Pátzcuaro's Best Eats?

¡Experimental!


While playing around with Google Maps, I started a custom map. On it, I added locations and descriptions of some of my favorite places to eat in the Pátzcuaro area. The list is short, but I hope to add more places worth of attention. Maybe later, I will highlight them in some detail.

See the embedded map for my picks.


View Pátzcuaro's Best Eats in a larger map.

My Other Blog???

Yes! I have another blog! Actually, there is yet a third blog, supposedly on travel, but it hasn't been updated in over three years. It might be merged with Surviving La Vida Buena, as soon as I figure out how to do that.


I'm gratified to have 27 registered Followers of My Mexican Kitchen.
However, my other blog, Surviving La Vida Buena, has only 2.

So in the interest of raising awareness of my other blog, which has occasional musings on the expat life in Mexico, a few posts on technology from an avid user's viewpoint, and any other topics which might interest me, I commend you to have a look at Surviving La Vida Buena.

I just posted on Google Earth's amazing Street View capabilities, coming soon to a major city near you.

Saludos,

 Don Cuevas

Black Magic Radish

The Black Radishes arrived in stealth by night, then at daybreak, sought cover in a nest of verduras to the side of the puesto de Los Padilla in the mercado de Pátzcuaro.

These rarely seen, dark and mysterious vegetables are a special delight for some of us whose heritage is from the eastern side of Europe. They look something like an anarchist's bomb from the reign of the Tsars.

We were shopping for vegetables and fruits in the mercado yesterday and I was surprised to find two large black radish roots other than at Los Padilla. When I asked the Señora how much, she pointed  to the larger and said, "Cincuenta pesos", and the smaller, "Treinta." I felt that was a little high, so we passed them up.

As we were winding up our marketing, we stopped by los Padilla to see what special items they might have.

From El Mercado de Pátzcuaro 6/5/09 4:28 PM

Los Padilla, Arturo y Sra. Rosa.

Whle I waited as they served other customers, my eye caught the two black radishes hidden to the side of the stand, under a cover of acelgas  (chard) or some similar verduras.

Arturo asked only $20 MXN for a substantial black radish, a very good price. It weighed perhaps 500 grams.

Soon after we arrived home, I started to prepare a version of my Mom's Black Radish Salad.

Given the unusual size of the specimen, I hard cooked 4 eggs, 2 more than usual. When they were cool, I first washed, peeled and disinfected the radish. The skin was unusually coarse and almost scaly, evoking mental images of black iguanas.

Brrrrrr!!!

I then cut it into pieces that would fit down the feed tube of our Cuisinart food processor. I set up a coarse shredding disk in the processor.

I cleaned one small onion and peeled the hardcooked eggs. It's an easy task to run the sections of black radish, the eggs and the onion through the shredding disk. The contents were then transferred to a large mixing bowl. (On reflection, it might have been somewhat better to first shred he eggs, the onion, then the radish; which would serve to better clean the shredding plate. Also, the hardcooked eggs shred better when chilled.)

Salt and freshly ground pepper were applied to taste.

Now, we come to a fork in the culinary road. Traditionally, rendered chicken fat cooked down slowly with onions is lightly applied to the salad and tossed in. As we don't have schmaltz und grebenes on hand, I used olive oil. It's less interesting but healthier. One could use toasted Oriental sesame oil to good effect, I think.

It seemed lacking in pungency, so I took the radical step of reconstituting some wasabi in a little water, letting it repose 5 minutes to develop "heat", then blended it into the salad.

Taste again: a few drops of lime juice or white wine vinegar, perhaps, and it's ready to eat. We served it to ourselves on romaine leaves flanked by strips of sweet orange pepper.

Here's another blog's essay on Black Radish: Weird Vegetables.

And this Black Radish Beer is a German style dark beer, but I hope that it doesn't really contain black radish. That would be too weird.

(There's also a Jewish-Eastern European conserve of black radish and ¿honey? which I must investigate. It's not this recipe by Mimi Sheraton, for a long keeping conserve. It definitely has honey in it.)

Southern Comfort: Country Sausage Gravy

The recipe for this is open to many variations, depending on custom and individual taste. What I'm saying, is don't expect much in the way of precise amounts or hand-holding.

For enough gravy to serve 4 to 6 people, you'll need about 8 tablespoons of meat drippings, either from cooking off a pound of Country Sausage, augmented, if necessary, with some bacon fat or butter. Lately I've been using a little butter, with good results. Set the crumbled, cooked Country Sausage aside while you do the roux.

Heat the fat in a large skillet (iron if possible) while slowly heating a quart/liter of milk in a separate pot.

Sprinkle in the flour and mash it around to get a nice paste. Cook slowly until it's bubbly, about 5 minutes, and remove from the heat. (It won't look too nice.)

Add the roux to the pot of heated milk by tablespoonsful, whisking continually. Use all the roux. Keep some milk on hand in case this gets too thick.

You must stir or whisk nearly constantly.(You can do this while the biscuits are baking.) Keep the heat fairly low, just under medium, and it will gradually thicken. Do not allow it to boil.

Add the cooked, crumbled sausage meat, stir and heat a few minutes.
Taste for seasoning. Now, after the highly seasoned sausage has been added to the gravy, is the right time to adjust for salt and pepper. Customarily, it's well peppered.

Serve hot, in a gravy bowl, and let your guests dip their own to ladle onto split, hot biscuits. If serving just for yourself, skip the gravy bowl and just dish it up as you like.

Here's an image from another website.
It's the best B & G image I've found in my brief search. May yours look as good.

Southern Comfort: Angel Biscuits

I admit, I really hate writing out recipes on the blog. But since I more or less promised recipes for Angel Biscuits and Country Sausage Gravy, I'm going to try to get this over in one long and one short post, so I can return to my more typical fanciful food flights.

Angel Biscuits (Adapted from The Complete Book of Breads, by Bernard Clayton.)

A really great thing about these biscuits is that you make up the dough in advance and refrigerate it. The author claims you can do so up to 4 or 5 days, but I've never taken it past 3. The tangy buttermilk plus yeast fermentation increases its sour power with each hour. I believe that there would be a point of diminished leavening potential after 3 days.

Ingredients
• 4 1/2 cups all purpose flour (Mexican equivalent; Celestial or Sello Rojo Tradicional)
• 1 package dry yeast (about 2 teaspoons)
• 1 tablespoon baking powder (Royal)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda (Bicarbonato de sodio)
• 3 tablespoons of sugar (I've cut that sometimes to only 2. The fll quantity is needed, in my opinion, for a prolonged, cold fermentation.)
• 1 teaspoon salt (May be increased to 1 1/2 tsps)
Blend the above ingredients well.
Cut in with a pastry blender, two table knives or finger tips:
• 3/4 cup shortening. Bernard Clayton says "lard preferred", but I typically use a half cup of "Cristal Manteca vegetal" and a 1/3 cup of Kirkland butter. I avoid hard, semi-crystalline shortenings such as "Inka". The particles should be about the size of grains of rice. But if you have a few slightly larger, don't worry.

Add:
•• Two cups of buttermilk, slightly warmed.
Here's the catch. Buttermilk is almost impossible to find in Mexico, so substitutions must be found. Various have been tried: a little vinegar in milk works fairly well; Activia Natural might do, but you'll need to reduce the sugar in the dry ingredients.
Yoghurt natural, sin azúcar could work if thinned out a bit.
I haven't tried Jocoque Libanés. It's also very expensive.

The best liquid buttermilk replacer is SACO dry cultured buttermilk. Pack some into your luggage when coming to Mexico from El Norte, or ask your friends to bring some. (Once the canister is opened, store the remainder in a tightly enclosed container to keep out moisture and to prevent lumping.)

Let's say you lucked out and got some SACO.
Use 4 tablespoons for every cup of water in the dough. SACO must be well mixed with very warm water to combine without lumps. An alternate way is to blend it well with the dry ingredients, then use somewhat warm water to combine the dry ingredients into a rather wet dough. The warm water is also useful in activating the yeast.

Mix the ingredients just until blended. Place in a Pam-sprayed bowl or better, a Pam-sprayed large plastic bag. Close, leaving some room for expansion, and refrigerate, at least overnight. Twenty-four to thirty-six hours is about optimum, IMO.

Baking Day
Preheat oven to 400º F or 205º C.
Get a couple of ungreased cookie sheets, a rolling pin and a small (2 inch or so) biscuit cutter. Mine is an old Vienna Sausage can with one end removed and a few vent holes punched into the other side. (My kinfolk brought it on their mule drawn wagon when they crossed the Cumberland Gap on their way to the State of Arkansaw.)

Flour your work surface well, and take the damp dough out of the bag or bowl. Flatten it to a rough rectagle, and pat or roll out, then fold in thirds. Repeat this at least once, up to three times. (This is why the dough was mixed wet.)

With the rolling pin, roll out the dough sheet to 1/2 inch thick. Lift it and give it a little shake to allow it to shrink back. Reroll if necessary to 1/2 inch. These biscuits will rise mightily.

With a lightly floured cutter, cut straight down, without twisting, and place each biscuit on the cookie sheet with about 2 inch spacing. (Unlike regular biscuits, these bake better if not too close together.)

You may, if you like, lightly brush the tops with melted butter, but it's not really necessary.

Place in the oven for about 15 to 17 minutes, or until the tops are nicely browned. (Here's where a good oven thermometer pays its way. Your kilometraje wil vary with your oven and your elevation above sea level)

Pull one open to be sure the interior is fully baked.
Serve warm with butter, syrup, molasses, honey, jam or Country Sausage Gravy. (Recipe up next.)

Southern Comfort: Spicy Country Sausage

One of my favorite food books is the long out-of-print, Better Than Store-Bought, by Helen Witty and Elizabeth Schneider Colchie. More than a cookbook, it's a collection of recipes for specialty foods that are not only better than store bought, but for many of us living in México, unobtainable in any store. Thus, it's the first source to which I turn when I need a recipe for special jams, mustards, English Muffins, and in this instance, sausages.

I have adapted their excellent recipe for Spicy Country Sausage (page 6) to local conditions and our tastes. I've also increased the quantity to a kilogram of meat. If you are going to the effort to do this, you might as well make enough to freeze some. You may do so as well, as you wish.

First of all, speak with your butcher and ask for un kilo de carne de cerdo molida, con grasa. The fat is necessary to make juicy and savory sausage. About 20% fat is about a good starting point. Get the pork ground freshly to your order, as you watch. If your butcher won't do that, get another butcher.

If you have a meatgrinder, you may buy the meat in chunks, cut into pieces that will fit your grinder. Apply the seasoning and leave in the fridge overnight, well-covered. Next day, grind and mix. (It's always best to be very conservative when seasoning. You can always add more later.)

Now, the recipe. Make this as soon as possible upon arriving at your kitchen. In other words, don't stash the ground pork in the fridge for 3 days, then start making the sausage.

I'm highlighting Mexican substitutions in red.

Place the ground pork in a large mixing bowl.

In a spice grinder or a molcajete, grind the following:

• 2 1/2 teaspoons sea salt (more to taste later) Sal fina del Mar.

• 2 teaspoons leaf sage, crumbled. Salvia

• I usually add some crumbled thyme. Tomillo.

• 1/3 teaspoon whole black pepper. Pimienta Negra.

1 to 3 small hot dried chiles, or chile flakes. Chile Piquín or similar.

Grind these spices to a medium grain, and sprinkle over the ground pork.

(I always add about 2 teaspoons of granuated sugar to a kilo of pork, to give it that good ol' Tennessee Pride kind of taste.)

Mix well with cleanwashed hands until the seasonings are thoroughly blended.

Now, you must sample this to check for seasoning. Please, don't eat this raw. It not only could be very bad for your health, it won't taste right, either.

Make a very small patty and slowly fry it in a small skillet. When it's fully cooked, taste it. It may need more salt or other seasoning. If so, go back to the mixing bowl and add more seasoning in very small amounts, then cook another tiny patty.

Note that the flavor will change once the sausage meat is refrigerated over night. I think it becomes milder.

Now, for Don Cueva's Secret Tip: The mixture may seem dryish, in spite of its fat content. To remedy that, I often add apple juice, just enough to loosen up the sausage a bit. The apple juice also tends to smooth out some of the more picante highlights and wed all into a state of blissful harmony.

We pack the sausage meat into small Zip-Loc bags, about 5-6 ounces each, close well, and freeze them. If you plan on cooking some within a day, keep it in the fridge. You can, of course, form breakfast-sized patties, and freeze them with plastic film or waxed paper between.

My next recipe will tell how to make the ethereal Angel Biscuits. They need to be mixed one to two days before baking. This is very convenient  as most of the work is already done before the day of baking.

Stay Tuned.

(I was just browsing Google for this recipe, and, BEHOLD! an uncredited copy on CD Kitchen. I'm not too surprised, as this sort of rampant copying is rife on the Web. If you decide to use their servings quantity widget, beware that increasing the spice proportionately to the meat may result in an inedibly overspiced sausage meat.)

Southern Comfort: Biscuits and Gravy

Although I am not a son of the South, I spent 44 years in the border state of Missouri and in the deeper South state of Arkansas. Those years shaped my taste for Southern comfort foods, such as grits, country ham and especially, biscuits and sausage gravy.

                      Photo courtesy of Geni Certain


The first time biscuits and gravy and I met was in a cheap cafe in Waynesville, Missouri, near Fort Leonard Wood. My buddy, a true son of the rural South, and I were between activities on an extended caving weekend. We stopped in the early morning hours (in my opinion, 4 to 7 a.m. is the time to experience small town cafes  and truck stops at their best. Guys in gimme caps are being served endless cups of coffee from bottomless pots while fine greasy aromas of hash brown potatoes and bacon waft from the kitchen pass-through.


At that time, I'd no idea what biscuits and gravy (hereafter, "B&G") was. To me, a son of the South side of Brooklyn, "gravy" was a brown sauce that went on pot roast or roast beef.


At the urging of my caving buddy, I ordered the B&G. When it arrived, I was somewhat startled by the gravy. It was a thick, not very attractive white sauce, studded with bits of country sausage. The biscuits, (a "drop" version of which my Mom used to make from Bisquick, here were of lower profile, and when split open, revealed a more open textured crumb. The taste was tangy with buttermilk. It was all a bit odd, but palatable, and certainly a lot easier to eat than my first bowl of menudo, years later, in a trackside cafe in Lordsburg, NM. (Note the sneaky reference to Mexican food, thus validating my blog's title.)


Over the years, and many caving trips later, my taste for B&G grew fitfully. Some restaurants make the worst imaginable grease-based wallpaper paste gravy and leaden biscuits. That usually occurred around midnight, when B&G are unofficially out of season.


Eventually, I learned how to make this true Southern delicacy at home. B&G has become a favorite dish for when we have guests to breakfast. Although it's a simple dish, my interpretation depends greatly on high quality ingredients. There are three principal components:
• Homemade Country Sausage
• Angel Biscuits (AKA Double Leavened Biscuits)
• A proper gravy, based on a flour and meat drippings roux, properly cooked.


First, I'll issue the usual Disclaimer:
This Is Not Health Food. It contains mostly carbohydrates and  fat, with a reasonably healthful diluent of milk. It will meet all your cholesterol needs for the near future. You really don't need bacon, ham or additional sausage with this meal. But some have had those additions, and lived, at least for a few more years.


I'll be giving detailed recipes in the next installment, God willing.
Watch for updates.


Saludos,
 Don Cuevas

Grilled Pizza Confidential

Lately, seems like nearly every other with it food blog does grilled pizza.
It's been covered thoroughly on cooking sites as well as blogs.
I'd been tempted to do this, but it seemed daunting. So many things could go wrong. My confidence was shaky.

Fortunately, my blogging buddy, Constantino, has had experience with this technique, and was present to help and give good tips. Most of all, he gave me confidence to proceed. (And two good bottles of wine to go with our lunch.)
(By the way, Constantino doesn't look a bit like the old guy represented in his avatar.)

The problem with baking pizza in our Mexican GE gas oven is that it just doesn't get hot enough to consistently brown the bottom of the crust and quickly cook the toppings. I do use 16 inch, dark colored perforated pizza pans and occasionally get a decent crust bottom, but it's unreliable.

What I'd read about grilled pizza was that you are almost guaranteed a crisped, brown bottom crust. There are, however great differences in the technique from that of oven pizza.

•Basically, the grilled pizza crust is parcooked on one side, turned, toppings added to the cooked side, then finished at somewhat lower heat to amalgamate.
•Different heat zones are required for optimum results.
•Because the pizza is not assembled all at once, but in stages, it's inportant to have all ingredients ready and close by.
•A major doubt in my mind was how to keep the raw dough from sticking to the searingly hot grill bars. Some videos on the Web advise stretching out the dough round on a heavily oiled baking sheet. This turned out to be unnecessary for us. A light brushing of olive oil was all that was needed.
•Constantino gave good advice when he said to slide the half cooked pizza bottom off the heat in order to assemble the toppings. As we lack a proper pizza peel, I used a rimless cookie sheet. That worked quite well for transfers. This halts the cooking of the underside and gives you breathing space in which to assemble.
•Details are important. I'd sliced the cheese into thin strips, but it melted slowly. If I'd shredded it, it would have worked better.
•It's best to use few topping ingredients, and they must all be precooked (except for the cheese) because of the short baking/grilling time.
(One website used simmering, cooked pizza sauce, but that was unacceptable to me. Pizza sauce, IMO, should be uncooked. Mine was a simplified version of my standard, and at ambient temperature.)

In the end, the two pizzas we made were somewhat irregular in shape. One had a scorched bottom, but still tasty. Both were very good eating. Now, with restored confidence, I'd do it again some time.

With great restraint, I'd confined my creative urges to making two kinds of pizza; a Margherita; tomato sauce, cheese and lots of fresh basil.
The other was Bacon and Caramelized Onion, sauce and cheese.
They both were very tasty, had characterful, crisp yet chewy crusts, infused with a little smoke, plus savory toppings. What more could you ask for?

Recipes? I like the pizza dough recipe in The Vegetarian Epicure, Book Two, by Anna Thomas. I reduced the yeast to 1 tsp, and let the dough rise slowly for three and a half hours, in our cool kitchen. I also used three tablespons of rye flour, which adds considerable flavor.


The pizza sauce recipe in the same book is also very good, but you may want to cut back or eliminate some of the many herbal seasonings. I used salt, freshly ground pepper, oregano and garlic, and less than 2 tsps balsamic vinegar. I did not use sugar. I spiked it with some red pepper flakes; just enough to perk up the flavor without causing mouth burn.

The Death of GOURMET Magazine

I have just learned on the Lonelyplanet.com/thorntree Get Stuffed Branch that Condé Nast Publishers have killed off the grand old GOURMET Magazine.

Here's what I wrote (edited for My Mexican Kitchen) on that discussion thread:

I was first exposed to Gourmet Magazine back in the 50's, when the murky covers seemed individually hand painted. I was introduced to what was then an enigmatic world. I remember one of the first issues we had had a cover painting of mushrooms under a glass dome. I wondered "Why would anybody do that?" Covers were usually drab, with what I thought of as a "European" feel. What did I know? I was a 10 or 12 year old kid.

There was a long running series, "Travels with Gramps", by Stephen Longstreet, that was fascinating and opinionated. I liked Gourmet best during the 80's. Later came Bon Appetit Magazine, which seemed to me an upstart of lower class, devoted to pink peppermint layer cakes on its covers. Later it got better.

Eventually I became disgusted with the whole lot, the pretentious excess, the upwardly mobile striving, the stinking perfume ads (thankfully, those have gone) and the thick pack of ads in the front of the magazine. I hadn't seriously read it in years. We jokingly called it "Grommet Magazine". Recently I read an article, on nytimes.com about the whole bloated Conde Nast expense account and staff perks system. Read that, and you'll understand better why they are sacrificing Gourmet. Cuts Meet a Culture of Spending At Conde Nast Truly serious cooks would gravitate to Cook's Illustrated, but I'm not quite that serious. Besides, the postal fees to Mexico are exorbitant.

Since the name of this blog is, My Mexican Kitchen", here's a cover of some tacos estilo Gourmet, from the 1960s. Drab, isn't it?

More GOURMET covers here. I'm saddened that I can't find the one of mushrooms under glass.

My First Baby Shower

Being a red-blooded American man, I'd never been to a baby shower before.

But, this is Mexico, and things are different. (Red-blooded Mexican hombres don't go to baby showers either.)

A week ago, Rosa, our friend down the road, invited us to the baby shower for her daughter Patricia. Patricia, also known as Pati, is one of the three lovely daughters we've met. (That's Pati, on the left, in a picture taken 3 years ago.) There are four attractive daughters. We haven't met any of the several sons.

The day was dreary and overcast, and a light rain was beginning as we drove down to the gate to the family property. We discovered we could drive in along a gravelled track closer to the house.

The rain put an end to the brief attempt at outdoor festivities, so we carried the tables and chairs indoors once again.

The house is humble, but it was filled with warmth and merriment. Preparations were underway to decorate the brick walled rooms with balloons. We were given handfuls of confetti with which to shower Pati, in a "surprise" welcome.

We were also given miniature party favors such as a baby rattle and a baby carriage to pin to our clothes. It gradually dawned on me that a game was underway, in which if you cross your feet or arms, the person noticing your blunder gets to claim your party favor.  It wasn't long that I lost mine to María de la Luz. She smiled with satisfaction.

Another, less subtle but more active game involved transferring a lime with a plastic spoon clenched in your teeth. This was very lively and ending with the semifinalists in a playoff involving how fast they could consume Coca Cola from a small baby bottle. (Fortunately, I'd been eliminated early on, so could not even come close to qualifying for the playoff.)

After the hilarious playoff between the finalists, another contest began: how fast could you diaper the grown "babies" lying on the blanket? My wife, Doña Cuevas, is a good sport, and volunteered to be a "baby".
In the end, the other "baby's" diaper fell off when she stood up, so my wife's team won.

Soon there was the opening of the many gifts, received with thanks by Pati and applause from the attendees.

We were then served a light meal of tostadas, one of Ensalada Rusa, the other of Carne Apache (we set ours of Carne Apache aside). There were refrescos and then cake and brownies, which I'd made.

At that point, night came upon us, and we drove back to "Centro" with several passengers, an Abuelita and her nietos. It was a good time, and just right to banish melancholy.

Invasion of the Giant Meatballs

Meatballs and spaghetti: what a standard cliché of Italian-American cooking.

Yes, it's truly a cliché, but I love a good culinary cliche, when it's well made.

Recently I was browsing through Jack Denton Scott and Maria Luisa Scott's classic work, The Complete Book of Pasta (William Morrow & Company, 1968), with photographs; not of food, but of Italy; by Samuel Chamberlain).

I found the recipe for Polpettone, or a giant meatball. In reality, it's a rounded meatloaf, browned in olive oil, then braised in tomato sauce in the oven. There are some chopped raisins in the recipe. Use them, they are hardly noticeable but add a special touch.

When I went to make it, I was challenged by how to turn the thing, so I compromised, and turned 3 pounds of ground beef and pork, and other ingredients into some 15 to 18 large, but not gigantic meatballs. Each weighed about 5 or 6 ounces.

For the recipe, I merged the one in the book with another I found at About.com.
The management of all this was somewhat complex. I first made a large batch of basil tomato sauce. I then mixed, formed and browned the meatballs. I used our largest roasting pan, sprayed with Pam, and a layer of sauce, then the browned meatballs. I covered the pan with heavy duty aluminum foil (do not let the foil touch the sauce) and baked them about 1 hour at 350º F. I later slowly reheated them, with more tomato sauce, for an hour and a half, before serving to our 4  delighted guests.

To start our meal, we had three antipasti: lighly marinated cooked carrot sticks, roasted sweet peppers with anchovies and capers, and funghi trifolati (in this version, nothing more than sauteed sliced mushrooms, garlic, white wine and parsley.) plus a large mixed green salad brought by our guest, B.

Alongside the large bowl of steaming meatballs and spaghetti was a dish of sauteed spinach and Italian mustard greens. Warm "French bread" from  a local supermarket bakery. (Oh, well. It was o.k.)

                            

     Spinach and mustard greens.

We ended the meal with a really good apple pie, made by G. and ice cream, made by Holanda and coffee, brewed by me.

Here's a recipe for a really good Basil Tomato Sauce. It's simple and quick. You will need fresh basil. This comes from "The Classic Italian Cookbook", by Marcella Hazan, with my comments.

Fresh Basil and Tomato Sauce
For 4 persons. (Might as well double it, it freezes well.)
1 large bunch of fresh basil, small leaves preferred.
2 cups canned Italian plum tomatoes, seeded (I never bother!), drained (yes!), and coarsely chopped.
(I use Cidacos brand Spanish tomatoes. That's what we can get in Morelia. I use two large cans of tomates triturados and one can of tomates enteros, which I break up in the pan with a spoon.)

5 large cloves of garlic, peeled and chopped fine.
1/3 cup of olive oil, more if desired (she wrote). I think it's a bit excessive.)

Salt and freshly ground pepper.

1. Pull all the basil leaves from the stalks, rinse them briefly in cold water, and chop them. The yield should be 1 1/2 to 2 cups. (I actually had about half the required amount. The end result was delicious.)

2. Put the chopped basil, tomatoes, garlic the 1/3 cup olive oil. 1 tsp salt and pepper in an uncovered saucepan and cook over medium-high heat for 15 minutes. Taste and correct for salt.
(O.k.; I added the chopped fresh basil toward the end of the cooking, to preserve its fresh flavor. O.k., I confess that I added a sprinkle of hot red pepper (chile quebrado) to give it a buzz. That's all.)

Please, do not cook this sauce for a long time. The tomatoes come out of the cans already cooked!

Please, do not add other herbs and spice, nor sugar, for God's sake! Keep it simple, and you will enjoy it.

A midsummer's day cookout

We got the grill out today and put it through its paces. It had been neglected for a long time. It performed admirably.

Our starter consisted of large, Grilled Bacon Wrapped Fresh Figs Stuffed with Goat Cheese, made by our Geni and Larry. There was a reduced balsamic vinegar sauce for them, infused (very mildly) with chile ancho. These are truly lush.

One of our guests brought excellent tostadas of potato salad (big chunks), on which we drizzled chimichurrí rojo. There was also classic chimichurrí (green). Most of us preferred the red.

They were meant for the arrachera, but there was plenty, and they were tasty.

Also some fresh, crunchy, garlicky Health Salad, something like cole slaw.

Then, came the grilled vegs; sweet red peppers, cebolletas (knob onions), nopales (prickly pear catus pads, small zucchini cut lengthwise, and chiles largos* (pale, semi-picante long chiles. These were grilled by La Dama de La Parrilla, Doña Cuevas. Rather than re-marinate them, we simply gave them the lightest coating of vegetable oil.

*At least, I think that's what they were.

The meat was suposedly "arrachera", something like the meat used in fajitas, but our skilled butcher (at Carnicería La Sin Rival) skillfull cut an eye of round into arrachera-like form. After two days of marinating in garlic, lime juice, beer, orégano, olive oil, Maggi Jugo, Worcestershire Sauce (just a little) etc, it was near butter-tender.

We had warmed slices of sesame seeded baguettes, Mexican style, from the Bodega Aurrerá. Butter from Costco.

A huge salad of mixed greens of every description, including arugula, broccoletti, with white flowers. Many of the salad ingredients came from the Mercado Buen Provecho, Pátzcuaro's new specialty market. The dressing was a vinaigrette with fresh basil.

We drank Agua de Jamaica (cold hibiscus flower tea) with the meal. Sodas and beers were available.

Some of us started with Absolut Mandrin and Centenario Tequila. (Separately.)

Later, after a short walk, we had dessert, a warm deep dish peach cobbler, made with peaches from the tree of two of Geni and Larry. Some of us had mugs of Nescafé Decaf Sabor Intenso with dessert.

NEW! A few recipes!! Don't count on seeing many of these; this was a special occasion.)

Health Salad New Jersey Deli Style

Doctor the seasonings and proportions to your taste.

1 med head cabbage -- Coarsely shredded

3 carrots -- sliced thin

1 green pepper -- sliced thin.

2 cucumbers -- peeled and cubed. Seed them if the seeds are large and coarse.

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup water

1/2 cup oil

1 lg onion -- sliced thin

3/4 cups vinegar

1/4 teaspoon salt

Half sour dill pickles, cut into thick slices.

Some of the pickle brine.

a garlic clove or two, finely sliced.

dry mustard to taste

ground black pepper

dillweed (opt)

Mix liquids. Add vegetables and let stand in fridge overnight.

CHIMICHURRI ROJO

1/2 cup Spanish sherry vinegar or red wine vinegar (I used a combination of Pepper Sherry and red wine vinegar.)

1/4 cup virgin olive oil

1 1/2 tablespoons hot paprika

2 teaspoons cayenne pepper (that, IMO, is too much cayenne. I subbed Pimentón de La Vera Agridulce, and a small piece of chile Manzano rojo, carefully seeded.)

4 cloves garlic, minced (A LOT of garlic. Pongalo como te gusta.)

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon toasted and ground cumin seeds

1 bay leaf, broken in half

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

(Note: I overlooked the garlic in the recipe, a terrible error or omission. So I added a TBSP of Vietnamese Crushed Chiles With Garlic Sauce. That did the trick.

(The sauce is somewhat thin, so I added about two TBSPS tomato paste.)

Combine in blender all of the ingredients and blend well, refrigerate. Keeps for 1 month. Use on chicken

to be grilled or barbequed.

Peach Cobbler

(From The Fannie Farmer Baking Book, by Marian Cunningham)

Peach Filling

7 cups of fresh peeled and stoned peaches, cut into sixths.

3/4 cup of sugar.

2 TBSPS lemon juice.

4 TBSPS butter, held back to dot on top.

(I also add 2 TBSPS cornstarch to restrain the juiciness.)

Biscuit Topping

1 cup of flour

2 TBSPS sugar

1/4 ts salt

2 tsps baking powder

4 TBSPS chilled butter

6 TBSPS milk

Glaze, optional:

2 TBSPS butter, melted

1 or 2 TBSPS sugar

(That is too much butter overall for me, so I apply a few TBSPS of milk to the top crust, then sugar it lightly, just before putting it into the oven)

Method

PREHEAT OVEN, 425º F

Mix the peach slices with the sugar, lemon juice and cornstarch, if used. I also put a few drops of almond extract. Place mixture into a buttered 8"x8" or 9x9 baking dish.

Meanwhile, whisk or sift the dry biscuit ingredients in a separate bowl. Cut in the chilled butter until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add the cold milk and lightly combine with a fork.

Roll out this dough on a lightly floured surface, and place over the peach mixture in the baking dish. Trim excess dough edges. These may be cut into decorative shapes if desired.

Meanwhile, brush the top of the raw crust with melted butter or milk. Stick on the decorative cut outs.

Cut a few slots into the crust. Place on a sheet of heavy aluminum foil large enough to catch any boilovers, (already on upper oven shelf.)

Bake approximately 35-45 minutes, or until golden brown on top.

Allow to cool 15 minutes before serving. Vanilla or peach ice cream, or half-and half, optional, for those who must have it.

Slideshow photos by Geni Certain. ¡Gracias!

Weekend in Roma, Mexico City

Fountains in Plaza Luis Cabrera, Colonia Roma Norte

Back in late April, we'd planned to stay a few nights in Mexico City, enroute to a visit to parents in New Jersey. However, the swine flu dissuaded us, and instead, we flew out of Morelia.
That non-event left us with two vouchers for tickets on the AutoVías bus lines. Moreover, an old friend in Mexico City had just acquired a new Apple iMac Computer, and asked for tips in making her conversion from Windows P.C.'s. I was very pleased to help.

We arrived Friday, and took the fast Metro ride from Metro Observatorio (just across from the Observatorio Bus Station", and a few minutes later, were looking for the correct exit for Calle Jalapa in the sunken gladiatorial glorieta ring at Metro Insurgentes.)

Our hotel was the perennial Milán, on Av. Ávaro Obregón. Nice place; modern, clean and very nicely sitauated in one of the pleasantest areas of the city.
After checking in, we headed out for grilled hamburgers at the now famous Hamburgesas a la Parrilla stand in Colonia Roma Norte, Mexico City. They were good but not as searingly memorable as on previous occasions, as trade was light and the hamburgers were parcooked when we ordered. Still, the 3 of us managed to eat 5 in all.

Sunday afternoon in Mexico City, an old friend and her 20+ y/o daughter invited us to dine at Parrilla Quilmes, one of many choice Argentine restaurants in Colonia La Condesa. We further satisfied our carnivore lusts with two orders meant for two persons; one of "vacío", a hanger steak like cut; and "bife de lomo", a more compactly grained slab of beef. Both served on wooden cutting boards. Chimichurrí and a picante red sauce, and a bottle of o.k-but-not-great mustard sauce to be added al gusto. We shared a boat of crisp brown papas Francesas and a bowl of salad.

Parrilla Quilmes

Vacío

We also sampled a couple of Empanadas Argentinas; one extremely good, filled with Roquefort and onions; and one pretty good, with what seemed to be chopped roast beef. We shared a nice bottle of Argentine red wine.

Empanadas at Parrilla Quilmes

Monday, Doña Cuevas and I lunched not far from our hotel at "La Embajada Jarocha", a somewhat funny name for a restaurant (meaning, "the Jarocha Embassy". Jarocha is slang for a woman of Veracruz.)

The distinctive Veracruzana treatment of seafood is famous in Mexico. I started with a bowl of Chilpachole de Jaiba, a spicy crab soup, loaded with crabmeat, already picked from the shell.

La Embajada Jarocha building

Doña Cuevas had a hearty bowl of Arroz a la Tumbada, which in this case, was a Sopa de Mariscos (including slices of abalone) over rice, although they at first forgot to put in the rice.)

It was filling, and she couldn't quite finish her second course of three tostadas with different types of hot (!) seafood on each. However, the saucing and spicing were identical on all, so interest palled after a few bites. Still, not bad, if somewhat over salted (as were the two soups.)

I forged ahead with a filete de mero (grouper) al acuyo (cooked in a leaf of Hoja Santa or Piper Auritum http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoja_santa, wrapped in aluminum oil and steamed. It was light and clean, yet savory and very good, especially after the spicy soups.

Filete de pescado al acuyo

The restaurant opens at 1:00 p.m. and closes at 2:00 a.m! (Or so says the sign. There appears to be live music at times, including a drum set. Uh-oh.) Decór is farly minimal, so that it doesn't intrude on the food. We didn't look upstairs.

There was other food, of course, over the weekend, but those three places were the memorable highlights. Breakfasts were usually at Bisquets, Bisquets, Obregón, at la Mamá de Todos Bisquets. Moderate priced, nice Mexican family fare, brisk service; plus, they give a discount to viejos who carry an INAPAM credencial. The specialties are the house-made pan dulce and the café con leche, served with style, from two metal kettles, with the milk poured from on high.

(Oddly, with such good pan dulce, why is the bread in the baskets so corriente?)

Next to the Hotel Milán is Café Fertíl, a Fair Trade coffehouse serving o.k. breakfasts and terrific coffee. We also enjoyed a couple of soda fountain treats at La Bella Italia, on Calle Orizaba, after a visit to the Circo Atayde Hermanos, which is another story, but one nicely described on Mexico Cooks! and David Lida's blog. I won't elaborate on it here, except that we really enjoyed the show. (I, for one, was shocked, SHOCKED, I tell you, by the scantily clad and lovely female dancers. Mmmm.)

We took an ETN bus home as far as Morelia. We really need to use ETN more often, as it's quite a bit more comfortable than AutoVías, our usual choice, and the included sandwiches weren't too bad. There's also hot water, of a sort, for tea and instant coffee, which you must ask for when you board.

At Morelia, we got a second-class, Purépechas bus, which dropped us off at the intersection of our choice. Second class buses give you opportunities to buy snacks and other stuff from vendors who come on board, but we did not.

A Serious Sunday Seafood Feast

For years, the People's Guide To Mexico was my Mexico "bible". One of the memorable sections of the book described serious Sunday seafood feasts, with entire extended families going out for a leisurely and extended comida, often entertained by musicians. Well, the good news is that it's still a tradition alive today. The bad news is that the prices have risen considerably since the earlier editions of that book were written. Yet it's still possible to eat well on mariscos and not break the bank.

Five of us got together for such a Serious Sunday Seafood comida at Mariscos La Güera Campestre, on the Pátzcuaro-Morelia highway, across from OXXO and next to Viveros Pátzcuaro, at Km. 44.6

We made a point of arriving later than our usual time, in order to enjoy the bustle and the tables filling with other customers. The covered beer garden is now open, but as no customers were in it, and as I like to observe the open kitchen, we sat inside in the main building. Two of our group were already waiting for us.

Inside, there was live entertainment of a very good karaoke singer and his ocasional guitarist partner. (Just a little too much volume to where conversations were difficult.)

Drinks were ordered, among them several of the zesty Micheladas Preparadas con Clamato, which now came with one shrimp perched on the rim and 3 in the copa.

It's like a mini shrimp cocktail. How the restaurant can afford to do these drinks with shrimp at $24 MXN each, I have no idea, but we are not complaining!

Some of us started out with tostadas, for which Mariscos La Güera Campestre (and the matriz restaurant) is noted. I had one of the smoky, densely textured smoked marlín, and a light and refreshing one of tiritas de filete de pescado. The latter was tasty, but the fish strips were very soft, more than nomal, as if they'd soaked in the lime juice too long.

Others in our group had tostadas de Ceviche de Calamar, a saucy and spicier concoction. Muy recomendable. Other options were cocteles de camarones and/or pulpos, in 3 sizes, made to your taste, with or without cilantro, regular or with poca catsup, cucumber on request.

I decided to be dutiful and brave and give the Camarones y Pulpos a la Diabla a third try. I'd had the camarones only version at Mariscos La Güera matriz on two past occasions, and hadn't been pleased. The starch or flour-thickened red sauce had problems both times. This time it was quite successful. It's a tomato based, thickened sauce with a good kick, possibly of chipotle, although I can't be sure. There was a minor hitch when the platter arrived, as the food was lukewarm, but when I notified our waiter, he took it back to the kitchen and they quickly reheated it. It was more than just satisfactory; it was picante and delicious.

Mariscos La Güera is notable in that if ever arise any problems with your meal, a quiet word with your server or the manager will bring a quick and satisfactory solution.

Three of our group ordered whole fish; two of which were the mighty Mojarra al Mojo de Ajo, and one Trucha a la Veracruzana. The last is prepared in a style very unlike any pescado a la Veracruzana elsewhere. It's somewhat minimalist, as if the classic Veracruzana treatment had been deconstructed to a few strips of tomato, a chile, a few slices of green olive. Although it wasn't what he'd expected, our friend liked it.

We could argue that the La Güera style of pescado a la Veracruzana allows the taste of the fish to shine, rather than the dominant, complex and spicy tomato-onion-chile-garlic-bay leaf-capers and olives sauce. We could, but won't. I prefer it the classic way, although I think that it's too strong for delicate trout.

Another dining companion had Camarones Empani-Cocos, or shrimp breaded in unsweetened, shredded coconut. It's a dish that's easy to like, and he did.

The little yácata of rice that accompanies all the platters was unusally good and well prepared. All, of course had the usual backdrop of shredded carrots, tomato, cucumber and orange slices, and a little fan of avocado.

Quibbles, apart from the tepid Camarones y Pulpos a la Diabla: the table tostadas for munching were stale, and the lime chunks on the plates were a little past their prime.

We actually requested and received separate checks, which process took a little while, but what's the hurry? (I hated to leave, even though I was very full.)

We were given a friendly send off, and as we stepped out to the cars, raindrops were felt.

(Slide show is a compendium of over three years of photos, from both locations.)

A Brunch for a Saturday in Summer

To celebrate the return to the Rancho of our Alabaman neighbors; as well as to take advantage of the excellent produce and seafood now available, Doña Cuevas and I hosted a brunch loast Saturday. There were seven of us in all.

The developing menu went through several stages of creative imaginings, but in the end, this is what we had.

Brunch Menu July 11, 2009

Sangríta Marías -Bloody Mary drinks made with Tequila and seasoned muy picante.

Platón de frutas de la temporada.

"Gazpacho" Salad

Angel double-raised Biscuits with crisped cecina.

Salsa Poblana Cremosa,. (Roasted fresh green chile crema salsa; muy rica.)

Herbed, garlicked and pimentón dusted roasted baby potatoes.

Revuelto de gambas y ajetes, (soft, creamy scrambled eggs with shrimp and garlic chives; tocino y quesillo de Oaxaca)

More Angel Biscuits, butter. Conservas de Santa Rosa, GTO. Miel de Abeja. (Tropical and other jams, marmalades and honey.)

Café Americano

Brioche au raisin et canelle

(Nadie pudieron comer el brioche por tanta comida. Lo cortamos y repartimos para llevar.)

Our neighbor, Geni took some pictures which she generously agreed to share with us.

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