Cocina al natural.
Cocina al natural, with Sonia Ortiz, is in Spanish, though everything is done so clearly and logically it should be possible to follow even if you don't speak Spanish.
She is crazily prolific, with over 1200 videos uploaded. Not all of the videos are of strictly Mexican cusine, though over the course of the 1200 videos she has covered anything I have ever searched for.
The videos are concise, as are the recipes themselves. They are similar in some ways to Mark Bittman's Minimalist videos, with each recipe taken to it's essentials and no unnecessary frills or elaboration.
The channel has almost 22 million views so far - so she is clearly doing something right. I'd highly recommend it to anyone looking for guidance on any Mexican dish.
Thursday, 4 April 2013
Saturday, 30 March 2013
Sopa de Fideo
It seems like a contradiction in terms, but there is a class of Mexican soups called "dry soups" or "sopa seco". Marilyn Tausend in the introduction to her recipe of Sopa de Fideo Seco con Frijol Negro, says it was common to serve both a "dry" soup and a "wet" soup before the main course in traditional Mexican meal.
The sopa de fideo with black beans is a very typical dish, however here I'm going to talk about a slightly plainer version, a simple sopa de fideo, that is a little quicker and still describes the very unusual technique involved.
Fideos are small pieces of thin noodle an inch or so long. They can be bought in the shops here the same as any dry pasta, however broken thin spaghetti (spaghettini #3) will substitute perfectly well.
OK, Let the weirdness commence.
Heat a couple of tablespoons of oil in a large saucepan, add the dry fideo and fry until golden brown. Yip, heat a couple of tablespoons of oil in a large saucepan, add the dry fideo and fry until golden brown.
This needs to be done carefully. The goal here is to colour all of the fideo evenly and you can only achieve this if you work with care, over a not too high heat and stir often. Over browning the fideo will affect the taste, but more importantly, the dish will look terrible if it's flecked with brown fideo.
The sauce
There are quite a few choices here. You need a tomato sauce, but all recipes vary. I like to add a couple of toasted and soaked guajillo chiles for a small amount of heat and a little extra colour, however chipotle or fresh chile could be used, or the sauce left without chile altogether.
The sauce is made in the blender using the tomato, about a quarter cup of onion, a clove (or less) of garlic, chile (if being used), and seasoning.
Some water or chicken stock will be necessary. How much depends on the tomatoes and how fast you cook the pasta so it's difficult to judge, just remember it's easier to add water if the dish is too dry than to remove it once the pasta is cooked. What you are aiming for is a consistency similar to a loose risotto, the soup shouldn't be too liquid, but neither should it be so tight that you can stand your spoon up in it!
The soup is garnished with a swirl crema and some queso fresco if desired.
Simple, quick, comforting, cheap, and a little strange.
The sopa de fideo with black beans is a very typical dish, however here I'm going to talk about a slightly plainer version, a simple sopa de fideo, that is a little quicker and still describes the very unusual technique involved.
Fideos are small pieces of thin noodle an inch or so long. They can be bought in the shops here the same as any dry pasta, however broken thin spaghetti (spaghettini #3) will substitute perfectly well.
OK, Let the weirdness commence.
Heat a couple of tablespoons of oil in a large saucepan, add the dry fideo and fry until golden brown. Yip, heat a couple of tablespoons of oil in a large saucepan, add the dry fideo and fry until golden brown.
This needs to be done carefully. The goal here is to colour all of the fideo evenly and you can only achieve this if you work with care, over a not too high heat and stir often. Over browning the fideo will affect the taste, but more importantly, the dish will look terrible if it's flecked with brown fideo.
The sauce
There are quite a few choices here. You need a tomato sauce, but all recipes vary. I like to add a couple of toasted and soaked guajillo chiles for a small amount of heat and a little extra colour, however chipotle or fresh chile could be used, or the sauce left without chile altogether.
The sauce is made in the blender using the tomato, about a quarter cup of onion, a clove (or less) of garlic, chile (if being used), and seasoning.
Some water or chicken stock will be necessary. How much depends on the tomatoes and how fast you cook the pasta so it's difficult to judge, just remember it's easier to add water if the dish is too dry than to remove it once the pasta is cooked. What you are aiming for is a consistency similar to a loose risotto, the soup shouldn't be too liquid, but neither should it be so tight that you can stand your spoon up in it!
The soup is garnished with a swirl crema and some queso fresco if desired.
Simple, quick, comforting, cheap, and a little strange.
Friday, 29 March 2013
Chicken Tinga
Reduced to it's absolute essentials tinga is a tomato salsa spiced with chipotle. It's commonly used with chicken but goes well with pork also. The meat is shredded and added to the sauce and is very nice served in tacos or on a toastada.
Variations on the dish center on whether chorizo is added or not and also around whether the sauce is seasoned with something acid or with something sweet. I prefer the slightly sweet version, and although chorizo makes everything better I usually don't bother with it.
Ingredients:
3/4 roma tomatoes (or 1 can of tomatoes).
1 clove of garlic.
1/2 of a tennis ball sized onion chopped, not too finely.
1 or 2 (according to your tolerance!) chipotles in adobo with some of the adobo.
Salt to taste.
A good inch of ground black pepper.
A pinch of oregano.
1 tsp (or more) of sugar.
The fussy method is to fry the onion till translucent, then add the chorizo and the garlic. Next add the roasted and peeled tomatoes and seasonings and cook everything together for 20 to 30 minutes, finally adding the shredded meat and the sugar and simmering everything together for a few minutes before serving.
A quicker method is to put the tomato, garlic, chipotle and seasonings in a blender, if a small amount of water is necessary to get the blades spinning ad that, and blend everything. Fry the onion for a few minutes then add the tomato mixture and cook together for 15 to 20 minutes. Finally add the meat and sugar annd simmer for another few minutes.
This recipe can be adapted very easily for the slow cooker.
I think the two important things to get right for this dish are not to shred the meat too finely and secondly to get the consistency of the sauce right. The sauce should be think enough to coat the chicken and the pieces of chicken shouldn't be broken down too much.
Variations on the dish center on whether chorizo is added or not and also around whether the sauce is seasoned with something acid or with something sweet. I prefer the slightly sweet version, and although chorizo makes everything better I usually don't bother with it.
Ingredients:
3/4 roma tomatoes (or 1 can of tomatoes).
1 clove of garlic.
1/2 of a tennis ball sized onion chopped, not too finely.
1 or 2 (according to your tolerance!) chipotles in adobo with some of the adobo.
Salt to taste.
A good inch of ground black pepper.
A pinch of oregano.
1 tsp (or more) of sugar.
The fussy method is to fry the onion till translucent, then add the chorizo and the garlic. Next add the roasted and peeled tomatoes and seasonings and cook everything together for 20 to 30 minutes, finally adding the shredded meat and the sugar and simmering everything together for a few minutes before serving.
A quicker method is to put the tomato, garlic, chipotle and seasonings in a blender, if a small amount of water is necessary to get the blades spinning ad that, and blend everything. Fry the onion for a few minutes then add the tomato mixture and cook together for 15 to 20 minutes. Finally add the meat and sugar annd simmer for another few minutes.
This recipe can be adapted very easily for the slow cooker.
I think the two important things to get right for this dish are not to shred the meat too finely and secondly to get the consistency of the sauce right. The sauce should be think enough to coat the chicken and the pieces of chicken shouldn't be broken down too much.
Monday, 25 February 2013
Thursday, 21 February 2013
Some Breakfast Dishes featuring Eggs
There no need for anything in the way of recipes here....
Huevos Rancheros.
Fried eggs served over tortillas with a fresh tomato salsa.
Migitas.
Scrambled eggs mixed with strips of fried tortilla.
Huevos Divorciados.
Two fried eggs, one smothered in a cooked tomato salsa the other in a tomatillo salsa.
Huevos con Chorizo.
Scrambled eggs mixed with chorizo. Mexican chorizo unlike the Spanish cured version is fresh, it required cooking and cannot be eaten raw. When cooked it breaks into a fine mince consistency.
Huevos del Albañil - Bricklayers eggs.
An omlette (or sometimes fried eggs) smothered in tomatillo salsa and served with avocado and crema.
Machaca.
Scrambled eggs with dried beef, tomato, onion, chile and garlic.
Huevos Revueltos.
Scrambled eggs with tomato, chile, onion and garlic.
Breakfast Burritos.
No point trying to compete with Robert Rodriguez on this one!
Huevos Rancheros.
Fried eggs served over tortillas with a fresh tomato salsa.
Migitas.
Scrambled eggs mixed with strips of fried tortilla.
Huevos Divorciados.
Two fried eggs, one smothered in a cooked tomato salsa the other in a tomatillo salsa.
Huevos con Chorizo.
Scrambled eggs mixed with chorizo. Mexican chorizo unlike the Spanish cured version is fresh, it required cooking and cannot be eaten raw. When cooked it breaks into a fine mince consistency.
Huevos del Albañil - Bricklayers eggs.
An omlette (or sometimes fried eggs) smothered in tomatillo salsa and served with avocado and crema.
Machaca.
Scrambled eggs with dried beef, tomato, onion, chile and garlic.
Huevos Revueltos.
Scrambled eggs with tomato, chile, onion and garlic.
Breakfast Burritos.
No point trying to compete with Robert Rodriguez on this one!
Yet more cookbook recommending...
La Cocina Mexicana.
La Cocina Mexicana: Many Cultures, One Cuisine is by Marilyn Tausend and Ricardo Muñoz Zurita. It's a beautiful book with a carefully selected range classic recipes giving a very good overview of Mexican cooking, along with evocative descriptions of people and places, and some interesting historical context for the dishes.
I really enjoy this book. It's not fussy or glossy. What I find most impressive is that it is not simply content to rush through simple versions of the "greatest hits" dishes and takes a much more considered and careful look at the cusine.
The font for the recipe titles looks like it was lifted from the cover of a death metal album, and that is as much fault as I can find with the book. It belongs in any respectable collection.
The Mexican Slow Cooker
The Mexican Slow Cooker by Deborah Schneider was, on the other hand, a disappointment. It's a fine idea, well produced, but I expected more. I was really looking forward to this book and getting ideas for soups and tacos guisados (the stewed type of taco filling, pibil, barbacoa, tinga etc.) that could be made in a slow cooker.
While there are recipes for some of these the book is padded out with a lot of very standard Mexican fare, only very tangentially, if at all, related to the slow cooker.
La Cocina Mexicana: Many Cultures, One Cuisine is by Marilyn Tausend and Ricardo Muñoz Zurita. It's a beautiful book with a carefully selected range classic recipes giving a very good overview of Mexican cooking, along with evocative descriptions of people and places, and some interesting historical context for the dishes.
I really enjoy this book. It's not fussy or glossy. What I find most impressive is that it is not simply content to rush through simple versions of the "greatest hits" dishes and takes a much more considered and careful look at the cusine.
The font for the recipe titles looks like it was lifted from the cover of a death metal album, and that is as much fault as I can find with the book. It belongs in any respectable collection.
 |
| La Cocina Mexicana |
The Mexican Slow Cooker by Deborah Schneider was, on the other hand, a disappointment. It's a fine idea, well produced, but I expected more. I was really looking forward to this book and getting ideas for soups and tacos guisados (the stewed type of taco filling, pibil, barbacoa, tinga etc.) that could be made in a slow cooker.
While there are recipes for some of these the book is padded out with a lot of very standard Mexican fare, only very tangentially, if at all, related to the slow cooker.
 |
| The Mexican Slow Cooker |
Wednesday, 20 February 2013
Salsa de Chile de Arbol
This is a very hot sauce that is used to accompany Guadalajara's special Tortas Ahogadas, a pork sandwich in a crusty bap drowned (hence the "ahogada") in a tomato salsa. This fiery sauce is served on the side, though some people do drown the sandwich entirely in this sauce and omit the tamer tomato salsa altogether.
Even though the sauce is hot, it does still have flavour. Just remember not to rub your eyes!
- Chiles de Arbol - about 50 - a good fistful, toasted and then simmered in enough water to cover for 20 minutes or so.
- 2 cloves of garlic - preferably toasted.
- A tablespoon of cider vinegar.
- A tablespoon of sesame seeds - preferably toasted.
- Some onion - not much.
- A couple of cloves
- A teaspoon of salt
Even though the sauce is hot, it does still have flavour. Just remember not to rub your eyes!
Thursday, 15 November 2012
Wednesday, 14 November 2012
Aguja Nortena
Cuts of Beef
The cuts of beef in the butchers shops in Mexico can be slightly different to what I am used to and it can sometimes be confusing to identify exactly where in the animal a particular cut comes from, and also what the best cooking method for a particular cut is.
This article by Karen Hursh Graber gives as good a summary as one could hope for. It has finally cleared up the arrachera question for me, which US writers regard as equivalent to hanger steak, flank steak or skirt steak pretty interchangeably (it's skirt steak). It's a very useful resource and I've used it quite a bit over the past three years. The diagram below is from the same source.
Aguja Nortena
When it comes to cuts of beef, especially the popular Mexican cuts which are destined for the grill, you need to remember that quick fast cooking and medium rare meat doesn't necessarily equate to tender meat.
Arrachera for example, can be quite stringy when cooked medium rare and works much better when cooked through completely. Similarly, aguja nortena, which is very common here in Monterrey for BBQs, works better when grilled slowly and served well done. It seems counter intuitive, but in these cases, well done is more tender. The mesquite coals that are used here help by providing a steady but not fierce heat that allows relatively slow grilling.
Agujas themselves are cut from the underside of the animal, about six inches by three inches with some bone along one of the long edges. These steaks are cut quite thin - to about a centimetre. At parties they are often cooked, a couple for each guest and offered with tortillas. They are best when seasoned simply, just salt and a sprinkling of Worcester sauce before grilling.
The cuts of beef in the butchers shops in Mexico can be slightly different to what I am used to and it can sometimes be confusing to identify exactly where in the animal a particular cut comes from, and also what the best cooking method for a particular cut is.
This article by Karen Hursh Graber gives as good a summary as one could hope for. It has finally cleared up the arrachera question for me, which US writers regard as equivalent to hanger steak, flank steak or skirt steak pretty interchangeably (it's skirt steak). It's a very useful resource and I've used it quite a bit over the past three years. The diagram below is from the same source.
Aguja Nortena
When it comes to cuts of beef, especially the popular Mexican cuts which are destined for the grill, you need to remember that quick fast cooking and medium rare meat doesn't necessarily equate to tender meat.
Arrachera for example, can be quite stringy when cooked medium rare and works much better when cooked through completely. Similarly, aguja nortena, which is very common here in Monterrey for BBQs, works better when grilled slowly and served well done. It seems counter intuitive, but in these cases, well done is more tender. The mesquite coals that are used here help by providing a steady but not fierce heat that allows relatively slow grilling.
Agujas themselves are cut from the underside of the animal, about six inches by three inches with some bone along one of the long edges. These steaks are cut quite thin - to about a centimetre. At parties they are often cooked, a couple for each guest and offered with tortillas. They are best when seasoned simply, just salt and a sprinkling of Worcester sauce before grilling.
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
Cafe De Olla and Hot Chocolate
Hot Chocolate.
Mexican hot chocolate, rather than being made from cocoa powder or powder is made using bars of spicy sweetened chocolate. This chocolate is very sweet and has a coarse texture, you can see the grains of sugar in it and it's spiced with cinnamon.
The hexagonally shaped Ibarra and Abuelita brands are popular, but it also comes in rectangular slabs similar to regular cooking chocolate.
Preparation is simple. Heat the milk, place in a blender with the chocolate and process until combined. Simple. There is a traditional tool called an molinilo which can be used to whisk the drink, and while it probably makes a fine souvenir, the blender is faster.
Cafe de Olla.
Cafe de Olla is a sweet coffee spiced with cinnamon and sometimes also clove and orange peel. It is sweetened with piloncillo, a unrefined sugar sold in cones slightly smaller than a fist. Assuming this isn't available to you dark brown sugar will substitute just fine.
When it comes to preparation there are lots of methods, most of which tie themselves up in knots with French presses etc. The problem is that the time necessary to extract the flavour from the spices and dissolve the cinnamon is longer than required to brew the coffee. Rick Bayless gets around this by making a spiced syrup first then brewing the coffee using the syrup. Personally I can see no reason not to simply add the coffee grounds to the pot after the syrup has been made and let that stand for five minutes. The drink can then be strained directly into a mug, removing both the grounds and any stray bits of cinnamon or clove at the same time.
I think a single stick of cinnamon and two to three cloves will flavour about four cupfuls of water and to my taste this will require about 3 heaped tablespoons of ground coffee and add as much sugar or piloncillo as you like.
It's unusual, but comforting, and goes well with pastries of any kind, perfect for a mid-morning break.
Mexican hot chocolate, rather than being made from cocoa powder or powder is made using bars of spicy sweetened chocolate. This chocolate is very sweet and has a coarse texture, you can see the grains of sugar in it and it's spiced with cinnamon.
The hexagonally shaped Ibarra and Abuelita brands are popular, but it also comes in rectangular slabs similar to regular cooking chocolate.
Preparation is simple. Heat the milk, place in a blender with the chocolate and process until combined. Simple. There is a traditional tool called an molinilo which can be used to whisk the drink, and while it probably makes a fine souvenir, the blender is faster.
 |
| Mexican Hot Chocolate |
Cafe de Olla.
Cafe de Olla is a sweet coffee spiced with cinnamon and sometimes also clove and orange peel. It is sweetened with piloncillo, a unrefined sugar sold in cones slightly smaller than a fist. Assuming this isn't available to you dark brown sugar will substitute just fine.
When it comes to preparation there are lots of methods, most of which tie themselves up in knots with French presses etc. The problem is that the time necessary to extract the flavour from the spices and dissolve the cinnamon is longer than required to brew the coffee. Rick Bayless gets around this by making a spiced syrup first then brewing the coffee using the syrup. Personally I can see no reason not to simply add the coffee grounds to the pot after the syrup has been made and let that stand for five minutes. The drink can then be strained directly into a mug, removing both the grounds and any stray bits of cinnamon or clove at the same time.
I think a single stick of cinnamon and two to three cloves will flavour about four cupfuls of water and to my taste this will require about 3 heaped tablespoons of ground coffee and add as much sugar or piloncillo as you like.
It's unusual, but comforting, and goes well with pastries of any kind, perfect for a mid-morning break.
Sunday, 7 October 2012
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