My Mexican Kitchen

Grilled Pizza Confidential

2009-10-18T07:31:00.004-05:00

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

2009-10-07T05:18:00.015-05:00

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

2009-09-28T10:22:00.004-05:00

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

2009-09-28T06:02:00.002-05:00

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

2009-08-02T08:50:00.003-05:00

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

2009-07-30T17:44:00.010-05:00

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

2009-07-20T05:43:00.007-05:00

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

2009-07-13T15:56:00.004-05:00

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.

Mercado Niño Santo Morelia

2009-07-11T18:54:00.007-05:00

"How could I have missed this place all along?" I exclaimed when our friend Rose led us to the Mercado Niño Santo (officially, the Mercado Nicolás Bravo), on the western side of Morelia's Centro. The popular name derives from la Iglesia del Niño Santo, up at the corner.

I had often walked nearby, south of Avenida Madero and west of Calle Galeana. I'd been close, but not quite close enough.
The Mercado is just south of Calle Corregidora, on Calle Nicolás Bravo.

Photo: Cambio de Michoacán

It's a small, traditional mercado, one of the most pristine in México. I Googled it and found out that it was the first mercado in Morelia to be certified under the government's "Mercados Saludables" program. News article, Spanish. It's celebrating its 34th birthday this year.

Across Calle Nicolás Bravo from the mercado entrance is a small shop where a busy family makes corundas. Customers line up to have these small, simple corundas, 4 pesos apiece.

Back on the steps at the portals of the mercado were bread and pan dulces sellers. Rose bought us a few hearth baked bolillos. We ate them later that day at home. They were hand made, and had the characteristic and desirable scorch marks where la masa had hit la piedra. They were tangy with sourdough, equal and perhaps superior to those of La Espiga in Pátzcuaro.

Inside the main floor of the mercado was a world of blue and white walls showcasing the dried chiles, vegetables, fresh fish and meats.

An older woman was selling tall bottles of golden liquid. I asked her what it was."Vinaigre de piña" was the reply. I wondered if there were any smaller size bottles available. She sad the big one was only 10 pesos. She unscrewed the cap to allow my to sniff the mildly pungent vinegar. She said, "Look, there is la madrita on top."
It's a fuzzy little fermentation film that I remember from my Mom's pickling and canning days, back in the 50's.

"Es muy bueno para el estómago" she went on.

I decided that for the price, I couldn't go wrong. I gave her the 10 peso coin and she crossed herself and blessed it. It may have been her first sale of the day.

Beyond were beautiful, rosy huachinangos being unloaded from an icy crate onto a sales table. I knew I'd have to come back another day. For one, I hadn't brought a camera.
Various meaty joints and piggy parts were set up on a table across from the fish.

The mezzanine level beckoned, with its comedores ringing the mercado, promising a savory breakfast in the true Mexican mercado tradition.
Although not al the comedores were open that early, it was still a difficult choice.

One of the nice things in a mercado comedor is that the proprietors are happy to lift the tops of the cazuelas and explain the contents to you. Local # 127 had birria, bistec de res en salsa negra; albóndigas. I imagine that they could prepare huevos al gusto.

On the opposite side, another local had barbacoa, which in that instance looked a lot like the birria across the way. The were also serving menudo. The man lifted the pot lid to show me the caldillo and to one side, a separate pot full of very fresh cooked and varied viscera.

Over in a corner local, a strumming guitar player sang scratchily. Although I can appreciate the cultural aspects, I prefer not to listen to these performances while I'm eating.
I found my wife and Rose and we sat down at Local #127, Comedor Doña Feli."Felicitas" is her true name, and it's felicitous to eat there.

My choice was easy: birria. I'd had a bowl of barbacoa de borrego the day before at Barbacoa José Luis, on the Periférico near ISSTE, west of Costco. But it wasn't up to its usual standard. There were too many small bony fragments which detracted from an otherwise pleasant meal.

At Doña Feli's, the birria was bone free, rich and meaty, red with chile and tomato and very satisfactory.

Doña Cuevas had a plate of Bisteces en Salsa Negra, with some good beans and a small mound of rice. We both drank jugos de naranja brought up from the juice stand downstairs. Rose recommends this juice stand for its special combination jugos.

When we finished, Rose ordered some rice and beans to go.

We asked for la cuenta. $115 pesos Mexicanos. About $8.44 USD
This demonstrates again that in México, the best food bargains, and delicious ones, are in mercado comedores.
Contrast that cuenta with what we paid the evening before at Cafe Catedral, under the portales, looking at the Plaza de Armas. Two limonadas, a cafe con leche, a portion of carrot cake and some pastel de elote: about $160 pesos.

The sótano or lower level of the mercado seemed more typical of mercados elsewhwere: dark, relatively low ceilinged (compared to the main floor) and jammed with merchandse and more chiles and vegetables.

I've a last observation about el Mercado Niño Santo.

Upstairs, on the mezzanine level, you can get a dental or medical checkup or, as I've read, even a chest x-ray . It's open to the locatorios or stall holders and the general public.

Don't go away.
I'll be back...with a camera.

My Vegetable Love Should Grow

2009-07-06T08:29:00.004-05:00

A new enterprise, the Mercado Buen Provecho burst upon the Pátzcuaro food firmament like a nova, one day before the Fourth of July.

It was a great beginning for what promises to be a mecca for gastronomes and foodies alike who crave fresh produce of varieties hitherto unknown or rarely seen in Pátzcuaro.

Lisa, one of the principal movers behind this mercado/tianguis told me that for their first day, they hadn't brought everything that they might have. To my eyes, it was still a dazzling selection of beautiful salad greens, white eggplants, two sorts of earthy turnips and herbs; as well as hen's eggs and freshly killed ducks. There was also a table of specialty fruits, including the fantasy pitahaya, giant Italian lemons like small footballs, Persian limes (not so rare, but excellent, and most tempting of all, red round hothouse tomatoes, just a day or so short of perfect ripeness.*

Panadero Ivo's bakery table had a attractive selection of whole grain and seed breads to sell, but the packages of plump cinnamon rolls were selling like the proverbial hotcakes.

I had to restrain myself from buying more than we could use. I focused on vegetables: mixed salad greens plus arugula. Since all the salad greens were priced the same (I wasn't paying close attention to the prices), mix-and-match was easy.

I also bought some super nice, purple blushed, young turnips with great greens attached. There were red turnips as well, which, I was told were sweeter and had little or no "bite". But as I like "bite", I chose the purple ones.

A branch of fragrant Lemon Verbena or "cedrón, for tea; and a handful of basil, sweet basil, not the small leafed variety common in Michoacán, completed my herb purchases. There was also very robust branches of rosemary, and amazingly fragrant Lavender!

I bought two dragon fruit pitahayas from the second vendor's table, plus over a kilo of medium tomatoes, and one Italian lemon, just to fulfill my lust for lemon lemon LEMON! We rarely can get sour yellow lemon here.

The next morning, we tried one pitahaya for breakfast. It was easy to peel, despite its fearsome apparance, and the vivid vermilion-purple flesh was pleasantly light and tartly refreshing.

Although the baker's table held attractive products, I didn't want to buy any as I have much home baked bread of my own. The plump, packaged cnnamon rolls seemed to be selling like the proverbial hotcakes.

Then came the reckoning: la cuenta. I paid up; it was not cheap, but to me, well worth it for specialty produce of top quality.

When I returned to Hacienda Enmedio de Nada, I laid out all my purchases and took a few photos ** of them.

The following day, inspired by a sample of Braised Turnips I'd tasted at the Mercado, I made my own version.

I first coarsely cut several strips of smoked bacon. Thick sliced would be best, but I used what I had. This was set to slowly frying in a large non-stick skillet. The greens had been throughly picked over (they were in very good shape) and washed in several changes of cold water. They were then cut very coarsely into lengths. The tougher stem toward the root was discarded.

One onion, sliced, was put into the skillet, then very carefully, I put in the greens. It's important to leave some moisture on them. In fact, I added about 3/4 cu of water.
Salt and pepper are added. Go lightly on the salt.

When they begin to simmer, I turned down the heat and covered the pan.

The turnip roots themselves had been peeled and sliced into thick rounds. They went into the pan before the apples.

Next, I cut an unpeeled Granny Smith apple into small chunks, then as the greens began to get tender, added the apple pieces. Next, a tablespoon of white sugar sprinkled over all. I let this caramelize a bit, then added a "glug" of cider vinegar.

At that point, I replenished the liquid with about 1 cup of beef stock, made in this case from Bovril Beef Concentrate and a cup or so of hot water. That is the reason to be very easy on the salt at the start.

After a while, when the vegetables become tender, it was time to check the seasoning.

This was a wonderful, earthy, hearty dish, which went very well with the brown beans I'd cooked the day before and some freshly made Southern Style Buttermilk Cornbread.

*Last night, we tried a couple of the beautiful tomatoes. They were a little disappointing in that despite their brilliant red color and perfect conformation, they lacked any sort of that unmistakeable, sharp fresh tomato fragrance. The taste was o.k. but not what we were hoping for. I found that when I sliced them, they had good acidity, but were improved by sprinkling the slices with salt and a little sugar, and letting them repose about 10 minutes. Best of all, there a much better texture than the watery, pale red balls sold for tomates bolas in the supermarkets here.

** While at the mercado, I acceded to a request to not photograph within the mercado, so that all my photos were taken afterwards, in my own kitchen, at home. I'm hoping that the ban on photography will one day be relaxed, so that the mercado can be shown at its best to others.

Chickening Out (reprise)

2009-07-02T07:30:00.005-05:00

We're big fans of pollos asados al carbón. It used to be that we didn't distinguish between the al carbón pollos and the pollos rostizados. I now make the distinction that the former are cooked on a grill over charcoal and the latter, more common and usually cheaper, cooked by gas or perhaps la luz on a rotating spit.

So, over time, we've made a small list of favorites. Many made our list due to their convenience as well as their savory qualities. Price is a lesser consideration, but still of some importance.

Here's our personal favorites; what are yours?

1. Pollos Asados al carbón "El Tejaban". It's north of the railroad tracks on the right side of the highway on the edge of Tzurumútaro, heading towards Tzintzuntzan. It's ably run by Abel, but is consistently open only on weekends. Sometimes you can get lucky and find it open other days.

The pollos Tejaban are coated with adobo marinade before cooking, then fresh orange is squeezed on at the finish, and a sometimes too generous shake of salt and black pepper. They come with a thin, piquant salsa roja; a fresh, crisp and barely dressed cabbage slaw, accented with strips of chile Jalapeño, and crunchy carrot rounds; rice (we skip the rice as it's extremely dull, oily and stodgy); tortillas hechas a mano are extra. Sometimes, but not often, Abel will grill chiles güeros to toss in. Prices have varied from $50 to $60 pesos recently.

There is outdoor seating, and drinks (including barrel Tequila in the nearby tienda de abarrotes "Los Fresnos".) We usually get it to go, but it's even better eaten on the spot, even with some flies about.

2. We have heard good things about Pollos "El Rey" from a blogger named Felipe Zapata. He likes El Tejaban but says El Rey is even better. It's on Libramiento kind of near the bus station, below Mercado Tariacuri but above Ibarra. We haven't tried any yet, but intend to.

3. Just stopped yesterday at "Pollos Asados "La Vías", which kind of translates to "Chicken Tracks", indicating it's closer to and just south of the RR tracks at Tzuru crossing, on the other side of the highway than El Tejaban, but close to Barbacoa a la penca "Javier y Lety".

(Got all that?) It's the one with the pineapple upright on the grill. It seemed a bit more primitive and less professionally run than Abel's El Tejaban, but the chicken we had today (and it was a slow day for pollos) was very tasty. It came with grilled onion, nopales and a couple of tasty slices of grilled pineapple. It was supposed to have salsa and rice, but the very young assistant left them out of our purchase, even though he told his Mamá he'd put them into the bag.
No importa; we had both rice and salsa at home.

A whole pollo to go at Pollos Las Vías was $65 MXP. A good deal, even with the mixup and a general air of dishevelment. I didn't note any seating.

4. Pollos Al Pastor "Don Alfredo" This place attained a moment of fame from an appearance in a Lonely Planet Guide to Mexico. We once got one of these rustically prepared chickens, speared on a tilted stake over smoldering charcoal and were quite unimpressed, It was one of the blandest pollos we've had. The price a few years ago was $70 MXP, and not worth that much. Today, I was quoted $80 MXP. We passed on that. The chickens did not look very attractive, especially at the price. I think they may come with frijoles de olla. Maybe it's the Lonely Planet listing and maybe it's the superb location, on the lower end of Libramiento, just before it enters the Glorieta, opposite the new Bodega Aurrerá, but they are just not worh that much to me. (Speaking of which, I'm surprised that Bodega hasn't put in a rotisserie for chicken.)

5. 'Way up on the Carretera a Santa Clara is a pollos al carbón grill run by women. It's sort of across from and between Super Codallos and Automotriz Gárvez. These chickens have a heavier coating of adobo. If you get there early, say, 1:00 p.m. they are quite good. But if you arrive after 3:30 or so, the pollos tend to be dry. Back when we used to stop there, 3 years ago, the chickens came with frijoles de la olla, tortillas and salsa. I have no idea of current prices.

6. Unnamed pollos asados al carbón, Calle Padre Lloreda, east of Siete Esquinas, more or less below el Hospital Civil. Nicely adobado, about $60, but doesn't come with much. One disadvantage is that they are cooked ahead and kept warm in an ice chest. I don't care for that method, but prefer them fresh off the grill. However, they are no bad and will do in a pinch.

You Are My Flour

2009-07-01T05:47:00.007-05:00

By pura casualidad, Joe Pastry is starting a series on flours and their qualities. Interestingly, an American Mexpat acquaintance emailed me last week with a question about Mexican flours.

DISCLAIMER: My reply is based solely on my subjective experiences and should not be seen as a result of deep and painstaking research.

Don Cuevas, I know you have a background in baking so perhaps you can comment on this observation. Isn't it true that the wheat flour sold in Mexico is soft wheat (i.e., cake/noodle) flower, rather than the hard, red wheat flower used for bread in the US. I notice that the bagged wheat flour sold at Soriana clearly has a picture of cakes and pancakes on the bag, and I have noticed that most breads sold here have the texture of cakes. Could this be the problem with the breads baked here?

D.Y.

In reply;

D.Y., that answer may be partially correct, but in my experience, pan salado (not pan dulce) is chewy and occasionally crisp crusted. That's not likely achieved with soft wheat flour. I'm confident Bodega, Wal-Mart, and probably Soriana have steam injected rack ovens. This steam injection, in the first moments of the bake, are what give the baguettes and other pan Francés its crisp crust. Crispness is not considered desirable in teleras, or the usual bolillos (although you can get fantastically crisp bolillos from a tiny bakery on Calle Abasolo, near Plaza Carillo in Morelia. However the taste of those is inferior, IMO, due to the probable use of dough conditioners "fluffer-upper").*

The packaged consumer grade flour you are seeing on the shelf at Soriana is probably a soft wheat flour for making hot cakes, cakes and the occasional tortillas de harina. ("Harina Celestial" is a good example.)

I'm betting that with the exception of harina integral, your regular, popular bakeries (not in the supermercados) use one kind of flour only, and I'm going out on a limb to predict that the majority use Harina Óptima. It's milled by Harinera Guadalupe.

In my baking, I use Sello Rojo Harina Tradicional, milled by Harinera Michoacana, which makes fine bread. I also use it for cookies, cakes, sweet breads such as cinnamon rolls and Danish, and even occasional strudels. A strudel dough is optimally made from a high protein Hungarian wheat flour, but lacking that, I just make it work with Sello Rojo.

Óptima flour is my close second choice. I buy 10 kilo bags of these at Super(mercado) Codallos.

If I wanted to be very picky, I'd buy Harina Celestial brand, in 1 kg bags, just for pies, biscuits and cookies. It seemes to be a softer wheat flour, although I have nothng but subjective experience on that one.

Addendum: There's an excellent baker's supply house in Morelia on Calle Abasolo at Plaza Carillo, "La Frontera". They have just about everything the professional and home baker might need.

*(The best tasting bread in Pátzcuaro, as far as I know, are the teleras made in the Panadería La Espiga, bien escondida in a casa in a colonia north of Don Chucho's. The rest of their products are not at the same level of quality.)

And, now, purely for your musical entertainment, here's Flatt and Scruggs doin' that old favorite, "You Are My Flower". ( I am aware that Flatt and Scruggs were for years sponsored by Martha White Mills, makers of Martha White Flour, with "Hot Rize".)
Come on in boys, and pick it out.

Conservas de Corazón

2009-06-28T07:22:00.009-05:00

Until very recently, I'd never heard of Conservas Santa Rosa at Santa Rosa de Lima, Guanajuato; a women's co-op dedicated to conserving and selling fruits of that area.

We had the opportunity to pay a visit to the shop, located on the main street of upland Santa Rosa, at an elevation of over 8000 feet above sea level. It's about a half hour by car from Guanajuato Capital, on the highway to Dolores Hidalgo.

If I had ever visited Oregon state, which I've not, then I could say that the area resembles that state.

The shop is small, neatly and attractively set up. The walls are lined with shelves displaying the co-op's various products. Above are jars of beautiful, selected pear halves and peaches; below, an extensve assortment of marmalades of several types. Fresa is popular, and is avalable in different sizes. Durazno, chabacano, ciruela, piña, nopal, xoconostle, mango and guayaba. I may have missed a few.

Another shelf unit holds sweet fruit licores, such as tamarindo, of which I was not fond for its sweetness. There are others.

I was drawn to a shelf near the back door holding very attractive jalapeños encurtidos, but I can make those myself. More interesting were the Conservas Santa Rosa's Chiles Chipotles, in glass jars which showed off the chiles' dark, smoldering and smoky potential to advantage.

All the products are packaged in attractive glass jars with brown paper caps and twine. They would make good gifts. We bought about 10 items and have already given way 3 of 4.

This is a recommended excursion out of Guanajuato. You can visit the Valenciana mines; Las Conservas Santa Rosa, the fancy Alfarería Mayólica; and have a nice comida at one of the famed local restaurants, sch as Restaurante de La Sierra, Rancho Enmedio, or where we did, at La Cabaña de Lolita.

Website: http://www.ccg.org.mx/santa.HTM
Product Catalog.
Email: conservasanta@yahoo.com
These are their hours of operation:
All I know is that weekends, they open
sabado 10 AM to 6 PM

domingo 12 PM to 5 PM

The tienda may be open only on weekends.

Their website says that you can try some of the mermeladas in Tok's Restaurants; various locations in La República Mexicana.

Carne en Su Jugo

2009-06-27T07:05:00.015-05:00

Carne en su jugo is, literally, "Meat (cooked) in its own juice". It's somewhere between birria and caldillo, on their way to evolve into Chile Con Carne, Texas Style. (The latter contains neither beans or tomatoes. However, the recipe for CESJ I used contains frijoles de olla.)

Ever since I read the Mexican Cooking Project #10 on mouthfulsfood.com, for Carne en Su Jugo, I've wanted to make it. I think I made one careless (insouciant?) attempt before, with limited success.

This time, I used Cristina's* Carne en su Jugo 2, with very few modifications of my own.

The marinade consists of fresh Mexican jugo de limón, Salsa Inglesa (Worcestershire), Maggi Jugo or salsa China (soy sauce), and Salsa Tamazula, a bottled hot sauce.

One of the keys to the dish is to add no salt until it is almost done, after tasting it. The seasonings and the knorrsuiza de res add a lot of salt. (I actually used Knorr Suiza Costilla Jugosa de Res tablets, and they worked very well).

It seemed to be a boatload of bacon and thus, of fat, but you only live once, and well. The pieces of marinated meat are drained and dried off, then browned in the bacon fat. It made sense to me to first caramelize the cebolletas in the fat, remove them, and then cook the meat, thus adding more flavor from the onions to the meat.

When all the necessary elements are browned, I added the liter of caldo de res made from the tabletas Costilla Jugosa de Res. Follow package directions carefully, as it's always better to start with not enough and add more later if necessary. The meat is then simmered until tender. Surprisingly, it did not take as long as expected. Some cooked frijoles de olla and some of their broth are pureed in a blender and added to the pot.

One of the very important garnishes are cebolletas (young knob onions) or cebollettas de cambray (scallions). These small onions are caramelized in the fat leftover from cooking the bacon and they are wonderful. Next time you are at a taquería, be sure to get some cebolletas with your order. The well browned ones are the best.

The bacon is recommended to be added to each bowl of CESJ at the moment of serving, but in a lapse, I added it to the pot in the last few minutes of cooking. It was still good.

Condiments can make or break a dish. Here the recommended additions at the table are fresh, crisp and pungent radishes; chopped white onion, cilantro, limes and sea salt. We had the sea salt ready, but the CESJ did not need any more salt.

We ate hot flour tortillas as we generally prefer them to corn tortillas, but I think hot, crisp-crusted pan Francés would be good.
(We have found above average pan baguette Francés at the Bodega Aurrerá in Pátzcuaro.)

I recommend a good cerveza clara to accompany the dish, or an agua fresca de jamaica.

Some versions contain tomates verdes or tomatillos. That's something to try the next time I make the dish, and it won't be as long until I do so again.

*Cristina Potter of the excellent Mexico food and culture blog, Mexico Cooks!

Guanajuato: Restaurante Las Mercedes.

2009-06-25T06:22:00.180-05:00

I have to confess that the title I chose for my earlier post on Guanajuato, ("Guanajuato: Eating the Mummy") was meant to seduce you, titillate, and horripilate, with a promise of the delicately macabre. After all, Las Momias are among the icons of Guanajuato. But in reality, we prefer not to visit them "in the flesh," but to keep them at a safe distance.

In truth, there was nothing at all macabre about our wedding anniversary dinner at Restaurante Las Mercedes. I did indulge my imagination with an appetizer of Chile Pasilla Relleno de Queso, Envuelto de Tortilla de Harina con Natas. When I thought of the dark, shriveled chile pasilla, shrouded in a sheet of tortilla de harina, an alternate name, "Momia Envuelta" leapt into my imagination. The reality was a pungent chile, filled with requesón, in a very buttery wrapper. The flour tortilla, made in house, took on some of the qualities of a strudel, but with more substance. It was an appetizer with an earthy heart, despite the refined presentation.

Doña Cuevas enjoyed a "Napoleon" of nopal, (or, may we call it a "Nopaleon"?) with smoked salmon, goat cheese, capers and anchovies, sided by a very dark crushed chile salsa. That had a very nice balance of acidity and unctuousness.

I had better return to the beginning. After a whirlwind ride in a Guanajuato taxi through calles y colonias, tuneles oscuras y carreteras panorámicas, we were deposited at the gate of the sunny contemporary Mexican house in the Colonia San Javier hills. We were greeted like old friends by our host, Sr. Jesús Cárdenas and our model waiter, Pedro. La Chef, Sra.Luzma Gonzáles, was in the kitchen.

Sr. Cárdenas is a very good host, charming and engaging in a very friendly and informal manner. Pedro's service is nearly perfect, quietly attentive and unobtrusive.

Jesús enjoys interacting with interested guests, explaining the origins of each dish and its ingredients. The menu is verbal, and we had several excellent selections among the choices.

We were brought amuse bouches of tiny, crisp envelopes, perhaps made from fried flour tortilla, filled with a cool black bean pico de gallo. We were also brought complimentary, small raspaditos (shaved ice) drinks of mezcal de la sierra with the juice or puree of xoconostles, a sour cactus fruit.

Then, the above mentioned entradas, or appetizers, the "Nopaleon" and the Pasilla Chile.

My second course, a dramatically presented (an empty bowl set before me, a dried red chile protruding from julianas de tortilla, a wooden paddle perched on the dge of the bowl, holding clantro, cebolla and limón; then the Sopa Negra de Cuitlacoche is served at the table. It was an excellent choice, and for all its earthy complexity, lighter than anticipated. My wife wisely chose a nice salad of mixed greens, flor de calabaza with herbed goat cheese, and a light tarragon dressing.

Doña Cuevas continued with the salmon theme for her plato principal with a perfectly cooked, moist fleshed salmon fillet, a little mound of very rich mashed potatoes, a bit of spinach, touched with capers and anchovies.

I chose a Chamorro de Cerdo en Caldillo de Frijól Negro, which was very good. It carries a lot of porky meat. I enjoyed it, the bean broth more than the pork shank, but it was too much to finish.

Already sated, we regretfully were going to skip dessert, but Jesús, in his charmingly convincing manner, said that Chef Luzma had prepared a special Anniversary dessert. It was a small basket of good chocolate, filled with a light cream of garambullo, a variety of ripe cactus fruit. It rested next to half a small cake of a budín de elote or steamed corn cake. I liked the combination very much, especially the corn cake.

With a bottle of very good Argentine wine, Roca Valdivieso 2004; one bottled water, 1 cafe Americano and and 2 cafés express, the total bill was $1010 pesos Mexicanos, about $77 USD, apart from a well deserved tip to our waiter. We consider the meal a fantastic one, and a bargain by our standards.

An earlier review from another blog, "Living and Working In Mexico")

Restaurante Las Mercedes

Calle de Arriba No.6, Fracc. San Javier, C.P. 36020, Guanajuato, Gto.
Telephone: 01-473) 732-7375 y 733-9059

Mobile: 473-756-3836

Nextel: 52*185656

Email: lasmercedesrestaurante@gmail.com

Guanajuato: Eating the Mummy

2009-06-25T06:03:00.013-05:00

We were just in Guanajuato for our 41st wedding anniversary over a long weekend, and had some enjoyable meals (and some less so.).

Our first stop was Casa Valadez, where we had a pleasant supper in plushly elegant surroundings that belie the moderate pricing. Doña Cuevas had Caldo de cebolla, a very good French Onion Soup, Fettucine con Camarones; I, Tacos de Arrachera, tender and tasty. Other than the superb Flan de Cajeta, nothing that we had was ground breaking, but the food and service were good.

The beautifully appointed restrooms were a plus! Have a peek into the Men's:

The restrooms broke the scale on the SBRT, Standard Baño/Restroom Test.

Following the advice linked from Rachel Laudan's website, we booked for Saturday afternoon at Las Mercedes, where we had a delightfully memorable, 2 1/2 hour meal. I won't recount the details here, but will expand on that in a separate post. Meanwhile, a preview here. (Scroll down to "Anonimo's" second post.)

Breakfasts at Restaurante Truco 7 (part of our B&B package) were "o.k."; filling but undistinguished. That was very disappointing to us as we had warm memories of the place back in the 90s. The Enmoladas con Queso were dreadful, IMO, as the almost fudgy mole was thickly sweet while the queso, both inside and on top was totally excessive. I was unable to finish it, which is unusual for me.

However, on our first morning at Truco 7, I had a slice of Pastel de Tres Leches, and I'm happy to report that it it fulfilled my fondness for this dessert very satisfactorily. Truco 7's Pastel de 3 L's is among the best ever in México. The coffee is decent if not outstanding.

A small but enjoyable "find" were the antojitos stands up by El Pípila. One cart was already open on the morning of our vist, and the woman's sopes were beautifully done while her tlacoyos eran muy guapos.

One of the highlights of our visit was riding up towards Santa Rosa, about 30 minutes out of town, with a resident American friend, where we visited the Conservas Santa Rosa. I recommend the store for its variety of delightful products, low prices, and friendly service.

While in Santa Rosa, my wife enjoyed a roasted elote, served in a fresh corn husk and painted with lime and chile molido. It was a style of elote we'd never seen before. (It was too dry and chewy for my tastes, but Susan enjoyed it.)

After considering the options for comida, Restaurante de La Sierra (big) or La Cabaña de Lolita (small), we went to the later, off the highway at Puerto Barrientos, just a few kilometers back towards Guanajuato Capital.

I liked the simple, relaxed family country restaurant feel, and our meal bore out the wisdom of my decision. A decision, based in part, on the SBRT; the Standard Baño/Restroom Test. Below, you'll see two very simple facilities, in out buildings, painted appropriate colors. (Spotless and freshly scrubbed, also.)

Our meal was of traditional comida campestre favorites:
Caldo de borrego, caldo de pollo, one order of cecina, one order of mixote de carnero, a mescal curado con naranja, two jugos de naranja; an agua mineral. About $310 pesos.

(Doña Cuevas, perhaps affected by my general cynicism, proposes that the mixotes at Cabaña de Lolita are made up in bulk in a big pan, then wrapped in the foil packets when a customer orders it. She claims that the foil was just too clean of smoke or soot on the outside. I hate to believe that, but it could be true. Personally, I really would have preferred the mixiotes be cooked in the traditon parchment of maguey, pero, así es. Despite that, it was tasty, if rather ridden with bones.)

A specialty of La Cabaña de Lolita is the cecina. It's cut extra thin and cooked very crispy. It will virtually shatter in your mouth. It was lightly salted, if at all.

On our last morning in Guanajuato, we skipped breakfast at Truco 7, and instead, I bought 4 plump, steaming hot tamales from a vendor setting up, on a callejón just off Plazuela Baratillo. $28 pesos, supplemented with some so-so pan dulce from Panadería La Infancia, the one on Calle Alonso.

If we could have gotten better sleep, we would have stayed another night, with the aim of revisiting the Mercado Hidalgo, La Carreta, Cafe Tal, and more.

But we'd had a very enjoyable visit of two full days and part of two others, and we were ready to get home and get some rest.

I realize that I haven't explained the title of this post, "Eating the Mummy". That may happen in my next post.

Meanwhile, contemplate this:

More On the Cecina Scene

2009-06-23T07:58:00.002-05:00

I posted a link to this blog on the Any port in a storm forum, and got some feedback from Oaxaca area resident. "Bixaorellana"

Nicely done report, DonC, although I've got some quibbles. One is that the pork version of cecina is not semi-dried. As a matter of fact, it's quite common to order it and wait for the butcher to make it from a solid piece of pork right in front of you. And the two versions are cecina blanca -- simply salted, and cecina enchilada. The cecina enchilada is smeared not with chile molida (ground dried chile), but with a paste of ground chile guajillo, garlic, oregano, vinegar, salt & maybe some secret ingredients. Each meat stall has its own recipe.

Ditto the beef tasajo (no accent on the o!). When you ask for tasajo, it's fresh beef, although dried versions are usually hanging over the display area. I need to find out if they're called tasajo as well. It's always simply dressed with salt around here -- no enchilada version.

Mexican food is so very regional, however, (note the disparity between what's cecina here & what's tasajo) that maybe cecina in other parts of the country is always semi-dried.

You are totally correct in your response to the reader who questioned the red flag. That misguided person must think that all the meat he buys in the supermarket is truly "fresh".

And more:

Food in Oaxaca is frequently over-salted. When I first moved here, I thought I'd never be able to eat out, as so often the food seemed ruined with too much salt.

Cecina and tasajo don't have to be too salty. Since meat cutters (who are very frequently women around here) are quite willing to make it for you on the spot, you could request it with no salt at all.

If you wanted to try it, you could have your local meat cutter thinly butterfly something like a piece of top sirloin. Take that home & lightly salt it yourself. Let it set at least a half hour, then cook it in a very hot, lightly oiled skillet. For pork, something like boneless loin would do the trick. It's very good with some kind of light salsa added at the table -- try fresh minced chiles, minced or crushed garlic, lime juice and cilantro.

I can't vouch for this recipe as I've not tried it, but it looks like a pretty good guide if you want to try the spiced pork cecina. As I point out above, there's no reason to bother with the drying process.

I appreciate the authoritative input from our friend, Bixa.

Over the weekend, Doña Cuevas and I visited Guanajuato. Rachel Laudan had given me a lead on a restaurante campestre, "La Cabaña de Lolita", at Puerto Barrientos, a few kilometers from Santa Rosa.

Three of us sampled their crispy cecina, as part of a more extensive meal. It was delicious yet even less substantial than the usual kind, cut more thickly.
Here's a look:

Update:

I found a photo I took in January of plated cecina enchilada, at Restaurante María Bonita, in Oaxaca.

Nice, but it doesn't have the rustic character of that at La Cabaña de Lolita.

Cecina: Worth Its Salt

2009-06-19T05:44:00.001-05:00

Cecina is thinly sliced, salted and partially dried sheets or strips of beef or pork. The technique for making it requires an extremely sharp knife and considerable skill and patience. A largish piece of boneless beef of beef is turned into a continuous roll of thin slices by deft cutting, back and forth, within the mass of muscle.

It's much simpler to go to a specialist who'll make it for you. Remember, a little piece goes far to satisfy your need for both protein, and salt, for that matter.

I've had it, both in the United States and in different parts of Mexico. Some (at a Mexican restaurant in Little Rock, Arkansas) it was so tough that it was impossible to chew. Even 4 hours of slow simmering at home rendered it barely masticable.

But cecina varies.

In Chihuahua city, in 1990, we entered a small shop selling everything needed to make antojitos Mexicanos: dried chiles, hojas de maíz para tamales, masa fresca, maíz pozolero preparado. They also served platillos típicos del Distrito Federal. The owner, Ramón, was from el DF and Edomex. One platillo offered was cecina enchilada. Although the hour was late, and the owner was reparing to close, he cooked a slab of cecina enchilada for me, and heated up a bowl of first rate pozole for Susan.

When the cecina arrived, I was a little surprised: it was like a large, thin, boneless steak. I had misunderstood and had been thinking of "enchiladas": corn tortillas dipped in a thin chile sauce, lightly fried, with a filling.

This was different. Pura carne, lightly coated with chile molido. It was pleasantly salty and mildly picante, chewy but doable. I'd rate it a "9" on the Chewy but Doable Decimal Scale.

Some years later, while in Oaxaca, we had tasajó, the Oaxacan version of cecina, often served in small pieces on tlayudas, (extra grande tortillas), smeared with a paste of frijoles negros, and nicely garnished with onions, avocado, tomato and quesillo, or Oaxacan string cheese. One is a meal.

Oaxaca goes its own separate way in la comida regional. There, "cecina" refers to sheets of semi dried pork, often with a sprinkling of chile molido. Tasajó is made from beef. This section of the Mercado 11 de noviembre, in Oaxaca Centro, specializes in grilled tasajó and cecina. It looks like a scene from Hell, but it smells great.

Here's a picture of a tlayuda con tasajó.

Last week, I saw that one of our favorite Pátzcuaro carnicerías, La Sin Rival, had some strips of cecina on top of the counter. I asked the hard working owner, Sr. Moíses Pérez H. about it. He guided me to some that was drier, for not long ago, at another carnicería, I'd bought some that spoiled. The fault was mine, for leaving it in the plastic bag without refrigeration. Not all cecina attains the dryness of carne seca, otherwise known as jerky.

The red flag is displayed to say "Fresh Meat Today!"

The cecina from La Sin Rival fared better. It became breakfast a few mornings later. I lightly oiled a skillet, and browned the meat on both sides. Meanwhile, I fried some huevos estrellados. These were flanked by a steaming mound of stone ground speckled grits from Nora Mill, Helen GA. Add some salsa casera of your choice, and you're all set. It's my Mexican version of a Good 'Ol Boy breakfast down South; the cecina a perfect stand-in for salty, aged Country Ham.

A couple of days later, I lucked out when carrying my camera while in Pátzcuaro Centro. I went to La Sin Rival with hopes of photographing some cecina. Sr. Pérez told me that none was available until later, as it was drying at that moment, in the patio of the family house.

He generously allowed me to pass through the work area of the carnicería to the pleasant patio where a large slab of plywood held sheets of meat drying in the sun.

The carnicero and his assistant apply vegetable oil to keep flies from alighting.

Carniceria owner Sr. Moises Pérez Hinojosa with some finished cecina.

I asked if any jugo de limón was used in the process, as I'd read in an old Mexican food cookbook I have.
"No Señor, solamente sal y un poco de aceite.", he replied.*

I recommend trying cecina when you have the chance. Just be sure to get it from a reliable shop like La Sin Rival in Pátzcuaro. (But, if you are less adventuresome, get una Hamburguesa Doble, como te gusta, at the Cafetería Chió's next door. Sr. Pérez wife runs the tidy little lonchería, and makes some of the best, juiciest hamburgers in Pátzcuaro.

Soon, we hope to sample some at a Santa Rosa, Guanajuato Restaurant, "La Cabana de la Lolita", recommended to us by Rachel Laudan, food scholar living in Guanajuato, as serving "Incredible cecina."

I hope to report back soon with my findings.

*I have the theory that all too often, American writers on Mexican food make overly complicated, overly elaborated versions of some simple, uncomplicated food. We could discuss the example of carnitas, but not here at this time. Remind me later.

Camarones a la Mandarina o Naranja

2009-06-17T07:23:00.000-05:00

Our comida yesterday was a big deal. The day before I'd bought 500 grams of headless shirmp in the shell. I have had this idea of Camarones a la Mandarina for sometime.

I got out an old Chinese cookbook by Virginia Lee and Craig Claiborne. It's notable for its excess in seasoning. I found a recipe for Szechwan Shrimp, which was my anchor.

The night before I put some dried tangerine peels to soak in some Cien Años Tequila (lacking Absolut Mandarin).
Today, I slowly dissolved a big cone of piloncillo (crude brown sugar) in simmering water, and reduced it to a molasses like syrup.

Meanwhile, I shelled and deveined the shrimp, trying to keep the tails. That was only partially successful. It was also tedious.

I put the shrimp in a small bowl and sprinkled on some tangerine peel-Tequila infusion. Some Controy Orange Liqueur figured somewhere in here also.

Separately, I peeled my last remaining ginger root, shredded it as well as some garlic and 3 or 4 very picante yellow Chiles Piquines (as defined in Michoacán terms).

Next, I peeled and julienned one stubby carrot and about 1/3 of a large, sweet red pepper. Celery, cut small. Then one white onion, cut vertically into segments. (Supposed to be green onions—scallions— with the tops, but I didn't have any.)

A sauce was mixed in a small bowl of light and dark soy sauces, red wine vinegar, brown sugar, plus some Tuong Cu Da, to substitute for the Fermented Rice I didn't have. I figured some Sichaun (modern spelling) Pepper would go well, so I ground up a little and sifted it through a tea strainer, to avoid those hard little pieces. There was sesame oil in the sauce and on the shrimp with the Mandarin infusion. Black pepper also.

I also used some of the macerated mandarin peel and shredded it finely to add to the ginger, garlic and chiles.

Method:
First I stir fried the carrots, celery, onions, and removed them from the pan.

Then I stir fried the shrimp, adding the chiles, ginger, etc. There was an eye and sinus-searing blast of strong chile fumes.

As the shrimp became opaque, I tossed in the soy sauce mixture. Next, a small amount of that reduced piloncillo syrup. Then the cornstarch-water suspension, which I failed to mention earlier. It took a moment to thicken.

I tasted it: too sweet. More vinegar to perfect it.

I garnished it with a small thicket of very nice cilantro leaves, and we ate it with our Basmati Rice, green beans, etc; and a plate of sliced cucumbers, radishes, a tomato and the rest of the cilantro.

With this meal, I paired a lovely, red Agua de Jamaica, Mexico, 2009; which exhibited subtle floral notes that were underscored by its native acidity. I had to drink a lot of it, but really, the picante aspect of the main dish was less assertive than expected.

On Eating Cocteles de Mariscos

2009-06-14T04:23:00.007-05:00

A friend emailed me regarding shrimp cocktails as sold at MEGA Comercial in Morelia. You get them in the Fish Department, preferably earlier in the day.

Until now, I was unaware that Mega offered such. Somehow, it just doesn't seem quite right to eat a coctel de camarones in that setting. Coctelería should be left to the specialists, not a mega hypermart chain. This is the same, "full service" store that among its notable features is an espresso bar, but one that is rarely staffed. To get a coffee, you have to flag down the Produce Manager or whatever employees nearby and they'll hail some especialista callow teenager barista to put the coffee pod into the machine and push the BREW button.

My friend asked, in a followup:
"Now then, about those stands at Plaza Chica (Pátzcuaro) that you seem to regularly 'never frequent'???"

Yes; what about them? I don't eat at those out of concerns of hygiene. Friends who've eaten at those open air carts, with the blocks of ice, (passed on by Canine Inspection Teams as the blocks lay waiting in the early morning gutter) have reported no ill effects. But I'd rather spend a little more for assuring quality and good hygiene. Chopping onions or tomatoes on a wooden board perched on an upturned catsup bucket, resting in the street, as traffic sputters by within arm's reach doesn't cut it for me.

In 2004, within the Mercado Independencia in Morelia, I ordered a coctel de camarones. I waited and watched while the guy defrosted the plastic bag of shrimp under running tap water. It was a passable, but not great CdC. What do you expect for breakfast at a stand overlooking the skinned cow's heads over at the carnicería close by? I'll spare you the foto de las cabezas de vacas.

A couple of years ago, I had a small, cheap CdC at Don Prisci's within the Pátzcuaro Mercado. It was poor; the shrimp were mealy, the sauce corriente. Don P should stick to his birria.

The first coctel de camarones I ever, ever had was the Gulf Coast village of Nautla, Veracruz. It was our first trip to Mexico, Feb, 1980. The air was warm and sultry, under the palms. A borracho entertained himself by mildly bugging us.

The coctel arrived; a very tall glass, brimming with very fresh, barely cooked shrimp, in a light red, not too sweet sauce, studded with fresh, picante bits of chopped chile jalapeño, minced onion, and LOTS of chopped cilantro. This was El Chingón Coctel de Camarones, one which will always be that against all others are measured.

The restroom was, unfortunately, quite memorably ghastly.

Nowadays, at least here in central Michoacán, cocteles are made too sweet for our taste. Even at our querido y lindo Mariscos La Güera. The trick is to ask for it as you like. "Poco catsup, pero con mucho cilantro, por favor."

The one exception, so far, to sweet cocteles has been at LangoStiko's in Morelia. They offer specialty cocteles including a Coctel Mazatleco style, made with NO CATSUP but with pepino and pineapple, and garnished with carambola. (starfruit.)

Actually, it's almost too pure for me. I'd appreciate the addition of some cilantro.
The same restaurant, and by no means, the only one, makes Micheladas Preparadas con Clamato and shrimp and oysters in it. Very tempting, but as I don't eat raw mollusca while in Mexico, I ordered it with shrimp only. (Michelada is basically beer with lime juice in a salt rimmed glass. Starting there, many different seasonings and variations are possible.)

We are lucky to have decent seafood inland here in Michoacán. Years ago, in Zacatecas, inland, far from the sea, I had a coctel at Mariscos Boca del Río, at the Plazuela Genaro Codina. It was murky and borderline hazardous. I hope that it's better there now.

La Jaiba, on Blvd. Garcia de León in Morelia has amongs its offerings huge chabelas (large goblets) full of Vuelve a la Vida (occasionally called "Levantamuertes"), either of which seem to have some sexual revival connotations. The La Jaiba version has just about every kind of boiled and raw seafood in it that they have. I had the oysterless version once. It was quite good, but lacking the oysters, I can't report on the sexual revival aspects.

Similarly, the "Viagra" coctel at El Pescador, Morelia. It's something like a Vuelve a la Vida coctel but in Clamato instead of the usual clear syrup-stock and catsup. Here is the Vuelve a La Vida under an alternative name of "Rompe Colchón": "Break Mattress". You figure it out. Here's a recipe, in Spanish, for this treat.

To conclude; in my opinion, you generally get what you pay for. In the better marisquerías, you can customize your cocktail al gusto. It helps to speak Spanish.

As a reward for staying the course until this point, our Feature Presentation of Pátzcuaro's beloved Mariscos La Güera, below.

Chicken Hash: An Improvisation

2009-06-13T21:13:00.019-05:00

Leftovers? What to do.

I had some leftover, boneless poached chicken, some sliced, boiled potatoes, celery, onion and a lot of seasonings and condiments. And some Granny Smith apples.

The chicken, although less than two cups in all, needed to be used, soon.

Solution: Chicken Hash.

I found a nice recipe on Epicurious.com, but I didn't have more than a cup and a half of chicken and no green pepper. So, instead of green pepper, I used green, Granny Smith apple, diced.

The rest was easy. Instead of chile powder, I used Pimentón Español Picante and Pimentón de la Vera Agri-dulce. I did have branch thyme.

Instead of cream or half and half, I used Crema Aguascalientes, an excellent brand.

Here, a pic of it cooking:

Here's a picture of the finished, plated dish:

A question arose on the forum, "Any Port In A Storm".

"Don C....how do you cook the eggs like that?"

The answer was, "I spray some custard cups with non-stick food spray. I get a small round sauce pan going with simmering water. I crack one egg each into the custard cups, and immerse them up to their midlines. Then I partially cover the pan and lower the heat.
Despite the PAM spray, the eggs wouldn't slip out easily, so we just spooned them out of the cups."

We did have the requisite whole grain toast; some oatmeal and bulgur bread I'd made, which toasted up beautifully. The Chicken Hash was a hearty, brunch dish, and it sustained us until 4 o'clock in the afternoon.

Bodega Aurrerá Pátzcuaro Opens

2009-06-13T19:42:00.007-05:00

No Frills, and No Thrills, Either

We went today, June 13, 2009, to the newly opened Bodega Aurrerá in Pátzcuaro, after the opening day crowds had subsided. Getting in and out was easy, as long as you are headed up the Libramiento. It's a good location for those living north of the city center.

We arrived at about 11:00 a.m. and it was only moderately busy. The inflatable jump-up-and-down-and-scream games had been deflated and taken away after Tuesday's uproarious opening.

I'm please that the building is relatively attractive, and the paint job is o.k., although the earlier, adobe color was more attractive. (Another, well-known, local blogger, told me that the city made them repaint it to approximate Pátzcuaro traditional colors.)

The publicity campaign had been intense, as sound trucks carted persons costumed as "Mamá Lucha", the indomitable Aurrerá super heroine about the city. Even distant ranchos were visited by publicity trucks bringing a little excitement to la vida cotidiana.

The real life store is fine for what it is, but it has few thrills to anyone seeking specialty foods ("gringo necessities"). Mamá Lucha has fought hard to bring you precios bajos, and that's what it's all about.

Parking seems limited, but probably adequate.
The store has that enjoyable "new store" smell of fresh paint.

It's essentially a stripped-down Wal-Mart, a warehouse look, bare cinder block walls, exposed girders; without flash or decor, focusing on low prices in a no frills environment. Our brief reconnaissance shows a very limited selection of brands and varieties in many categories. There are lots of options in the rice and dried beans department, and in Tequila ready-to-drink. No Controy, pero sí, (ugh!) Margarita Mix.

At least one item was represented only by the house brand.

On the bottled salsas shelf, I couldn't find either Salsa Huichol nor Salsas Cosecha Purhépecha. It was mostly Valentina and La Costeña.

One brand of agua, Santorini, in big garrafones.

The carnicería is small and seems to have a very limited selection, but that could be my (possibly erroneous) impression. Surprisingly, two women were working in the carnicería. I didn't see any men. This seems a little unusual in Mexico.

Huevos, rojos or blancos, I think are higher than in the tienda de abarrotes where we usually shop for them. At Bodega, over $30 for 18. At Abarrotes Los Fresnos, I think they are less. I recall paying $27 for 18 at Soriana, but it's been a while.

The produce was above average, and a wider selection for a supermercado. We got some nice looking and smelling nectarines, pears and firm, not overmatured smaller cucumbers.

I didn't look in detail at the panadería, but it reminded me of Soriana's, perhaps a little smaller.

This is a store for staple items and very few, if any imported luxuries. The deli was pushing those pale pink hot dogs and bland cheeses so beloved in Mexico. Not a Chorizo Español or Jamón Serrano to be seen.
The meat department, surprisingly, not the Deli, had some cooked pork ribs in barbecue sauce in a hot case.

The checkouts are narrower than Soriana's. Overall, though, the store's aisles are better arranged, with only two racks of shelves per aisle. Better than Soriana, it's easy to get to the checkout without threading the maze of clothing racks and other merchandise obstructing your way.

There is no snack bar, no cafetería, no kiddie rides, no ATM, as far as I could see. iPod Shuffles and iPod Classics in Electrónica, but no iPod Touches. They don't offer to cook your meat purchase for free. There are also no "Savings Cards", which suits me.

These are my first time impressions, and they may change on future visits.

Stretching the Strudel

2009-06-10T10:02:00.003-05:00

Baking Madness may strike at any time. Back in March, I had a powerful urge to make a strudel. On of the motivators was that we have in our dining room a round table capable of seating six diners comfortably. This is just what strudel stretching calls for. You need to be able to walk the perimeter in order to evenly hand stretch the dough.

The ingredients for strudel dough are few and simple: bread flour, warm water, vegetable oil, eggs, salt and possibly a small amount of vinegar or lemon juice.

The ingredients are mixed, then the resulting mass is vigorously kneaded; either by hand or machine. Ten minutes of heavy handed dough slapping is considered normal and not excessive. But a Kitchen Aid stand mixer, or a heavy duty food processor makes short work of it.

After kneading, the dough rests under cover for 20 minutes to an hour.

Meanwhile, the table is prepared by first placing protective plastic sheets down and thumbtacking them into place. Then a patterned tablecloth or bed sheet is placed over the plastic. The pattern is useful to determine how this you've stretched the now nearly transparent dough.

While the dough rests, the filling is readied, cinnamon sugar is mixed, and toasted bread crumbs prepared.

The rest of this semi tutorial will be in slide show format. If you click the slide show window, you will be taken to a web album of the photos.

(This post was backdated to synch it with the actual event occurence. It was then updated on June 9, 2009. In other words, a reprise.)

El Pescador, Morelia

2009-06-04T17:37:00.001-05:00

Our favorite food when eating out is seafood, and it's good to try someplace new. Rose Calderone recommended El Pescador, at Cuautla # 77, Centro, Morelia. It's down at the western end of Avenida Madero where it goes into a tree-lined area, then about a block south on Cuautla.

I was pleasantly surprised to see such an attractive dining room. Some of the places we frequent around Sanabria, a tiny crossroads north of Tzurumútaro, populated by 3 roadside fish shacks. El Pescador has one of the nicest dining rooms of the various marisquerías we've tried, with prices to match. When I looked at their website, Mariscos El Pescador , I saw that there's a simpler, upstairs dining room as well.

The menu is compact yet covers a lot of ground. The entradas include the usual tostadas and more. (Sorry, I wasn't taking notes. That means I'll have to return and try more dishes.) I had a tostada de marlyn (their spelling) and Larry had one of calamar. The marlyn was meatier than most that I've had elsewhere, and it was heaped upon the tostada in a way that sort of justified its price of $20 MN.

Susan ordered a Coctel mediano de Camarones y Pulpos, and it was about average, good, but not stellar.
I noted that one coctel was called "Viagra", a combination of callos, ostiones, camarones and some other shellfish, in a Clamato-tinged sauce. As I don't eat raw oysters in Mexico, I didn't try it. That's the only reason.

My three companions all ordered some form of filete de pescado. Larry's was the best looking, Filete dorado; lightly crumbed and cooked in a little oil.

Rose had her filete asado, which if I understod our waitress correctly, is grilled a la parilla. Susan had hers a la plancha, which is cooked one a flat top grill. It was simple but pleasant. She told me that as in most seafood places, the filete de pescado was bland and with a very soft texture. I speculate that the fish used is Blanco de Nilo, or Tilapia, which to me has very little character.

The plates of filetes were accompanied by arroz blanco and a finely chopped carrot salad with raisins, which Larry enjoyed but I thought was boring. Thus tastes vary.

For a main course, I went for the gusto, ordering a mediano Huauchinango a la Veracruzana. Truthfully, it's not my top favorite way to prepare fish, but it's a classic, and serves as a test of the restaurant's kitchen. And, at $100MN, it was deal.

A pescado entero mediano turned out to be more than I could finish. The whole fish was heaped with tomatoes, onions, garlic, sweet peppers, olives (but no capers) and lots of chiles Jalapeños. In fact, it was the Huachinango a la Veracruzana más picante de siempre. The only accompaniment was a big scoop of plain white rice. It was welcome in toning down the "heat".

El Pescadors' version of pescado al al Veracruzana was pretty good, but was somewhat overwhelmed by the chiles. In addition, the flesh of the fish seemed very wet and cooked almost to the point of mushyness.

Their treatment was the polar opposite of that of La Güera, in Pátzcuaro, which was spartan to a fault, at least the only time I tried it a few years ago. The best Huachinango a la Veracruzana I've had in the region was at a marisquería on the outskirts of Ario de Rosales, of all places. Also, that at El Navegante, also in Morelia, on Blvd García de León was better than average.

In the end, it was a nice lunch, although a bit pricier than that to which we we are accustomed. With a Coke, a Michelada preparada, a half pitcher of horchata and a small bottled water, the cuenta was $541 MN, plus propina.

After we paid la cuenta, we looked into the sparkling clean, tiled kitchen. One of the cooks, I could tell, was preparing crepes. We asked what they were for. They said that the crepes were used mostly in desserts, as in crepas con cajeta, but there was at least one dish, involving crepes filled with shrimp, but not on the printed menu.

PS: There's a more down market seafood place next door called "El Corsario". We don't know any more about it than that.

A Bellyful of Whole Belly Clams

2009-05-26T06:39:00.005-05:00

Another greatly sought delicacy during our visit to the Northeastern U.S. was Fried Whole Belly Clams. Some of you, like us, may have sampled Fried Clam Strips, a dish that resembles short lengths of rubber bands and deriving most of its flavor from the breading and the accompanying Tartar Sauce. Think, "Howard Johnson's". I once worked in the kitchen at a Red Lobster (I'm still trying to compensate for those 9 months), and there, we cooked Clam Strips by dipping the end of a small plastic bag of preportioned, frozen clam strips into the hot fat of the deep fryer, releasing those wormlike morsels towards their final destiny.

Whole Belly Clams are a whole different dish.

(I'm suddenly curious why it's called Tartar Sauce or Sauce Tartare. I associated the Tartars as a tribe of horsemen who tenderized horsemeat by placing it under their saddles during vigorous, rollicking jaunts over the steppes. Thus, the possible origin of Tartar Steak.* They were also fond of koumiss, fermented mare's milk. (This is not an auspicious beginning culinarily.) The Mexican version of Tartar Steak is Carne Apache, a name which has some of the rough and wild associations of Steak Tartare. It's also a food I wil not eat, as served in its unrefrigerated and dubious form at street and mercado stalls. But, I digress.

Whole Belly Fried Clams are a New England Specialty. When I was growing up in and around New Haven, CT, we'd sometimes be treated to a fried seafood meal at the Clam Box at Branford(?), or even better, Jimmy's of Savin Rock, back when it was a parking lot and a stand, with long lines in the summer.

On this trip to Connecticut, we had two Whole Belly Clams ops. The first was at the excellent Maine Fish Market, in East Windsor, CT. Not to miss an opportunity, I started my meal with a shellfish platter of 6 icy clams and 6 oysters on the half shell. A Long Trail Ale was the perfect accompaniment.

After a small salad came a platter mounded with golden fried whole belly clams (WBC from here on.) There was a mountain of French fries and slaw as well.

(I'm sorry, but I don't have any photos of WBC at either restaurant! What must have I been doing? Eating. I'll Google a photo and put it in here.)

Thanks, I appreciate that.

The clams were excellent. In fact, I liked everything about the meal. well, maybe the Tartar Sauce wasn't great, but it was o.k.) I had to take about a third of the clams and half of the fries to our niece's home, where the next morning, I made a Connecticut version of Hangtown Fry. (Scrambled eggs, potatoes, fried WBCs.) More than you ever wanted to know about Hangtown Fry.

The second WBC op was at Skooter's Restaurant in Windsor Locks, CT. (Mentioned in a previous blog post under "Lord of the Rings".)

The Skooter's building

My wife had an order of clams only, a rather more modest portion, but very tasty and the right size for lunch, before boarding the Amtrak Vermonter train back to Newark, NJ.

This concludes our presentation for today.