This diary is dedicated to my wonderful friend, drchelo, who passed away two years ago on June 20th, 2009. I can think of no better memorial than to pass on her recipes to her friends here on Dkos. Every time I make the apple mango chutney and her other recipes, I think of her kindness and her laugh. She had such a great laugh. This Mexican/Irish woman loved food and good cooking, had a garden and loved her dogs, her fiddle, being a doctor, and her friends and family. Here's a little more about her. I am thankful that I can use the search function on Dkos and find her feisty, thoughtful and hope filled comments here to lift me up and remember her beautiful self.
This is going to be long as I want to get all her words in. Growing up in Mexico City must have been fun in the 1950's!
drchelo:
In Mexico City while I was growing up, the mid-day meal was the big meal of the day. The first meal, desayuno, which literally translates into “undoing the fast”, is generally a light meal of coffee and bread or a tortilla, and this would be followed by a more substantial mid-morning meal of eggs, breads, and fruit called merienda, which is eaten mid-morning. After noon some time, schools close, businesses shut their doors, and the family settles in for a multi-course meal called almuerzo. This meal would start with a “wet” soup, then a “dry” soup (the sopa secas), then the main course, followed by a salad and a sweet – and a siesta to help digest the food! In Mexico City, there was the prevailing myth that children should not eat a heavy evening meal, because of the altitude, so we kids were generally served sweet breads (pan dulces, the lovely sugar-heavy pastries we’d buy every day at the panaderia). The grown-ups might get together for a Spanish-style late night meal called a cena that started around 8-10 o’clock, but that was considered dangerously heavy for us little ones.
MEXICAN WET SOUPS:
The wet soups are soupier than the moles, pipians, or tingas, and are generally lighter.
Menudo
2 lbs. honeycomb tripe
1 (1 1/2 lb.) veal knuckle
6 c. water
3 med. onions, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. coriander seed
1/4 tsp. dried oregano, crushed
1/4 tsp. crushed red pepper
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 (15 oz.) can hominy
Pequin chilies or crushed red pepper
Lime wedges
Cut tripe into 1″ pieces. Place in a Dutch oven with veal knuckle, water, onions, garlic, salt, coriander, oregano, the 1/4 tsp. crushed red pepper, and pepper. Simmer, covered, for 3 hours till tripe has a clear, jellylike appearance and veal is very tender. Remove veal knuckle from pot. When cool enough to handle, discard bones, chop meat return to soup. Add undrained hominy; cover and simmer 20 minutes longer. Serve with pequin chilies or crushed red peppers to taste. Garnish with lime wedges to squeeze into the soup – better than salt!
Mexicans love cream! Perhaps that is why the Aztecs allowed Cortez and the Spanish to annihilate them and take the country, because they anticipated the lovely cows they’d bring, and the delicious fat cream these cows would produce. You find crema, a sweet cream as heavy as sour cream served as a condiment along moles, on top of tostadas, and just about with any dish that may have a strong chile spice in it. They also make cream soups out of just about anything – not your Campbell’s cream soups, but lighter, more complex cream soups like this one:
Carrot Cream Soup
4 medium carrots, cut up(2 cups)
1/2 cup water
2 tsp. instant chicken bouillon granules
1/2 tsp sugar
1/4 tsp dried mint, crushed
1/4 cup chopped onion
1 T butter
1 T all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups milk
3/4 cup Mexican “crema” or heavy cream
1/2 tsp salt
Dash pepper
In covered saucepan cook carrots in water with bouillon granules, sugar, and mint for about 25 minutes or till very tender. Meanwhile, cook onion in butter or margarine till tender but not brown. Stir in flour. Add milk all at once; cook and stir till thickened and bubbly. Gradually add about 1 cup of the hot milk mixture to cream, beat until smooth. Return to saucepan and mix well.
In blender container place carrots with their liquid; cover and blend till smooth. (Or, force through a sieve or food mill.) Add carrot mixture to milk mixture. Cook and stir till soup just comes to boiling. Stir in salt and pepper. Garnish with fresh mint leaves, if desired.
MEXICAN DRY SOUPS:
The Sunday mid-day meal being a celebration of food, family, conversation and general carrying on. This time I’ll be talking about the “dry soup” course, a course that is uniquely Mexican – and delicious! Join me for a couple of recipes and some conversation.
A “dry soup”, or “sopa seca” is generally a rice or pasta dish that is served after the first or “wet soup” course. The well-known “Spanish rice” is a US version that we got to know (and hate) when served in elementary school cafeterias, but rice with some sort of sauce and meat is important in the family of sopa secas. The other staple of the sopa secas is “fideos”. Fideos are like angel hair pasta, but you find them sold in little birds’-nest structures that will be served in bowls, filled with the sauce/meat/fish combination that makes the dish.
So the Big Mexican Sunday Lunch will start with a wet soup, then a dry soup, then perhaps a smallish salad before the main course. Salad as a separate course or dish are not a big part of Mexican cuisine, as vegetables and starches are part of the main dish, incorporated into the meat/fish/chicken part of the dish. Following the main course, there may be a small sweet or a dish of cheeses and nuts with fruit. Tortillas are on the table, as are the various salsas. Slices of lime are placed alongside the salt and pepper as condiments, sometimes bolillos – that wonderful, crusty Mexican version of the baguette – are in baskets up and down the table. A good Mexican Sunday Lunch will last for hours. The starch overload will soon send the children toddling off to naps, but cold beer and strong coffee will keep the grown-ups at the table well into Sunday evening. No need for Sunday suppers after such an event!
Here are a couple of sopa seca recipes that I like. I have included a Tomato-Chipotle sauce recipe with one of them – a sauce that goes well with just about any meat or chicken dish, even without the fideos. Although these recipes use fideos, you can substitute rice – for the gluten-intolerant.
Sopa Seca de Fideos with Tomato-Chipotle Sauce
3 to 4 chiles in adobo
4 garlic cloves, unpeeled
2 1/2 pounds (5 medium-large round, 15 to 17 plum) ripe tomatoes
About 1/2 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup (about 6 ounces) chorizo sausage, casing removed, optional
1 (10-ounce) package dried fideo (vermicelli) noodles, preferably angel hair
1 cup beef or chicken broth
1 teaspoon dried oregano, preferably Mexican
1/2 teaspoon black pepper, preferably freshly ground
Salt, about a scant teaspoon
2 medium zucchini, cut into 1/4-inch dice
1/4 to 1/2 cup thick cream, whipping cream, or creme fraiche
optional
2/3 cup finely grated Mexican queso anejo or Parmesan
A few tablespoons roughly chopped cilantro, for garnish
For dried chiles, toast them on an ungreased griddle or heavy skillet over medium heat, turning regularly and pressing flat with a spatula, until very aromatic, about 30 seconds. In a small bowl, cover the chiles with hot water and re-hydrate 30 minutes, stirring frequently to ensure even soaking. Drain and discard the water. (Canned chiles need only be removed from their sauce.)
Roast the unpeeled garlic on the griddle or skillet, turning occasionally, until soft, about 15 minutes; cool and peel. Roast 1 1/2 pounds of the tomatoes on a baking sheet 4 inches below a very hot broiler until blackened on 1 side, about 6 minutes, then flip and roast the other side. Cool, then peel, collecting all the juices with the tomatoes.
In a food processor or blender, process the roasted tomatoes, rehydrated or canned chiles, and garlic to a medium-fine puree. Heat 1 tablespoon of the oil in medium-size (4-quart) pot (such as a Dutch oven or Mexican cazuela) over medium-high. Add the puree and stir for about 5 minutes as it sears and thickens. Set aside.
If using chorizo, cook in a little oil over medium heat, breaking up large lumps as you go, until thoroughly cooked, about 10 minutes. Scoop it out with a slotted spoon, draining as much oil as possible back into the skillet.
Pour 6 tablespoons of the remaining oil into the skillet and return to the heat. When quite hot (drop a stray noodle in – it should sizzle but not brown immediately), lay in about 1/3 of the noodle nests to fry until noticeably browned, about 1 minute, then flip and brown the other side. Remove with a slotted spoon, draining as much oil as possible back into the skillet, and drain on paper towels. Continue until all have been browned.
Add the broth, oregano, and pepper to the tomato sauce. Core the remaining 1 pound of tomatoes and chop into 1/4-inch bits. Add and simmer briskly until the sauce thickens to the consistency of a juicy tomato sauce, about 5 minutes. Taste and season with salt.
Add the noodles. In about 2 minutes pull the “nests” apart (they’ll have softened enough to do it at this point), then add the zucchini and the chorizo (if you’re using it). Simmer, stirring occasionally, until the noodles are tender but still firm, about 2 minutes.
If using the cream, add it now, raise the heat to medium-high and boil quickly until the sauce returns to its original consistency. Taste again, and adjust the salt accordingly. Stir in half the remaining cheese, scoop into a warm serving dish, garnish with the remaining cheese and sprinkle with cilantro and serve.
Sopa Seca de Fideos y Camarones (shrimp)
2 dried ancho or pasilla chiles
3 tablespoons olive oil
6 ounces dried vermicelli or fideos, broken in thirds
1/2 teaspoon anise seeds
1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 medium onion, chopped
2 large garlic cloves, minced
1 quart reduced-sodium chicken broth
1 pound (30 to 35 per lb.) peeled, deveined shrimp, tails left on
Kosher salt
1/2 cup sour cream (optional)
Diced avocado (optional)
1/4 cup chopped
fresh cilantro
Break stems off chiles and shake out seeds. In a small bowl, cover chiles with hot water and let stand until softened, 5 to 10 minutes. Drain and coarsely chop.
Meanwhile, pour olive oil into a 12-in. nonstick frying pan over medium-low heat. Add pasta; stir and turn often with tongs until almost golden, 3 to 5 minutes. Stir in anise and cumin seeds, onion, and garlic. Lift pasta so it mostly sits on top of onion mixture, then cook onion mixture, stirring often, until softened, 4 to 5 minutes.
Stir in chiles and chicken broth. Bring to a simmer over high heat, then reduce heat to medium and simmer, 3 minutes; add shrimp and simmer until pasta is tender to the bite, 3 to 4 minutes more. Season to taste with salt.
Spoon soup into wide, shallow bowls. Top each serving with a spoonful of sour cream and some avocado, if you like, and sprinkle with cilantro.
TAMALES:
(ever heard of a dessert tamale?)
Tamales are another example of the wonderful variety of what Elizabeth Lambert-Ortiz calls “the corn kitchen” – that part of Mexican (and Central American) cookery that is based on corn. Tamales are more complicated to make than tortillas. At our house, we would have “Tamale Days” when the interested participants would gather in the kitchen for a full day of making tamale dough and fillings, soaking corn husks, and steaming large pots full of tamales. There is a fair amount of labor involved in making tamales, as the fat must be whipped into a fluffy submission to make a proper tamale dough! Our little stand mixer was not up to the challenge, and the stirring bowl would be passed from arm to arm as the girl children would work that wooden spoon as hard as we could until we finally hollered “Uncle!” and passed the bowl to my big brother, whose 210 pounds could do a whup-ass on the rendered lard/masa mixture!
Basically, tamales are cakes of dough, filled with whatever you choose, wrapped in a corn husk and steamed until done. There are meat fillings, vegetable fillings, and dessert tamales. The basic dough can be flavored with broth and spices, or mixed with nuts, cinnamon and honey, depending on the type of tamale you are making. In Central America and the southern parts of Mexico, tamales are often wrapped with banana leaves instead of corn husks.
In this diary, I will give you recipes for basic dinner tamales with pork filling and dessert tamales. There are an infinite variety you can make, depending on your taste and imagination. The basic dough is simple, but requires elbow grease to make.
The fat we used in “the old days” is a white, solid lard sold as “Estrella Blanca”. It is guaranteed to clog arteries, impair circulation to the heart, and it has a shelf-life of forever. For those who have access to free-range pork, lard rendered from free-range pigs would be the best. You can use Crisco (with all its trans-fat loveliness) and some recipes even call for using corn oil. I have never been able to achieve a proper fluffiness of the masa/fat dough using oil; unfortunately, the solid fats seem to work best for me when I make tamales.
Tamales can be frozen and re-heated without affecting their taste or texture. They are one of the favorite Christmas presents I send to my Tex/Ex-patriate friends and family, as eating tamales on Christmas morning is a long-standing tradition at our respective houses, as well as in much of south Texas.
So, do some upper-body weight training, bulk up your shoulders and arms, and make some tamales!
Basic Tamale Dough
4 C Masa Harina -You can use MasTeCa, which is marketed as special for tamales, but I just prefer Quaker’s product.
2/3 C Crisco, Estrella Blanca, or rendered free-range pork lard
2 tsp salt
3 C water
1/3 C melted fat
In a large bowl, beat the fat/lard until fluffy. Gradually add masa and enough water, continuing to mix to maintain “fluffiness”. When all the masa has been incorporated, add the melted fat, and incorporate that. You may need to add a bit more dry masa to get a dough/batter that is somewhere between a thick cake batter and a cookie dough.
Making the tamales
While you were making the dough, you were soaking corn husks in some warm water until they are flexible. Spread the middle of the corn husk with a layer of dough, putting whatever filling in the middle. Be sure that you leave enough husk on each side to fold over. Now, fold over these edges, then fold up the ends – you should have a nice little package of dough with goodies inside it.
Put enough water in your steamer to cover the bottom about 1/4 of the way up. Stack the tamales upright in the steamer, and cover with a cloth before putting the top on the steamer. Bring the water to a boil, and steam the tamales about 1-1/2 hours, adding water as needed to keep the steam going. You may check the firmness of the dough by peeling the end back.
Savory Pork Tamale Filling
7lb pork butt roast, prefer boneless
1/3 cup chili powder
96 oz. chicken broth
1 Tbs. + 2 tsp cumin
2 heaping Tbs. Garlic powder
1 tsp. salt
1 Tbs. + 2 tsp chicken base
2 triangles of Ibarra chocolate
6 heaping Tbs. flour
3/4 cup cold water
Fill the pot with the chicken broth and add the chili powder, cumin, garlic powder, salt, chicken base and chocolate. Heat to boiling then cover and simmer on low while you cut up the pork. Cut the pork into 1 inch cubes. Trim as much fat off as you can. I prefer chucks of tender pork in my tamales recipe instead of shredded pork. You can do it either way. Add the cut up pork to the boiling sauce. Partially cover and simmer on low for 2 hours or until pork is real tender.
When the pork is done and very tender, combine the 3/4 cup cold water and flour with a whisk until well blended.
Turn the heat up to high and when it is boiling, slowly add the flour mixture to the pork. Stir the pork continuously to avoid lumps just like you would when making gravy.
Continue to slow boil while stirring for about 3 to 5 minutes and then turn the heat off.
Sweet or dessert tamales
Add to tamale dough:
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
2/3 cup chopped pecans
2/3 cup raisins
For the filling, you can use shaved Mexican chocolate, honey, coconut, or any other sweet, and cook according to the Basic Tamale recipe.
drchelo's Mother's Chutney a la Mexico City 1956
Me:
drchelo’s Momma made great chutney! I used her recipe and had to do a little dance on the ingredients as portions changed cuz I had more of some things and less of others. My recipe is first and the original is below. I haven’t canned this. I was too tired and plan to keep in the fridge or give away. It really tastes better today than yesterday when I made it.
Apple Mango Chutney II
(Makes about 5 1/2 – 6 cups)
2 cup raw Mangoes peeled and cut into 1″ chunks
2 cups Apples, peeled and cut into 1″ chunks ( the apples I used were wild and organic!)
1-2 cups Water
2 teaspoon fresh Ginger,chopped
8 cloves Garlic both spicy and mild, chopped
1 1/2 cup organic cider vinegar
2 1/4 cups Sugar
2-2 1/2 teaspoons Salt
5 cardamom pods, crushed in a motar and pestle and seeds used, pods discarded
6 teaspoons Raisins
1 1/2″ jalapeno, cut in 1/2 longwise and chopped (remove seeds and/or veins for less kick)
2″ serranos cut in 1/2 longwise and chopped (remove seeds and/or veins for less kick)
16 Almonds, blanched (use raw almonds and pour boiling water over them, let sit for a few minutes and then drain, peel the skin off and chop the almonds)
Cook mangoes and apples in 1 C water with the ginger and the garlic until they are tender, and the water is mostly absorbed.
Add the vinegar, sugar, salt, cardamom, raisins and chilies and cook until thickened (add more water as needed).
Cool and add almonds, pour into sterilized jars, and cover tightly with sterilized lids and either process as for canning or place in the fridge or freezer.
drchelo:
Your adventure in chutney inspired me to dig out my mother’s copy of Helene Curtis cookbook where she had written down many of her recipes. I have not personally made this recipe, and as she wrote it down when we were still living in Mexico City, circa 1956, I’m not sure what species of apples or mangoes she used. I’ve transcribed it pretty much as she wrote it, here it is:
Apple Mango Chutney I
1 cup raw Mangoes peeled and cut into chunks
1 cup cooking Apples, peeled and cut into 1″ chunks
2 big cardamoms, crushed
1 cup Vinegar
1 cup Water
1-3 jalapenos, cut into rings – remove veins and seeds for less kick
1 3/4 cups Sugar
3 teaspoons Salt
4 cloves Garlic, chopped
1 teaspoon long strips of Ginger
4 teaspoons Raisins
8 Almonds, blanched
Cook mangoes and apples in water with the ginger and the garlic until they are tender, and the water is mostly absorbed. Add the vinegar, sugar, salt, cardamom, raisins and chilies and cook until thickened. Add almonds. Cool, pour into jars, cover tightly.
I hope you all enjoy her recipes and when you make them, think of our friend, drchelo, and pass it on!