Tamales!

Today was Tamales making day for me, I had bought my vegetables yesterday off of the produce truck and this morning I headed off to the meat market to get my kilo of meat only to find out he is closed today....all day, said the ladies that were standing outside the shop chatting. They tell me I can buy meat at the Super Deli, I had never seen meat there other than wieners and sliced ham (wait until I tell you what they do with wieners here) so I head over there and the deli girl tells me she is out of meat, but she has 1/2 a chicken left, I take it. Tamales come in chicken, beef or shrimp, we had just decided to do beef because I plan on making these with moose when I get home but chicken is doable too.
On the way home I run into a parade on main street, it's the kindergarden kids all dressed up, not sure why but it was pretty cute. I took pictures and was going to post them but then decided it might not be a good idea to post pictures of other peoples kids on the world wide web. Trust me it was cute. I met Rosa there and we walked to her house from there....she has no idea how excited I am.
First step was washing and skinning the chicken and cutting it's claws off, when you buy a chicken here you get a chicken....all of it, including the feet and the head and the tail, we discarded the tail and head of course, the feet are still brewing in the pot for a nice bone broth. I was wondering why I got 2 feet and the whole head when  had only bought 1/2 a chicken.....just wondering if someone got jipped a foot.

Cock a doodle do

Simmering in pot with garlic

Chicken is put in a pot of water, just enough water to submerge the chicken and 2 cloves of garlic (I would have put more) While this is simmering pull the stems out of the dried chili and turn inside out popping all the seeds out and also put in a pot (different pot) of water, just submerging chilis, while this is all simmering take your camera and walk around your host's garden for a bit.

Dried chilis simmering in water

The Poinsettia of course never dies here, I think it's my favorite plant here

Then come in and slice your tomatoes into stick like pieces and your onions and the Serrano chilis and cut up the cilantro. When I first started coming to Mexico 11 years ago I loved the food immediately but always wished they wouldn't use as much cilantro, I was not a fan of cilantro and never used it at home, didn't even plant it in my garden. Now I like it and know that you couldn't have tamales without it, or some of the other dishes, I have acquired a taste for it and you will see it in my garden this summer.

Vegetables cut up like so

Once chicken is cooked chili will be done too, pour water from chicken pot (saving about 2 cups of it) into a blender and pour in the chili, including water, add about 6 cloves garlic and blend into a beautiful red sauce.
Now strip all chicken meat off the bones and pull apart the meat into small strands and put into the small pot you had the chili in and pour in 1/2 your blender of sauce (save the other 1/2) and simmer for a bit...oh add 1 tbsp cumin. This chicken mixture by itself can be a Mexican meal, served on top of rice, or potatoes or in a taco with some ensalada.(explanation of ensalda at the end) Taste this before you put into your tamale just so you know how many Serrano pepper you want to put in later.

delicious already

Now fill a pan with oil (we used Soy) and heat up, we used 1/2 a bottle of oil (1 liter bottle) I couldn't figure out why I had oil on my list because I knew tamales were not deep fried, here was my surprise. Empty a bag of Maseca flour into a large bowl and pour in your other 1/2 of sauce in your blender and stir, it will look a little crumbly.

Now slowly, very slowly pour in your hot oil as you are stirring. Stir until it is a nice soft dough, we ended up needing more liquid so she put some of the hot water that was in the chicken pot (member you saved a cup of it) into the blender and just swished it around rinsing it and poured it into the bowl. (never put cold water in here) When the dough was good you could roll it into a ball with your fingers without it being sticky. Who knew this was where the oil would go?...not I.

Hot oil going in

Somewhere along the way you need to wash your corn husks and while you are messing with your dough they are soaking in a pail of water (cold water) So now take them out of the pail and shake the water off so they are not dripping anymore.

Husks soaking in water

Now comes the fun part, use a little plastic bag as a glove (yes you need this...trust me) and take a ball of dough and smoosh it onto the corn husk coating it, leaving space at the top and lots of space at the bottom, once it's coated....no husk peeking through put a big spoon full of chicken mixture on, one slice tomato, one slice onion, one slice Serrano (more if you can handle it) and a little bunch of cilantro.

Now fold one long side over and then the other long side, fold up the long bottom piece and fold down the little top piece. Some people now tie them with a string, we did not. Put your pretty little tamales package upright in the steam pot. It is a pot with a little tray inside keeping your tamales off of the bottom which you have filled with water. I believe a rice steamer would work as well. Once you have them all filled steam for one hour. Let them cool off a bit before tasting or they will fall apart on you.

Steaming away

Yummy yummy

When you have your vegetables all cut up and are busy messing with your pots and your flour, cover your vegetables with a pretty pretty hand embroidered towel like this to keep the flies away.

This was so much fun for me, it was also good for my Spanish as Rosa does not speak English. Of course I had to have a huge boo because I am such a clutz, when I was gathering all the dirty dishes I dropped the glass lid for one of her pots it shattered of course, there is never any grace when you drop something on a concrete floor. I felt like such an idiot and will be buying her a new pot....I'm sure I can't buy just a lid.
I was so proud of my Tamales, I left Rosa enough for her family and as I walked home with mine I stopped at   Sophia and Mundo's house and gave them each one, then when I walked past my neighbors house she (can never member her name) called out tome asking where I bought my tamales, I proudly said, I did not by them, I made them....should have seen her surprised look, so I gave her one too. She was all impressed. Rosa was joking around and said I could make and sell Tamales at home and everyone could call me Tamalemaria....I think not, I'll stick to cutting grass and add making Tamales to my list of hobbies. Like I need a new hobby.
I was very excited to come home with my Tamales because I wanted to share them with my friend Augusta. Augusta is a beach vendor, she sells little bracelets, earrings and necklaces on the beach. She walks up and down the beach all day long trying to sell her stuff to the tourists, and these days there are just not many tourist. The media has scared them all away .... but that is a different story I might share later (grrr) . Augusta usually has her lunch break at one of my tables under one of my palapas. If I am here and am having lunch I like to share my lunch with her, she is always so grateful and gives me a gift in return, I don't want a gift in return but she always insists and I feel so bad then. At one point I was considering not giving her lunch anymore because I did not want her to feel obligated to give me gift, but I asked a few people and was told that I should allow her to give me a gift if she wants too. Today I was very proud to share my Tamales with her, and she wasn't on the beach, either I missed her, she's been going home early due to no tourist (grrr) or she didn't come today at all. I was sad. I ate her Tamale for supper. Tomorrow I am making Roll kuchen for Rosa and her family and will keep some for Augusta, who has already had roll kuchen....she said they were muy rico (very good)

Ensalada is the Mexican salad, it consists of cup cucumbers, radishes, and shredded lettuce, it is the topping for many dishes......never any dressing, so much healthier that our salads at home that are almost soggy with dressings. Sometimes a dollop of sour cream acts as a dressing here.

My supper tonight was one Tamales and some steamed peppers, carrots, onions, garlic, tossed with  a tbsp of sour cream and topped with fresh tomato and avocado.......so good.

In anticipation of Tamales

Tomorrow my friend Rosa is going to teach me how to make Tamales, I am so excited a few days ago I asked her for a list of ingredients that I should buy. It was a very interesting list, some of the amounts were in pesos. Everything here comes down to the peso, she knows exactly what this will cost her, right down to the exact peso. Which makes me sad when I hear that the price of tomatoes are going to go up soon ( 7 pesos a kilo now) since a lot of the crops in the state of Sinaloa froze during the cold spell a month ago. Will she still just buy 4 pesos of tomatoes for her Tamales making them less tomatoey or will she have the extra pesos to stick with her recipe?   When you cook a pot of soup, chili or stew do you know what the cost of it is and would you notice if  the price of tomatoes went up 2 cents? Most likely not, I know I wouldn't. I also do not know what the of a pot of chili is, mainly because when I buy the ingrientent I wouldn't buy just buy enough for the one pot, I used to buy a bag of beans that lasts a long time, a whole bunch of celery (half of it would rot in my crisper) and dried spices and herbs that come in a big box and are not fresh. Plus I most likely would have bought a bunch of other stuff at the same time and would always make sure the checkout girl put my recipe in the bag but would never look at it. But, Mexico has changed me, although I am not as conscience of my pennies as my friends here are I do stick to a grocery budget very faithfully and I do keep my recipes now and I try as much as possible to only shop for the day....no more hoarding as if the great famine is coming. It's amazing how much space that opens up in your kitchen cupboards and buying fresh tastes so much better.....and the health benefits..well, you all know all that. Any way....the list went like this;

2 pesos cilantro

2 pesos chilis Serrano

4 pesos tomatoes

1 garlic

6 chili para tenir (dried chilis)

oil

1 kilo carne de rez (beef)

I just bought the vegetables of the produce truck and the total came to 27 pesos..... unbelievable. First thing tomorrow I go to the meat market to buy the meat fresh, all she told me was a kilo of meat, that meat man better not ask me a whole lot of questions....should be interesting. I will take my camera with me tomorrow...promise.

27 pesos worth of vegetables

I have a funny story, I just went to find the produce truck to buy avocados for my lunch and we had a bit of excitement on the road behind my house. There was a guy that had about 8 small palm trees in pots (they were about 5 feet tall) that he was taking somewhere, he put them down to stop and talk to a buddy that was parked on a quad at the corner, they are standing there chatting away and 5 people on horseback come by, one Mexican guide taking 4 tourist on a trail ride. Two of the horses see the green palms and each snatch one, dragging the palm in their mouth...pot and all. Hilarious...when the guy goes after them to try and snatch them back one horse bolts and starts running with it, pot bouncing on the ground and dirt flying out, the other horse gave his up. Meanwhile the frightened rider cannot control her horse and is slowly sliding off the saddle....hilarious, myself and the dude sitting on the quad are laughing our heads off. Just in time the guy chases down the horse and gets the palm out of his mouth and he stops running  and all is well again. These are the funny moments that you just never catch on camera.

A Great New Site

The La Vina Church in Mazatlan has a children's feeding program where they go out to 12 different location throughout Mazatlan once a week and feed kids a healthy meal. This takes a lot of volunteers and of course money. During the high tourist season (Dec, Jan, Feb) the congregation at the church on Sunday mornings can reach 400 people, come March the people start dwindling down and so do the donations that go to the feeding program. By May there can sometimes be as little as 50 people in church....this hurts the offering basket. Even though the church is empty the kids still need to be feed and so the crunch is always on to raise all the money needed to run the feeding program in the 3 months that the church is full. And so, a wonderful couple came up with a little fundraising program that can bring in some money year round. It is great for us travelers. When you are traveling you tend to miss out on friends and family members birthdays, anniversaries,and a lot of other important events, and even though you can't be there to share the event it would be nice to be able to send a card, but the mail system does not always work, especially here in Mexico. Now I can go online and pick a card, I can put in a personal message, I can even add a picture and it gets sent in the mail...yes in the mail, this is not an e-card, it;s a card in an envelope with a stamp on it, for $2.99 and $1.50 of it goes towards the La Vina's feeding program. What a great program! While this is great for me it is great for you too, you can shop for a card at home and send it.....no need to go to the post office to mail it. This is even greater if you are like me and have the card riding around in the car for a few weeks before it even gets to the post office, it sat on the dashboard until it fell to the floor and then got stepped on and then coffee spilled on it and by the time I get to the post office it's just not gift-able anymore so I decide that I will just phone the person and say Happy Birthday instead....well...that happened once. Anyway...

They have a huge selection of cards and you can still write whatever you want in it, you can even do it ahead of time and tell them when to mail it. You could sit down with your address book and buy all your birthday cards for the year and be done....they will mail them when it is time.... brilliant or what? So here you go....

www.socretail.com/4thepoor paste this in your browser and send someone a card.

The infamous fruit bowl has a contender

We have all seen art that was inspired by a fruit bowl, such art has been around for many years but I think it's time we switch to the vegetable bowl. Since last summer I have fallen in love with vegetables, I don't seem to get tired of a plateful of lightly steamed vegetables and I love the crunch of eating them raw as well.

Tsunami Warning for the Pacific Coast of Mexico

This is the first thing I saw yesterday morning at 5:28 am when I logged on to my computer. It was in red letters on my Google home page, first thing I saw. I clicked on the red letters and was informed of the disaster that had happened in Japan and read how it was suppose to arrive on the Mexican coast at about 11 am. Since I am sitting at about sea level (I might be 2 feet above sea level) and am about 150 yards from the high tide line I was a bit alarmed....very alarmed. So I did what you do just before a disaster is to arrive, have a shower, don't want to be caught dirty and it might be my last hot shower if all gets washed away. As I stepped out I looked at the ocean for signs of disaster and it looked normal, surely there should be some signs of scariness.  After I was all prepared (showered) I kept surfing (haah) from site to site to get new and updated information. Meanwhile the village got roused out of bed by people knocking on doors at about 6am alerting neighbors and friends to be prepared to flee to higher ground. I was so glad I had gotten up early, it would have been frightening to wake up to someone at the door telling me a Tsunami was on the way. So I packed my emergency backpack, what do you pack when you are getting ready to flee? My passport, my cash that I had on hand, I looked around the house...humm, oh, a bottle of water, what else? Thats it, I zipped it up and placed it by the door. Ready to flee. My plan was to run to my friend Kathy's house here on the Island, she lives up on a hill. By now there is lots of traffic by my house, I think every household sent one member of the family to the beach to have a look and report back. Kids showed up with surf boards all hoping to surf the big one, but there was nothing to see.
They closed the port and all boats were told to come in, residents were told to stay of the beach, all beach restraunts closed, all tours to the Island were canceled, one ferry was closed, the other one was manned by police, the military arrived in big trucks, and schools were closed. The big white hotel on the beach (The Maria Coral) said they would be open for residents to seek refuge in....it's a tall building) You get the idea....a lot of excitement. By 11 am most of us had already been informed by the news that if it came down the pacific coast we would be shielded by the Baja of California, the Baja has saved Mazatlan from disaster a few times already. At the most we would have some stronger than usual waves.....surfers were standing by with their surf boards. By 2:00 pm it was clear nothing was happening, the lifeguards even went home, and the military pulled out and I unpacked my backpack.....and then realized I hadn't even packed a camera or a change of underwear. The day went on as usual.
This morning I read in the paper that the ocean has rose about 2 cm and that some 2000 people from Mazatlan had fled to Concordia, up in the mountains. Apparently the same thing happened 47 years ago, people fled to the mountain and then nothing happened. Oh well, a false alarm is better than no alarm at all.

How to make Chilis Rellenos

A few weeks ago (wow, time just flies here) I was invited to my friend Rosa's house (or did I invite myself...not sure) to learn how to make Chilis Rellenos, I was so excited. These are the authentic Mexican Chilis Rellenos, there are many versions out there but these are, in my opinion, the best. Here is your list of ingredients.

Poblano Peppers (however many you want to make)

Dried goat cheese

Tomatoes (these were Roma)

Eggs (fresh, non refrigerated eggs work best, I'll explain later)

Garlic

Onions

Cumin

Tomato Consume

Flour

To prep your peppers slit them down the middle and roast them on fire. Rosa has a gas stove and held them with a pair of tong above the flame on the burner and kept turning them evenly roasting them all around. This would work wonderful on a BBQ. Roast them until they become black and crackly looking....not burned to a crisp, just lightly black...yes lightly black....not pitch black. 

Once they are cooled enough to handle rub the crackled black stuff off with your fingers, it's a little sticky and messy, rub all the black stuff off and cut the seed ball out but leaving the stem. 

To prepare your caldo place a few onion slices in a pot and heat until the onion is roasted (yup, onion in a dry pot on the burner) meanwhile place a bunch of quartered tomatoes, a about 1/2 a head of garlic, a quartered onion or 2  in a blender, fill with water and puree. Once your onion is roasted (won't take long) pour your tomato puree in pot and add about a tbsp of cumin and a tbsp of tomato consume. Once your broth is heated completely you can taste and add more Tomato consume if you like. Leave this to simmer on the stove while you continue with your peppers. 

Dice a whole pile of tomatoes, how big of a pile depends on how many pepper you are stuffing. Mix the diced pepper with the dried goat cheese. It's about a half and half mixture. I don't know where I am going to get dried goat cheese at home so I am planning on trying this with dry cottage cheese, I think it will be similar. Now stuff your peppers plump full, have all of them full in a bowl beside your stove. Put some flour on a plate and have it ready by the stove as well. 

Now, put your egg white (whites only) in a bowl saving the yolks (you wouldn't have thrown them in the garbage anyway right?) Here is a little Mexican tip or superstition or whatever you want to call it. Rosa was very careful to explain to me that when you are beating egg whites into a meringue you need to be alone, yes alone in the room, reason being is apparently some people have something in their eyes that if they make contact with the egg whites it won't fluff up regardless of how long you beat them. When she told me this I was certain I had misunderstood her, but she saw my confused look and repeated it over and later when her daughter showed up she made sure that Jasmine explained it to me again in English this time. So she stepped into the bedroom and whipped her egg white and when she came back I couldn't believe how the eggs had fluffed up, I have never seen eggs fluff like that so I thought maybe I am one of the people that have the egg fluffing jinx in their eyes. I have since then learned that eggs that have never been refrigerated will fluff up more than refrigerated eggs. The eggs in the stores here are not stored in the coolers (ever) and if you never put an egg in the fridge it will not spoil left out but if an egg has been refrigerated it has to stay refrigerated or it will spoil. The key to a fluffy meringue,chiffon  or angel food cake is fresh non refrigerated eggs. There is your egg tip for the day.....and whip it alone just in case, especially if I am over. 

So now your eggs white are fluffy as clouds add your egg yolks to it with about a tbsp of flour and whip a little bit more. 

Now heat your oil in a pan, you don't want your chilis completely covered in oil...about half. The oil of choice here is soy oil but I think any kind will do. Make sure your oil is hot, very hot. Rosa say she can always taste when she eats them elsewhere if the oil has not been hot enough. 

Roll your chili in the flour coating it and being careful not to spill your cheese and then dip in your egg fluff completely covering it and put in your pan of oil, as it is frying spoon oil onto the top of the chili letting it run down the side...over and over until it is lightly browned, do not turn it over, just spoon the oil over it. Remove from pan and place on a paper towel. Do this to all the chilis. 

Just before you are ready to serve put all the chilis in pot of caldo (this is when you discover your pot is too small) and let sit for a few minutes (2 or 3) to serve spoon a chili into a bowl and spoon in some broth. Eat....yummmmm. If you have some left over egg fluff (we did) just pour into a hot pan, it make a nice little pancake. 

When I get home I plan on doing this all on a BBQ outside, just the thought of having a boiling pan of oil on my stove scares me.

If you don't have Tomato consume and you live near me I will bring back some from here and should have some to share. I know finding Poblano peppers is also not easy in High Level. I am bringing back seeds from here (don't tell the snoopy people at the airport) so I will see if I can't fool these peppers into thinking my greenhouse is a tropical Mexican garden.

Going on a trip

I am going on a road trip to Lake Chapala with a friend, she is staying there so I will take the bus back. She will drive me to Guadalajara and I will take the bus from there to Mazatlan. I am not taking my laptop so I will not be in touch for almost a week. I'm not sure how long I will be gone, 3-6 days. I guess it depends how interesting Lake Chapala is, from what I've heard it is a place where many many Canadian and Americans have made their winter homes. I'm not overly excited to see it but I am excited for the drive. Here is a map
http://maps.google.com.mx/maps?hl=es-419&pq=capital+of+sonora&xhr=t&q=guadalajara&cp=4&biw=1280&bih=611&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=Guadalajara,+JAL&gl=mx&ei=b8pqTaXxHJH0tgPHpsimBA&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=image&resnum=1&sqi=2&ved=0CCMQ8gEwAA

So I will leave you with a few pictures today.

Theses are Chilis Rellenos, A friend showed me how to make these the other day, it as so much fun, I've been wanting an invitation to a Mexican kitchen for a long time and it finally happened. I promise I will post the recipe when I get back.In the meantime start looking for some dried goat cheese.