shredded fresh cabbage
- crumbled queso fresco (fresh farmer-style cheese)
- fresh salsa roja (red sauce, different from the enchilada sauce)
- a base of fresh romaine lettuce
- chile perón en escabeche (locally grown and pickled yellow chile: HOT), as much as you want
Mexico Cooks! has never seen one person finish an entire platter of enchiladas placeras as prepared by Super Pollo Emilio. We were hard pressed, but in the interest of pure research we managed to eat most of this order. We accompanied the order with a glass of agua fresca de jamaica and a bottle of LIFT, an apple soda. Our total bill was 110 pesos.

Super Pollo Emilio sets up every evening except Tuesdays, just around dusk on Pátzcuaro's Plaza Gertrudis Bocanegra (the plaza chica). It's the booth closest to the portal (covered walkway) on the market side of the square. The booth is open till the food runs out.

If you're still hungry after your platter of enchiladas is gone, there are buñuelos for dessert. You can order a buñuelo broken and softened in a bowl of syrup or still-crispy and dusted with sugar.

Our waiter Jesús and his sweet daughter Paola, who was helping take soft drink orders. Jesús has been a fixture at Super Pollo Emilio since long before his daughter was born.

When you're visiting Pátzcuaro, don't miss the enchiladas placeras at Super Pollo Emilio. If nothing else about this marvelous city brings you back again and again, you'll be pulled in by these addictive enchiladas, eaten on a chilly night under the stars, just by the market-side portales.

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28 de July de 2012
And the Band Played On…Mexico and Its Music

Trio Los Panchos, from the 1950s. They're still playing today (with new members, some related to members of the original trio) and everyone of every age in Mexico knows all the words to all the songs they've sung since their beginning. You can hear them here: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD-Nre__RzY&w=420&h=315]

A few nights ago some friends and I were having dinner at a local restaurant. A wonderful trio (lead guitar, second guitar, and bass) played a broad selection of Mexico's favorite tunes while we enjoyed our food and conversation. From the table behind us, a woman's voice rang out in English, "Boy, these mariachis are really good."

Her comment, one I've heard over and over again, made me think about the many varieties of Mexican music. Not all Mexican music is mariachi, although many people assume that it is.

It's just as incorrect to classify all Mexican music as mariachi as it is to classify all music from the United States as jazz. Mariachi has its traditions, its place, and its beauties, but there are many other styles of Mexican music to enjoy.

Ranchera, norteña, trio, bolero, banda, huasteco, huapango, trova, danzón, vals, cumbia, jarocho, salsa, son–??the list could go on and on. While many styles of music are featured in specific areas, others, like norteña, banda, ranchera, and bolero, are heard everywhere in Mexico. Let's take a look at just a few of the most popular styles of music heard in present-day Mexico.

Norteña
Música norteña (northern music) will set your feet a-tapping and will remind you of a jolly polka. Norteña had its beginnings along the Texas-Mexico border. It owes its unique quality to the instrument at its heart, the accordion. The accordion was introduced into either far southeastern Texas or the far north of Mexico by immigrants from Germany, Czechoslovakia, or Poland. No one knows for sure who brought the accordion, but by the 1950s this rollicking music had become one of the far and away favorite music styles of Mexico.

A norteña group of musicians playing a set of trap drums, a stand-up bass, and the accordion produces an instantly recognizable and completely infectious sound. The songs have a clean, spare accordion treble and a staccato effect from the drum, while the bass pounds out the deep bottom line of the music.

Norteña is popular everywhere in Mexico. In many cities and towns, conjuntos norteños (bands) often play as itinerant musicians. These are the musicians who are often hired to play serenades in the wee hours of Mother's Day morning, who play under the window of a romantic young man's girl friend while she peeps from behind the curtain, and who wander through restaurantes campestres (country-style restaurants) all over Mexico to play a song or two for hire at your table.

The undisputed king of música norteña is Ramón Ayala. Over the past 30 years he has recorded an amazing 75 albums. His current group, Los Bravos del Norte, is heard everywhere, ??on every radio station and every jukebox. The group is widely imitated but never superseded. Ayala turns out well-crafted and balanced music, featuring lyrics with universally understood human themes. The songs, like the majority of norteñas, are about tragedy, loneliness, broken relationships, almost unbearable longing and pain, and about experiencing love in all its complicated nuances. You can listen here to Ramón Ayala y Sus Bravos del Norte:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJkAYYQNgNE&w=350&h=263]

Banda de Viento and Banda
Banda de viento and banda are similar musical styles: both have a military legacy. Each has moved in its own direction to provide different types of entertainment.

In Zacatecas, the state banda de viento plays concerts day and night.

Banda de viento (wind band, or brass band) originated in Mexico in the middle 1800s during the reign of Emperor Maximilian and Empress Carlota. Later, Presidents Benito Juárez and Porfirio Díaz commissioned the creation of brass bands in their home state, Oaxaca, in imitation of the brass bands that entertained at the Emperor's court.

The huge upsurge of popularity of brass bands in Mexico came in the early 20th Century. After the Mexican revolution, local authorities formed "Sunday bands" made up of military musicians who played in municipalities' plaza bandstands all over Mexico.

The Banda del Estado de Zacatecas (Zacatecas State Band) plays: Marcha de Zacatecas (Zacatecas March)

There are regional differences in banda de viento style, but you can still take a Sunday stroll around many rural Mexican plazas as the tuba oompahs the bass part, the trumpets blare, squeaky clarinets take the lead, and the tamborazo (percussion) keeps the beat. The Sunday municipal band concert no longer exists in some large cities (although you can hear weekly concerts in both Guadalajara and Zapopan), but something new has taken its place: banda.

Banda music, which exploded onto the Mexican music scene in the 1990s, is a direct outgrowth of the municipal bands of Mexico. Banda is one of the most popular styles of dance music among Mexican young people. In small towns, we're often treated to a banda group playing for a weekend dance on the plaza or at a salón de eventos (events pavilion) in the center of the village. The music is inevitably loud, with a strong bass beat. You'll hear any number of rhythms, from traditional to those taken from foreign music. It's almost rock and roll. It's almost–??well, it's almost a lot of styles, but it's pure banda.

Few expatriates go to these dances and that's a shame, because it's great fun to go and watch the kids dance. You might want to take earplugs; the banks of speakers can be enormous and powerful.

The dancing will amaze you. Children, teenagers, and adults of all ages dance in styles ranging from old fuddy-duddy to la quebradita. La quebradita is a semi-scandalous style of dance which involves the man wrapping his arms completely around the woman while he puts his right leg between her two as they alternate feet and twirl around the dance floor. Complete with lots of dipping and other strenuous moves, la quebradita is a dance that's at once athletic and extremely sexual.

Bolero
In the United States and Canada, it's very common for those of us who are older to swoon over what we know as the 'standards'. Deep Purple, Red Sails in the Sunset, Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, and almost anything by Ol' Blue Eyes can take us right back to our youthful romances. Most of us can dance and sing along with every note and word.

Here in Mexico, it's the same for folks of every age. The romantic songs from the 1940s, 50s, and 60s are known as boleros. The theme of the bolero is love–??happy love, unhappy love, unrequited love, indifference, ??but always love. I think just about everyone has heard the classic Bésame Mucho, a bolero written by Guadalajara native Consuelo Velásquez. This timeless favorite has been recorded by Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, and The Beatles, among countless other interpreters of romance.

Here's Luis Miguel, one of Mexico's modern interpreters of bolero, singing Sabor a Mi: Luis Miguel

Armando Manzanero, born in 1935 in Mérida, Mexico, is one of the most famous writers of bolero. His more than 400 songs have been translated into numerous languages. More than 50 of his songs have gained international recognition. Remember Perry Como singing It's Impossible? The original song ??by Armando Manzanero ??is called Somos Novios.

Crowds memorialize Pedro Infante, one of Mexico's greatest stars.

Agustín Lara was another of Mexico's prolific songwriters. Before Lara died in 1973, he wrote more than 700 romantic songs. Some of those were translated into English and sung by North of the Border favorites Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra, and yes, even Elvis Presley. The most famous of his songs to be translated into English included You Belong to My Heart (originally Solamente Una Vez), Be Mine Tonight (originally Noche de Ronda), and The Nearness of You.

Ranchera
The dramatic ranchera (country music), which emerged during the Mexican Revolution, is considered by many to be the country's quintessential popular music genre. Sung to different beats, including the waltz and the bolero, its lyrics traditionally celebrate rural life, talk about unrequited love and tell of the struggles of Mexico's Everyman.

Ana Gabriel is today's reigning queen of música ranchera. Listen to her sing one of her all-time great songs, Te Amo:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPpMFBrZrpU&w=560&h=315]

Ranchera finds its inspiration in the traditional music that accompanies folkloric dancing in Mexico. Its form is romantic and its lyrics almost always tell a story, the kind of story we're used to in old-time country music in the United States: she stole my heart, she stole my truck, I wish I'd never met her, but I sure do love that gal. Pedro Infante, Mexico's most prolific male film star, is strongly associated with the ranchera style of Mexican music. One of the original singing cowboys, Infante's films continue to be re-issued both on tape and on DVD and his popularity in Mexico is as strong as it was in his heyday, the 1940s. Infante, who died in an airplane accident in 1957 when he was not quite forty, continues to be revered and is an enormous influence on Mexican popular culture.

Ranchera continues to be an overwhelmingly emotional favorite today; at any concert, most fans are able to sing along with every song. This marvelous music is truly the representation of the soul of Mexico, the symbol of a nation.

Ana Gabriel is the queen, but Vicente Fernández is the king of ranchera. Listen to him sing Volver, one of his classics.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugNQ5uIN09Q&w=350&h=315]

Vicente Fernández, whose ranch, huge restaurant, and large charro-goods store are located between the Guadalajara airport and Lake Chapala, is the current reigning king of ranchera–??indeed, he is considered to be the King of Mexico.

Mariachi
Mariachi really is the music that most folks think of when they think of Mexico's music. Mariachi originated here, it's most famous here, and it's most loved here. The love of mariachi has spread all over the world as non-Mexicans hear its joyous (and sometimes tragic) sounds. At this year's Encuentro Internacional del Mariachi (International Mariachi Festival) in Guadalajara, mariachis from France, Czechoslovakia, Canada, Switzerland and the United States (among others) played along with their Mexican counterparts.

In the complete mariachi group today there are six to eight violins, two or three trumpets and a guitar, all standard European instruments. There is also a higher-pitched, round-backed guitar called the vihuela, which, when strummed in the traditional manner gives the mariachi its typical rhythmic vitality. You'll also see a deep-voiced guitar called the guitarrón which serves as the bass of the ensemble. Sometimes you'll see a Mexican folk harp, which usually doubles the base line but also ornaments the melody. While these three instruments have European origins, in their present form they are strictly Mexican.

Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlán is the most famous mariachi in the world. Every year in Guadalajara they honor the city with their presence at the Encuentro Internacional de Mariachi. If you'll be in Guadalajara between late August and early September, plan to attend one of the nightly Galas de Mariachi at the Teatro Degollado. It's an unforgettable experience.

The combined sound of these instruments makes the music unique. Like the serape (a type of long, brightly striped shawl worn mainly by Mexican men) in which widely contrasting colors are woven side by side–??green and orange, red, yellow and blue–the mariachi use sharply contrasting sounds: the sweet sounds of the violins against the brilliance of the trumpets, and the deep sound of the guitarrón against the crisp, high voice of the vihuela; and the frequent shifting between syncopation and on-beat rhythm. The resulting sound is the heart and soul of Mexico.

Next time you go to your local music store, look on the racks of CDs for some of the artists and styles of Mexican music I've mentioned. You may be quite surprised to see how popular the different styles are in the United States and Canada. As the population of countries North of the Border becomes more Mexican, the many sounds of Mexican music follow the fans. Next thing you know, you'll be dancing la quebradita.

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21 de July de 2012
Pulque: Pre-Hispanic Drink, Gift of the Gods from the Maguey Cactus

The agave atrovirens cactus. This enormous blue-gray plant, native to the ancient land which became Mexico, continues to provide us with pulque (POOL-keh), a naturally fermented alcoholic beverage. The maguey, with pencas (thick, succulent leaves) which can grow to a height of seven to eight feet, matures in ten to twelve years. At maturity, the plant can begin to produce liquor.

Pulque, native to Mexico, is suddenly all the rage in countries far from its origin. Folks who have never seen a maguey cactus 'on the hoof' argue the relative merits of natural versus flavored pulques, canned versus straight from the barrel, and so forth. Mayahuel, the goddess of the maguey, is laughing up her sleeve at this current rash of pulque aficionados: pulque has been well-loved in what is now Mexico for longer than humankind can remember.

Legend has it that a thousand years ago and more, Sr. Tlacuache (Mr. Opossum) scraped his sharp claws through the heart of the maguey and slurped down the world's first taste of pulque–and then another, and another, until he had a snoot full. His meandering drunken ramble allegedly traced the path of Mexico's rivers.

A drawing from the Codice Borbónico (1530s Spanish calendar and outline of life in the New World) shows Mayahuel, goddess of the maguey, with a mature cactus and a pot of fermented pulque. The first liquid that pours into the heart of the maguey is called aguamiel (literally, honey water); legend says that aguamiel is Mayahuel's blood.

Aguamiel actually comes from the pencas (leaves) of the cactus. In order to start the flow of liquid into the heart of the plant, the yema (yolk) of the plant is removed from the heart and the heart's walls, connected to the leaves, are scraped until only a cavity remains. Within a few days, the aguamiel begins to flow into the cavity in the heart of the plant. The flow of aguamiel can last anywhere from three to six months. Today, the men who work the maguey to produce pulque are still called tlaquicheros. The word is derived from the same Nahuatl origin as the name for the original tlaquichero: Sr. Tlacuache, Mr. Opossum.

An early tlaquichero removes aguamiel from the heart of the maguey by sucking it out with a long gourd. Today, workers use a steel scoop to remove up to six liters of aguamiel per day from a single plant. Aguamiel is not an alcoholic beverage. Rather, it is a soft drink, sweet, transparent, and refreshing. Once it ferments, however, it becomes the alcoholic drink pulque, also known as octli.

The fermentation of pulque can start in the plant itself. Aguamiel, left in the plant's heart to 'ripen' for a few days, begins to ferment. For the commercial production which began in the 19th century, tlaquicheros remove aguamiel from the maguey and transfer it to huge steel tanks, where it ferments.

The heart of the maguey, full of aguamiel. The tool balanced in the liquid is the same type gourd that is pictured in the early drawing seen above. Between extractions of aguamiel, the leaves of the maguey are folded over the cavity where the liquid collects to prevent insects and plant debris from falling into the heart.

Mexican photographic postcard dating to the 1940s or 1950s. The women and children pose in front of huge maguey plants.

By the end of the 19th century, pulque was enormously popular among Mexico's very rich and very poor. Weary travelers in the early 20th century could find stands selling pulque–just for a pickmeup–alongside rural byways. Travelers riding Mexico's railroads bought pulque at booths along the tracks. Pulquerías (bars specializing in pulque) were in every town, however small or large. In Puebla and Mexico City, legendary pulquerías abounded.

Italian expatriate Tina Modotti, a member of the Diego Rivera/Frida Kahlo artists' circle, photographed Mexico City's pulquería La Palanca in 1926.

This common image hung in pulquerías all over Mexico. Clients could order the amount of pulque they wanted according to the drawings–and be reminded of what they had ordered when the pulque had laid them low. Image courtesy of La Voz de Michoacán.

In the foreground are the actual pitchers and glasses used in Mexico's pulquerías. Compare them with the vessels in the drawing. Image courtesy of Museo del Arte Popular (DF).

Pulque lovers spent long evenings in their favorite pulquerías in an alcoholic haze of music, dancing, laughter and delight. Far less expensive than other hard liquors, pulque carries with it the romance of ancient legend, the tradition of a nation, and the approbation of the gods.

Edward Weston, American photographer, immortalized Mexico City's pulquería El Charrito, also in 1926.

Natural pulque is a pale white, semi-viscous, liquid with a slick, thick feel in the mouth; many people are put off by that feel, as well as by its slightly sour taste. Even for those who dislike natural pulque, another kind of pulque–called curado (in this instance, flavored)–is delicious. Natural pulque, combined with blended fresh fruit, vegetables, or ground nuts, becomes a completely different drink. Bananas, guavas, strawberries, and the tuna (fruit of the nopal cactus) are particular favorites.

Feria de Pulque (Pulque Fair) in the State of Mexico. Each of the jars holds pulque curado, each flavored with a different fresh fruit, vegetable, or type of nut.

Mexico Cooks! first tasted pulque about 30 years ago, in Huixquilucan, in the State of Mexico. Huixquilucan, known to its inhabitants as Huixqui (pronounced whiskey), used to be a small town, and Mexican friends took me to its small-town fair where home-made pulque was for sale in what seemed like every booth offering food and drink. "Try it, you'll like it a lot!" my friends giggled. "Just a little taste! C'mon!" I was nervous: I'd heard about pulque and its slippery slimy-ness and its inebriating qualities. Finally we stood in front of a booth offering pulque curado con fresas: pulque flavored with fresh strawberries. "Okay, okay, I can try this." And I liked it! The first small cupful was a delicious, refreshing, slightly bubbly surprise. The second small cupful went down even more easily than the first. And then–well, let it be said that I had to sit down on the sidewalk for a bit. I truly understood about pulque.

Try it, you'll like it a lot…c'mon, just a little taste!

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14 de July de 2012
Crafts, Food, and Mayan Culture in Zinacantán, Chiapas: Part Three

If you have not yet read Parts One and Two of Mexico Cooks! visit to San Lorenzo Zinacantán, Chiapas, please see the articles dated June 23 and June 30, 2012.

Restaurant J'Totik Lol, San Lorenzo Zinacantán, Chiapas

As we walked through the Templo San Lorenzo atrium to the main streets of Zinacantán, our stomachs grumbling for food, we noticed that the first three cocinas económicas (cheap-eats restaurants) were closed. At three o'clock in the afternoon–time for the main meal of the day–we couldn't understand what was (or better said, what wasn't) cooking. Then light dawned: it was a Lenten Friday. In Mexico, many restaurants serving primarily meat or chicken close on Fridays in Lent. It appeared that none of the restaurants around the plaza chose to offer a menú cuaresmeño (Lenten menu). Even though we were considerably past ready for lunch, we weren't ready to leave Zinacantán and head back to San Cristóbal de las Casas to find food. What to do!

"Look!" My partner pointed to a sign: Centro de Artesanía y Restaurantes. An arrow directed us to a short flight of steps carved into the hillside. We crossed our fingers and started up. At the top of the steps was Restaurant J'Totik Lol, jam-packed with San Cristóbal secundaria (middle school) kids on a field trip. We felt sure that unless the ravening teenage hordes had eaten all that there was to be had, we would soon have lunch.

The school group filled every table inside the restaurant and overflowed into the yard. We settled ourselves outside at the single remaining table and gratefully received menus from the wait staff. Would it be the menú del día or something a la carta? Our choice is usually the menú, and today was no exception. The menú at a home-style restaurant in Mexico is nearly always a treat. It normally includes a choice of two or three sopas aguadas (soups), choice of sopa seca (rice or pasta), choice of several guisados (main dishes), frijoles, tortillas, and dessert. Judy picked asado de puerco estilo chiapaneco as her main course and, at the waitress's recommendation, I asked for the menú con carne asada.

Restaurant J'Totik Lol interior with clay and brick oven.

The asado de puerco estilo chiapaneco was definitely the pick of the day. Fork-tender chunks of pork covered with a deep-brown sauce redolent of chiles filled Judy's plate, the thick sauce running gently into her rice. She tasted it and I knew from the ecstatic look on her face that I wasn't going to finagle more than a nibble. Yes, my carne asada was delicious. But after I snagged a shred of her pork and a bit of sauce, it was obvious that she had bet on the winner.

Both of us ate fresh tortilla after fresh tortilla as we enjoyed our meal. We were joined at table by a middle-size dog which had apparently recently delivered a litter of pups. Her beguilingly silent pleas for a snack resulted in a bone or two from Judy's asado and the crusty ends of my carne asada.

We all ate well. You will, too.

Asado de Puerco Estilo Chiapaneco

Ingredients
1/2 kilo (1 pound) fresh pork                   1 onion, quartered
1 kilo (2.2 pounds) small pork ribs          1 corn tortilla
2 cloves garlic                                        Thyme to taste
2 chiles cascabel                                     Oregano to taste
2 chiles pasilla                                        Salt and pepper to taste
1 large or two small tomatillos                Oil

Procedure
Cut the meat into 2" cubes. Cut the ribs into 2" sections. Salt and pepper well. Using a frying pan, sauté in hot oil until well-browned, adding the quartered onion to the meat. Reserve the meat and onion in the frying pan.

In another pan, carefully toast the garlic, the chiles cascabel and pasilla. Don't let them become too dark or they will be bitter. Reserve the mix in a separate bowl. In the same frying pan, sauté the corn tortilla. When all the ingredients are well-toasted, put them in the blender along with the raw tomatillos, add a bit of water, and blend until the ingredients are well blended. Add the blended mixture to the meat in its frying pan. Add the thyme and oregano to taste.

Allow to cook over a very low flame for about an hour, adding water little by little as needed so that the meat and sauce do not dry out.

Serves 4-6, accompanied by arroz a la mexicana (Mexican-style rice), frijolitos negros (black beans), and plenty of freshly made hot tortillas.

Provecho!

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

Mexico Cooks! is traveling. We'll be back to our regularly scheduled programming in mid-July.

7 de July de 2012
Crafts, Food and Mayan Culture in Zinacantán, Chiapas: Part Two

If you have not yet read Part One of Mexico Cooks! visit to San Lorenzo Zinacantán, Chiapas, please see the article dated June 23, 2012. This three-part series was originally published during March 2008.

One of several Centros de Artesanía (craft stores) in the town of San Lorenzo Zinacantán, Chiapas.

As we drove into Zinacantán, we noticed many large invernaderos (greenhouses) here and there on the mountain slopes. In addition to the work of artesanía (arts and crafts), there is a large flower-growing industry in the town. Roses, daisies, chrysanthemums and other flowers grow profusely in the greenhouses that dot the hillsides around this tiny town in a valley. The flowers are produced for use in the town as well as for export.

When Mexico Cooks! arrived in the town center, the parish church bells were ringing over and over again–Clang! Ca-CLANG! Clang! Clang! Ca-clang!–in a pattern that was neither the usual call to Mass nor the clamor (the mournful ring that indicates a parishioner has died). Although the Centros de Artesanía (crafts centers) beckoned and we had really come to shop, we decided to answer the call of the bells and visit the church first. Many villagers crowded the entryway, watching one of the most beautiful processions I've seen in Mexico. No photographs are permitted in either the church atrium or the church itself, and I wished so deeply that I had the talent to draw what we were watching.

Young men wearing white cotton shorts embroidered along the hems, thickly furry woven wool cotones, beribboned pañuelos and straw hats processed from a shadowy side chapel carrying huge wicker baskets filled to overflowing with every color rose petal. The procession came slowly, these young zinacantecos scattering thousands and thousands of petals throughout the candlelit main part of the church. The wooden floor disappeared under a pink, yellow, red, and white carpet. Other men wearing ritual black or white woolen cotones followed, stepping reverently on the rose petals, releasing their scent into the air along with the scent of copal burning in the clay incensarios (incense burners) they waved high above their heads.

Then followed twelve highly honored town elders dressed in even more elaborate ritual clothing bearing three life-size statues on their shoulders. The statues, each dressed in the finest ropa típica zinacanteca, represented the Virgin Mary, Jesus, and San Lorenzo, the patron of Zinacantán. The tremendous statues processed, crowned with gold and surrounded by candles and artfully arranged flowers of every description. The three saints gently tipped this way and that on the shoulders of their bearers as they moved through the nave of the church.

The first young men of the procession rained thousands more rose petals on the statues as they wended their way slowly through the small church and back into the half-light of the side chapel, where the saints were situated in places of honor in front of the communion rail and altar.

This image, taken inside Templo Santo Domingo in San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, shows candles similar to those lit before the saints in Templo San Lorenzo, Zinacantán.

Beneath swooping banners, strings of brightly colored metal ornaments, and tired-out balloons from prior fiestas, church elders lit hundreds of candles to honor the three saints. Men clad in garments resembling ribbon-festooned woolly black or white sheep hurried back and forth placing candles in large stands, stopping to kneel and pray aloud in Tzotzil. Meantime, women elders clad in brilliant blue and teal embroidered chales (shawls) crouched on the church floor. Ritual white cotton rebozos covered their heads and faces, leaving only their black eyes visible, watching the men. The men lit candles and more candles. Young boys left greenery around the statues. In the dimness, a solemn father pinched his laughing son's ear to remind him to respect the ceremony and the saints.

When we could tell that the ceremony was drawing to a close, I asked one of the elders to tell me its significance. "This is the first Friday of Lent," he replied. "We'll have this procession the first Friday of every month from now until All Saints Day in November." He smiled, bowed briefly, and moved away from me. My partner and I walked slowly out of the church and back into the brilliant Zinacantán afternoon light. We felt that we had been centuries and huge distances away from this millennium. And of course, after that much mystical time and space travel, we were starving. Lunch! Where would we have lunch?

View of Zinacantán from the floor of the valley, 8500 feet above sea level.

Next week, read Part Three as Mexico Cooks! continues its visit to San Lorenzo Zinacantán, Chiapas.

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

Mexico Cooks! is traveling. We'll be back to our regularly scheduled programming in mid-July.

30 de June de 2012
Crafts, Food and Mayan Culture in Zinacantán, Chiapas: Part One

Part One of a three-part series of articles about Mexico Cooks!' explorations in the indigenous village of Zinacantán, Chiapas. All three articles were originally published in March, 2008. Enjoy!

The highlands of Chiapas, the southernmost state in Mexico, are unlike any region of the 27 other Mexican states I know. The indigenous culture of the highlands is still fiercely Mayan, albeit with a veneer of Catholicism. The Chiapanecan Maya are for the most part unwelcoming to outsiders, holding their customs and celebrations close to their chests as jealously guarded secrets. Some regions forbid entry to both mestizos and foreigners, some forbid the taking of photographs, and some have essentially seceded from Mexico, allowing no access to services commonly accepted as essential everywhere else in the country.

There are a few small indigenous towns where outside visitors are at least superficially welcome, including the pueblo called San Lorenzo Zinacantán, located in a valley at 8500 feet above sea level, just six miles from the small but cosmopolitan city of San Cristóbal de las Casas. In Zinacantán, where the women dress like flocks of exotically beautiful bluebirds, a prominent sign on the church door reads, "Se prohibe matar pollos durante sus rezos," ('Killing chickens during your prayers is forbidden'), and the vernacular is Tzotzil, derived from Mayan. The name Zinacantán means "place of the bats". Mexico Cooks! missed seeing bats, but we lucked upon certain mystically Mayan Zinacantán ceremonies that left us wide-eyed and pensive.

Zinacantecas Juana Hernández de la Cruz, Josefa Victoria González, Juana Adriana Hernández Hernández, and Yolanda Julieta González Hernández laughed with delight when they saw their photographs.

Village residents wear ropa típica (native dress) made by their own hands. Women use hand-woven long black wool skirts, hand-embroidered red or blue blouses embroidered in teal blue, deeper blue, and green thread, and stunning tassel-embellished shawls. It's possible to identify the families that men, boys, and young girls are from based on the style of weaving and embroidery in the garments their wives, mothers and aunts make for them.

For their weddings, Zinacantán women wear the k'uk'umal chilil, an elaborately woven huipil (long blouse). White feathers are woven among the colored borders of these wedding dresses, which are nearly long enough to reach the ground. Under the huipil, the bride wears a finely hand woven and embroidered navy blue woolen skirt. The bride's white dress takes approximately five months to weave on a back strap loom. The people of Zinacantán say that the hen is a domestic animal that has feathers but cannot fly, walks on two legs just like people, is dependent on them for its nourishment, and is always near the house even when it runs loose. So the feathers that women weave into the bridal garment represent the attitude of the hen, which the bride is expected to adopt: she will not leave the household, even though she is capable of doing so, and she will shape a relationship of interdependence with her husband. Hence the feathers are a symbol of good marriage, as are the three borders of multicolored embroidery. In addition to the long blouse and the navy blue skirt, the bride wears a long white embroidered shawl which covers most of her head and face during the marriage ceremony.

Zinacantán men wear short pants and a knee-length cotón (a sleeveless garment made of one piece of hand-woven fabric sewn up the sides to the armpits, with a cut-out for inserting the head). The cotón is fastened with a wide red cotton belt wrapped several times around the waist and knotted. Over that, a man wears a hand-woven and embroidered pink fabric vest with long, elaborate tassels. A large scarf wraps around the man's head, either with or without multi-colored ribbons trailing down his back, and over the scarf the men wear a handmade hat woven of palm fronds, long colorful ribbons cascading from the peak of the sombrero.

Because many people in Zinacantán are reluctant to have their pictures taken, I took the photo of traditional wedding clothing in a women's cooperative crafts store with the permission of the women in the second photograph, who staffed the store the day Mexico Cooks! visited.

Sra. Pascuala Pérez Pérez weaves using a back strap loom.

The loom with a portion of Doña Pascuala's weaving lies neatly where she left it momentarily to tend the cooperative store.

Crafts work such as weaving traditional brides' huipiles, rugs, tablecloths, blouses, shawls, and straw hats has become the major source of income for many zinacantecos (residents of Zinacantán). Doña Pascuala told me, "We start as children, learning to separate the colored threads and put the same colors together. Many learn how to embroider, but the bad thing is that no one helps us export our crafts to anywhere outside the area."

Next week, read Part Two as Mexico Cooks! continues its visit to San Lorenzo Zinacantán, Chiapas.

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

Mexico Cooks! is traveling. We'll be back to our regularly scheduled programming in mid-July.

23 de June de 2012
Traditional Baking at Lake Chapala

Two days a week, José Manuel Mora Velásquez continues a tradition that has been part of his family for more than 80 years. Long before dawn, he begins preparations for baking pan de tachigual, a type of bread so distinctly regional that Sr. Mora says that it has only been made in San Juan Cosalá and in Ajijic, (in the state of Jalisco, Mexico), although it's sold in other towns along the north shore of Lake Chapala.

In years gone by, natives of those two towns did not allow a wedding, baptism, First Communion or confirmation to pass without tachigual as part of the festivity rituals. Although times are changing, even today the most traditional celebrations of these life passages include the humble local loaves.

Sr. Mora showed me around the tiny bakery at his home in Ajijic. The ceiling is low and the only light comes from windows without glass. Loaves of freshly baked tachigual are piled high on a wooden shelf while dough rises in a warm corner, out of the way of any passing breeze.

Tachigual loaves stuffed with nuts and raisins rise on the bakery shelves.

"The oven is heated only by wood. It's not easy to keep a good supply of wood, but we collect it from all over the area. People usually tell me where a dry tree has fallen, or where someone has cut down a tree that will burn well when the wood is dry."

"Which days of the week do you bake?" I asked.

"Wednesdays, like today, and Saturdays. It's very time-consuming work and you have to pay very close attention to the masa (dough) or it won't turn out right." Sr. Mora turned to peer into the oven as he spoke to me.

"A full twenty-four hours before I bake, I have to prepare the harina fermentada (starter). It's a mixture of flour and water. I mix that, and then it sits in the warm bakery for a full day before I can use it for the bread.

"Early in the morning of the days I bake, I mix the dough. It's made with the starter dough I made the day before, plus additional flour, eggs, sugar, and lard. Some of the dough is made with whole wheat flour and some with white flour. The white flour dough has white sugar, raisins and toasted nuts blended into it. The whole wheat loaves are sweetened with piloncillo (cones of brown sugar)."

Sr. Mora showed me how he weighs each of the ingredients to make the bread. "I don't measure. The bread is better if each component is weighed. How many kilos of flour I use depends on how many loaves I need to bake on any given day. Usually I make enough dough to produce 400 loaves a day.

"Baking this traditional way is different from baking in a modern oven. The first difference, of course, is that the oven is made of bricks and clay. It's shaped like a beehive. And as I said before, I use wood fire for the heat. Temperature control is more difficult. I have to start the fire about three hours before the dough starts to bake. That's so the oven will reach the right temperature. It takes two hours for the coals to be at the right stage, then another hour for the temperature to go down enough so the bread will bake in the right amount of time."

Tachigual bakes right on the floor of the brick beehive oven.

I looked into the oven, which has no door, and saw that the baking bread was beginning to turn golden brown. "I don't see a thermometer, Sr. Mora. How do you know when the oven has reached the right temperature to begin baking?"

Sr. Mora checks the oven to make sure the temperature is right.

He laughed. "I put one loaf in to bake. It should be ready in about 30 to 40 minutes. If it takes longer than that, I put more wood on the fire. If it bakes too quickly, I wait a bit for the temperature to go down. Then I try again. Of course I've been doing this for so long that I can almost always tell when the temperature is right, but I still bake a trial loaf to be sure."

I asked Sr. Mora if there were other tachigual bakers in Ajijic. "Yes, my cousin still makes this bread the old way. She lives on Calle Constitución and bakes on Tuesday and Thursday. I think we're the only two left in Ajijic who bake this bread. There is a family in San Juan Cosalá that still has a bakery, but I don't know them personally."

Ojitos (little eyes) rise near the warmth of the oven.

An article about the San Juan Cosalá bakers appeared several years ago in the Lake Chapala Spanish-language weekly newspaper, El Charal. At that time, Sra. Margarita Villalobos and one of her daughters were baking pan de tachigual for distribution and sale in San Juan, in Nestipac, and in Jocotepec. Sra. Villalobos told El Charal that as a young girl, she had learned to make tachigual from her mother. Her methods hadn't changed over the years, she said, because making the bread in the traditional way gives it the delicious flavor that people want. Sra. Villalobos said that someone had offered her an electric mixer to help beat the dough, but she was not interested in changing her style of preparation. "Other bakers make it using the same recipe I do, but they don't mix it by hand. Their results aren't the same," she reported.

Sr. Mora's baking sheet is made of a flattened 5-gallon square tin can.

Sr. Mora tells a similar story. "A woman named Teresa taught my aunt how to make tachigual, and my aunt taught me," he reminisced. "And now there's no one left to teach. My children don't want to be bakers. It's sad to think that I might be the last in the family to keep this tradition alive."

Although Sr. Mora graciously told me about his work and the traditions of the bread he makes, there was never a time when he was not also paying strict attention to the rising loaves, the bread baking in the oven, and the bread that was cooling on primitive wooden shelves along three walls of the bakery. I watched quietly for a while as Sr. Mora worked.

With one eye on the oven, he picked up an escobilla (double-ended straw brush) and started rhythmically sweeping the wood ash from each cool loaf of tachigual. As he cleaned each loaf, he placed it in a pile.

When he noticed that the bread inside the oven had turned a deep golden brown, he set aside the escobilla and picked up a pala (literally a shovel, but in this case it resembled a long-handled wooden pizza peel). He used the pala to remove a metal tray holding the ojitos from the oven and placed it on a table near where I was standing. In one experienced and skillful motion, he scooped up as many small panes de tachigual as the pala would hold and transferred them from the oven to a shelf for cooling. With a similar movement, he loaded the pala with unbaked loaves of tachigual. Gently shoving the pala as far into the oven as he knew it needed to go so that the bread would bake evenly, he snapped his elbow back and the raw loaves landed evenly spaced on the oven floor. In just a few minutes he demonstrated skills he had acquired over his 22 years as a baker.

The sweet smell of baking tachigual was making me very hungry. "Sr. Mora, do you take all of the bread to be sold at stores here in town?" I was hoping he'd say no, and I was not disappointed.

"A lot of people come here to the bakery to buy bread. And the boys take some to be sold out on the streets in that washtub…" he gestured to a galvanized metal tub in the corner by the oven. "And of course some does go to stores around town."

"What does the tachigual cost?" I was fingering some coins in my pocket.

"The small loaves are four pesos, the big ones are ten pesos. And those mini-loaves are two pesos apiece. I sell the miniatures to mothers for little kids."

I bought four loaves, one large and three small. The large one came home with me and I took the three small ones to share with my neighbors. My car held the tantalizing scent of the fresh-baked bread for two days.

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

2 de June de 2012
Wheat, Flour, and Yeast: Basque Spanish Immigrants’ Bakeries in Mexico City

Pan Segura, Legítimo Estilo Jalisco (Bread Segura, Real Jalisco Style) is almost literally a hole in the wall on Calle 16 de septiembre in Mexico City's Centro Histórico. There's just enough open space for a person to squeeze single file and sideways past a bread case and into the slightly wider part of the bakery to pick up a tray and tongs. Buy bread here often enough and you probably won't fit through the door!

A few weeks ago, Mexico Cooks! received an email from a total stranger: Jane Mason, the owner of Virtuous Bread, asked me where to buy certain kinds of specialty flours in Mexico City or anywhere in the rest of the República. Originally based in England, Jane Mason has recently been working on a bread-baking project in the Distrito Federal. After exchanging several notes with me, she mentioned that she and her partner were taking a Centro Histórico tour of traditional bakeries that weekend. Would I like to join them? Did I leap at the chance? You bet!

Racks of Jalisco-style pan dulce (Mexican sweet breads) at Pan Segura. Their most famous sweet bread is the unique cuadros de queso (cheese squares). Large, densely textured, and completely delicious, the bread balances between sweet and salty. With a freshly squeezed glass of juice, it's big enough to be breakfast. It's also addictive. Trust me, eating one cuadro de queso today leaves you wanting another tomorrow.

Universidad Iberoamericana, in the person of Maestra Sandra Llamas, planned the bakery tour to explore the 19th century presence in Mexico of Basque immigrants from the province of Navarre, Spain. Those immigrants came from the Spanish Valley of Baztán to live in Mexico City at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. Ultimately, they became the most important European influence on Mexico's commercial bakeries, flour sellers, and yeast purveyors.

Maestra Sandra Llamas begins the tour of traditional bakeries by offering an overview of prominent Basque bakers in 19th century Mexico City. Approximately 25 people of every young-adult and adult age participated in our three-bakery walking tour.

During Porfirio Díaz's long presidency/dictatorship (1876-1910), all things European were very much the rage in Mexico. Spanish and French goods were much more highly valued than goods made in Mexico. During the Porfiriato (the name used to describe those nearly 35 years), many Basque families were accustomed to sending their adolescent first-born sons to the New World. These young men arrived all but penniless in Mexico, and their families in Spain expected that they would make successes of themselves in their new homes.

In 1877, there were 68 bakeries in Mexico City. By 1898, the bakery count was up to 200. Most of the bakery owners were Basques from Navarre. They did not bring baking to Mexico, but they did bring a particular way of doing business. They bought wheat fields, built urban rather than rural flour mills, bought bakeries, and soon dominated the market that catered to one of humankind's basic needs: hunger.

Don Braulio Iriarte Goyeneche was born in Navarra, Spain, in 1860 and arrived in Mexico City in 1877.

Arguably the most successful of these young Basques was the teenager who, as an adult in Mexico City, would be known as don Braulio Iriarte Goyeneche. In 1877, his family forced him to leave Navarra and make a life for himself in this unknown world across the sea. Industrious, hard-working, and creative, the young Iriarte began his career as an employee at one of Mexico's first commercial bakeries. By the end of the 1800s, he was Mexico's king of flour, yeast, and bread. The two keys to his success were his business acumen and the trustworthy cleanliness of his bakeries.

Jalisco-style bread from Pan Segura. This tiny bakery has been in operation for 85 years.

During the fourth quarter of the 19th century, common practice meant that campesinos (country boys) worked barefoot in bakeries. In an attempt to keep their feet clean, they were not allowed to go outside the bakery during the day–locked in with the ovens, barefoot boys and young men clad in the white pants and shirts of the campesino, danced 17 hours a day in the heat of a wood-fired bakery to knead the fresh-made dough . It's no wonder that some customers complained occasionally that their bread was too salty: blame the extra salt on the campesinos' sweat blended into the flour mixture. Don Braulio's bakeries were considered to be extremely sanitary because, unlike in other Mexico City bakeries, machinery did all the kneading. No one's feet touched the dough.

Conchas (shells, a kind of sweet bread) from Panadería El Molino. These conchas are quiet large, and you can see that the price per piece is five pesos (at today's exchange rate, approximately 36 US cents).

At the end of the 19th century in Mexico, the salary for a Mexico City panadero (baker) was two pesos per month. Yes, two. In 1903, Mexico City's bakers began what is known as la huelga de los bolillos (the bread strike). Their demand? A raise in salary to 2.5 pesos per month. The bakers gave or threw away thousands of the individual loaves of white bread known as bolillos to protest the bakery owners' reluctance to pay them a half peso more per month. The bakery owners' main fear was that their young men would drink substantially more due to the salary increase.

Sr. Iriarte rapidly rose to the highest level of prominence in Mexico's world of wheat, flour, and yeast. Within 30 years of his arrival in Mexico City, he and a business partner owned numerous bakeries, had opened a flour mill in Toluca (near the urban center of Mexico City), and founded Mexico's first commercial yeast factory. By the end of the 1920s, he was grinding nearly all of Mexico's wheat.

In early 1922, Sr. Iriarte added another business to his stable: the Corona brewery, which has grown to become one of the largest and most important breweries in the world. Its flagship beer, Corona, is the largest-selling Mexican beer in the world. What's the connection between beer and bread? Yeast.

At El Molino, a bakery worker paints apricot syrup onto fresh-from-the-oven trenzas (braids) made of puff paste. She will then sprinkle the braids with sesame seeds.

You don't use your fingers to pick up bread in Mexico's bakeries. Near the entrance to any bakery, you'll find trays and tongs for choosing what you want to buy. The check-out clerk will use your tongs to put your bread in its bag or box, then bang the crumbs off the tray and back it goes for the next customer's use.

Our tour took in three bakeries, all within a few blocks on Calle 16 de septiembre in Mexico City's Centro Histórico. Pan Segura is the smallest of the three, barely big enough for four or five people to shop for bread at the same time. Pastelería El Molino, just down the street, has been in business since 1918 and was purchased first by Carlos Slim Helú's Panadería El Globo and then was sold to Grupo Bimbo, a giant international wholesale bread-baking concern which bought both bakeries in 2005.

One small room on the first floor of Pastelería La Ideal.

Cochinitos (gingerbread pigs), detail of one tray with stacks and stacks of one of the most traditional sweet breads in Mexico, Pastelería La Ideal. The number of trays of cochinitos is beyond comprehension. Seeing is almost–almost!–believing.

Little cookie men in their two-button suits at La Ideal.

The crown of our bakery tour was its visit to Pastelería La Ideal, long one of Mexico Cooks!' favorite spots in Mexico City. The bakery is enormous. Founded in 1927, the bakery specializes in…well, it specializes in being special. The first floor is devoted to decorative and delicious gelatins, flans, small cookies called pasta seca, everyday cakes, and breads. Hundreds of kinds of breads–350 different kinds, to be exact. Unbelievable amounts of bread, but there it is: right in front of your eyes and absolutely believable. This bakery alone (it has two more branches in the city) turns out 50 to 55 thousand pieces of bread every day, seven days a week.

Muffins with candied fruits, Pastelería La Ideal.

This branch of Pastelería La Ideal is closed for cleaning for exactly one hour a day. If you go between five and six o'clock in the morning, you'll find the doors locked. Otherwise, teams of master bakers (17 to 20 per shift, three eight-hour shifts per day) supervise and work with 350 workers to give us this day our daily bread.

La Ideal traditional package on Mexico Cooks!' dining room table. We bought our neighbor a coffee cake. Honest, it was for her, not for us.

During the early morning hours, you'll see men and women rushing up and down Calle 16 de septiembre and its surrounding streets, carrying packages from La Ideal, tied up with string, tucked under their arms or dangling from outstretched fingers. Mexico City's desayuno (breakfast), whether at home or at the office, almost always includes a pan, either salado or dulce (salty or sweet bread). Cuernitos (like croissants), biscoches (biscuits), panqué (poundcake), pan danés (Danish pastry), bigotes (bread shaped a bit like a moustache), orejas (elephant ears), and conchas (shells), plus bolillo, telera, and all the other kinds of breads fly off the shelves and into Mexico City kitchens, to be served with a coffee or hot chocolate.

Chocolate cake filled with strawberry marmalade and topped with cream horns, Pastelería La Ideal. In the evening, Mexico City stops back in at La Ideal to buy a little something for cena (light supper): a cake, a gelatin, or some cupcakes or cookies. This cake costs 190 pesos. Click on any photo to enlarge and show details.

The second floor of Pastelería La Ideal is entirely about big-deal party cakes. You and the person who is giving a party with you sit down at a tiny desk with a La Ideal sales associate to have a serious discussion about cake: how many people you plan to invite, how much other food there will be, what the occasion might be, how much you want to spend, and any other question you need to ask to have just the right cake made for your needs.

This six-kilo cake (model J-28) decorated with a chocolate basket and pink sugar roses would be perfect for your aunt's birthday, Mother's Day, or any occasion where a small cake is necessary. Hold onto your hats:

Model L-20, decorated with clowns, balloons, ribbons, and stalactites made of icing, weighs 25 kilos and is designed for a child's birthday party. Twenty-five kilos and four stories equal a mid-size cake at La Ideal. There are cakes for quinceañeras (girls' fifteenth birthday parties), engagement parties, first communion parties, and wedding receptions that weigh as much as 50 kilos or more. Those cakes are constructed with stories, bridges, and some have actual running-water waterfalls. The size of your expected crowd dictates the size of the cake.

Some things at your bakery are just about the same as they were when the Basques came to Mexico: bread is freshly baked throughout the day and night, it's affordable, and some is still quite delicious. Other things have changed completely: in most commercial bakeries, margarine or vegetable shortenings are used instead of butter, most everything is mechanized, and the lowly, delicious bolillo–Mexico's original white bread–is now more like cotton batting than like honest bread. But Jane Mason of Virtuous Bread and Mexico Cooks! have vowed to track down any real bolillo that still exists. It's the best thing since–since before sliced bread! I promise to report back.

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

26 de May de 2012
Dr. Atl in Mexico: A Painter’s Eye, A Painter’s Passion

The painter's eye. Detail of Dr. Atl (Gerardo Murillo) 1962 self-portrait, oil on cardboard. Private collection.

Gerardo Murillo was born in 1895 in the San Juan de Dios neighborhood of Guadalajara, at the height of the Francophile rule of Mexican president/dictator Porfirio Díaz. He began studying painting at the age of 19. Since studying in Italy in 1921, Gerardo Murillo has been better known as 'Dr. Atl' (atl is the Náhuatl word for water), as he was re-christened by Leopoldo Lugones, an Argentine writer and leftist political colleague. After his death in 1964, his ashes were interred in Guadalajara in what is known today as the Rotonda de Jaliscienses Ilustres (the Rotunda of Illustrious People of Jalisco). During his life, Dr. Atl was profoundly eccentric, his entire being immersed in his passions for painting, for politics, and particularly for volcanos.

Gerardo Murillo, self portrait 1899. All photos by Mexico Cooks! unless otherwise noted.

The Museo Colección Blaisten, part of Mexico City's Centro Cultural Universitario Tlatelolco (part of the UNAM, the huge multi-campus National Autonomous University of Mexico), mounted a December 2011 through April 2012 exhibition if 190 of Dr. Atl's masterworks. Dr. Atl, one of Mexico's most prominent 20th century painters, is actually very little known in the United States.

Volcán Iztaccíhuatl (the Sleeping Woman volcano), 1916. Colleción Museo Regional de Guadalajara-INAH. Labels of this and many other paintings in the exhibit indicate that they were painted using Atl color (a type of paint created by the artist). Atl color is similar to Greek encaustic paint. It contains resins, wax, and dry pigment which are melted, mixed, and hardened to form a medium similar to oil pastel. Dr. Atl used his eponymous colors on paper, cardboard, rough fabric such as jute, wood, and other bases.

Although Dr. Atl is best-known as the passionate painter of volcanos, he also painted portraits. Nahui Olín, pictured above in 1922, had a five-year romantic relationship with Dr. Atl. During the early part of her life, Nahui Olín's name was Carmen Mondragón. Dr. Atl gave her the Náhuatl name to honor the date in the Aztec calendar that commemorates the renovation of the cosmic cycles. Private collection.

The Valley of Mexico from the South, 1931, oil on fabric. Private collection.

Dr. Atl's scholarly observation and study of Mexican geography (he was not only a painter, but also a volcanologist and writer) combined perfectly with his travels in Europe to give him the tools necessary to become one of the outstanding landscape painters of the 20th century. In 1897, then-Presidente Porfirio Díaz gave young Gerardo Murillo a scholarship to study in Europe. Murillo studied not only Italian frescoes but also philosophy and penal law. He involved himself ever more deeply with leftist, anarchist politics, a consequence of his studies that President Díaz probably did not anticipate.

Dr. Atl was also an exceptional painter of clouds. This painting is Nubes sobre el Valle de México (Clouds over the Valley of Mexico), 1933, Atl color on asbestos. Collection Museo Nacional de Arte INBA.

Detail mid-right side, Nubes sobre el Valle de México. Note the variety of brushstroke used to create texture in the painting. Click on any photograph to enlarge the detail.

Dr. Atl began studying volcanoes during a trip to Italy in 1911. Beginning in 1925, he spent long periods of time at Mexican volcanoes such as Popocatépetl, Iztaccíhuatl, and the Pico de Orizaba. A tireless traveler, Dr. Atl climbed Popocatépetl and Iztaccíhuatl. Later those volcanoes became an important theme in his body of work.

In 1942, he visited the site of Mexico's newborn volcano Paricutín in the state of Michoacán. He said, “…El espectáculo del cono ardiente vertiendo aludes de materia ígnea, bajo un cielo de guijarros incandescentes, en sí mismo tan fuera de lo común que toda invención sale sobrando…” 'The spectacle of the burning cone spewing avalanches of lava under a sky of incandescent ash was by itself so far out of the ordinary that every other invention became like something left over…'

Volcán en la Noche Estrellada (Volcano on a Starry Night), 1950 (Paricutín). Atl color on plywood. Collection UNAM. Dr. Atl was the first artist to paint what he called 'aeropaisajes' (landscapes from the air); he took to the skies in small airplanes, flying over various volcano sites to immortalize them from above.

Life imitates art. April 16, 2012 photo of volcano Popocatépetl spewing flame, ash, and smoke. Popocatépetl straddles the state line between Puebla and Morelos, approximately 40 miles south of Mexico City. Photo courtesy Todo Oaxaca.

Dr. Atl, astonished and awed to see a volcano born in his lifetime, lived for approximately a year near still-erupting Paricutín. He observed, painted, and wrote about this majestic and completely unexpected young volcano for more than seven years.

Cráter y La Vía Láctea (Crater and the Milky Way), 1960. Oil and Atl color on masonite. Private collection, courtesy of Galería Arvil.

Detail, Cráter y La Vía Láctea.

For his entire life, Dr. Atl involved himself in left-wing political movements. In 1914, he allegedly was part of the plot to assassinate then-President Victoriano Huerta, because of which he was imprisoned briefly. After his release, he lived in Los Angeles, California until 1920. When he returned to Mexico, revolutionary leader and President Venustiano Carranza named him director of the Escuela de Bellas Artes (School of Fine Arts) and then Jefe de Propaganda e Información en Europa y América del Sur (Head of Promotion and Information in Europe and South America), a position he held for only a short time.

In 1956 Mexico awarded him the Medalla Belisario Domínguez and, in 1958, the Premio Nacional de las Artes.

Gerardo Murillo Pintando en el Valle de Pihuamo (Gerardo Murillo painting in the Valley of Pihuamo), 1952. Photo by Ricardo Salazar. Dr. Atl's right leg was amputated in 1949. Popular legend has it that the amputation was due to the inhalation of gases at Paricutín, but it was actually necessary because of complications of diabetes.

Mexico gave poet Carlos Pellicer the task of writing Dr. Atl's biography. Dr. Atl wrote to him, "Now it looks like a biography will really get off the ground! A couple, nearly human, came from Los Angeles as if they had fallen from heaven, to write a biography of me. Then I remembered that you were writing one. To make a long story short, I make the following proposal: you finish the biography that you already started. I enclose a slip of paper with some suggestions for organizing it in the most convenient way…I send you the most cordial handshake…" Some of the biographical material was printed in Carlos Pellicer en el Espacio de la Plástica, Volume 1, by Elisa Garcìa Barragán and Carlos Pellicer, UNAM 1997.

Dr. Atl died in Mexico City on August 15, 1964. His ashes are buried in the Rotonda de Jalisciences Ilustres in Guadalajara, where this statue is part of the site. Photo courtesy Rodrigo_gh, Flickr.

The five-month exhibition was an opportunity to see, through the eyes of this genius painter, the Valley of Mexico before Mexico City's explosion of population with its lava-like rivers of concrete swallowed nature whole. We had the chance to see the Valley and its volcanos when they ran with rivers, when the mountains burgeoned with trees and flowers.

Today, even though the exhibition has closed, we can see Dr. Atl's vision of the Valley of Mexico every time we visit the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City's Historic Center. His design, executed by the house of Louis Comfort Tiffany, is immortalized in the theater's million-piece stained glass curtain.

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19 de May de 2012