65 recipes down, 90 to go

On Thursday evening, at the tail end of Month 5, I made Spicy Plantain Pie (D12).  Frankly, I was a disappointed with the result.  It’s made with ripe plantains, dark brown sugar, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, and with cream and eggs to make it custardy.  I was actually quite surprised at how sweet it was — too sweet for my taste.  The flavor of the plantain, its tanginess, did come through, but for me it was sort of like a not-quite-ripe banana flavor with too much sugar.  The addition of the sweetened whipped cream, however, was good (mine was flavored with Mexican vanilla and sugar as I was out of Brandy).  John and the kids all liked it and ate it but I doubt I will make this one again.

On a positive note, though, the crust turned out perfectly.  I am now a firm believer in crust made with lard.  The lard lends a flakiness to the crust that butter or shortening by themselves cannot produce.  Especially now that I know where to get lard.  I suggest you all go out and find yourselves a lard source.  You won’t be sorry.  Lard is good.

60 recipes down, 95 to go

What better way to ring in the New Year than with a choice selection from the Classic Fiesta Food chapter!  Rick says that he looks forward to the recipes in this chapter more than any other ones in the book (275).  We chose to make Braised Turkey in Teloloapan Red Mole (CFF1).  Here is an excerpt from Rick’s description of the recipe: “This is cooking for people who love to cook and who love to share their creations with enthusiastic eaters.  It’s cooking that takes up the greater part of a day (or parts of several days) — definitely special-occasion fare” (277).  I heartily concur with Rick’s assessment.  We had almost all of that.  We love to cook and share our creations.  On this particular day we had last minute visitors to our table: John’s parents.  While they are enthusiastic eaters, my sense is that the result was a little spicy for their taste.  They were however fans of the Classic White Rice that was served as an accompaniment so they were happy with mainly turkey and rice with just a small amount of mole.  And, the recipe really did take the greater part of the day to prepare.

I guess it goes without saying that any recipe with 28 ingredients is going to take some effort to put together.  And even by the standards of some of the other mole recipes (that I’ve made pre-project), this one is complex.  This was not, however, the first time that I’d made this recipe, just the first time for the project.  There are some ingredients that make you wonder what they’re doing in the recipe (grated avocado pit comes to mind).  There was also a lot of frying of ingredients in lard: dried chiles, nuts, raisins, bread, etc.  Two separate purées were made, a chile purée and a seed purée.

chile purée

seed purée

These are ultimately cooked and combined along with broth and Mexican chocolate to make the mole.  Then the turkey breast (which has previously been browned) is braised in the mole.

This recipe is far too detailed to go over each step (this is a blog, not a book).  That said, I will make one aside to talk about the frying of the dried chiles (ancho and guajillo) in the lard.  As I said, I’ve made this before and I remember the chiles frying too quickly and getting a bitter smell to them and thus to the soaking liquid as well.  I remembered  from making the Plantain Turnovers that the oil should not be as hot as you might think, so I erred on the side of keeping the oil cooler so as not to overcook the chiles.  This seemed to work as my soaking liquid was not bitter at all and was able to be used in the chile purée.

Now for the results.  The mole was everything that Mexican food should be: sweet, spicy, complex, fantastic!  Also, the turkey breast was cooked to perfection.  This is one of those sauces that you taste and first you sense the sweetness of the sugar and the chocolate.  Then, a couple of seconds later the spice coats your mouth.  It really was quite spicy but you could adjust the ratio of sauce to turkey and rice to find a good balance for any palate.  We had made this mole before and I’m sure we’ll make it again.  One more great thing about this recipe is that it really makes more sauce than you need and so there was plenty not only for all of the leftover turkey but also a sizable amount to freeze.  And what’s so great about freezing the sauce is that you can then in the future whip up a fantastic meal with little effort.  This really was the perfect way to ring in 2010 and I look forward to a lot more Mexican cooking in the months ahead

45 recipes down, 110 to go

We had our neighbors and their children over for dinner last Sunday and made a great Mexican meal! It was really nice to share this experience with others who are excited about the project. My friend Kristi even made Creamy Lime Pie (D10) from the book to complement the meal, but also to not make anything that I haven’t made yet (since I would probably be tempted to count it without actually cooking it). I made Oaxacan Black Bean Soup (LHS7) and Red Chile-Braised Chicken with Potatoes and Greens (MD1). I also made poached chicken for the kids who didn’t want Mexican food and Kristi brought pasta with parmesan and carrots. In all there were 5 kids, aged 3, 5, 6, 8, and 11. Only the 11 year old wanted to try the “adult” food but I’m happy to report that she liked everything. The other kids were happy with their selections and all enjoyed the pie
Let’s start with the soup. This recipe was both easy and fabulous!! It’s a definite keeper. Just simmer black beans with water, fennel (since I couldn’t find avocado leaves), chorizo (only 4 oz. for 6 servings so I would count this as a healthy dish too), and onion. Once the beans are fully cooked you purée the soup with an immersion blender (truly one of the best ever invented kitchen tools!) and season with salt adding more water to get the consistency that you want. The soup is served with fried tortilla strips and crumbled queso fresco. The soup had a great smooth texture with the wonderful earthy flavor of the black beans. I was also really surprised at how much flavor a relatively small amount of chorizo added. It added a nice meaty spice to the dish that was subtle but a wonderful contribution. The queso fresco and the crunchy fried tortilla strips provided a nice flavor and texture contrast.

You can also add optional shrimp which would be cooked in the soup at the end. I had, in fact, intended to do this but I shopped for the meal early in the week and thought I would go out the day of and get the shrimp. Of course when the day came I didn’t think about it until I didn’t really have time to run out again. But really, unless you’re doing the soup as a main course, I don’t think you need them. I do sense that I’ll be making this soup again so at some point I’ll have to go the shrimp route to see what that adds.
Next was the Red Chile-Braised Chicken. I have to say that I really like dishes that are prepared all in one pot. This is probably because complete meal planning has never been my forte. For most of my adult life I’ve thought that if I’ve remembered to take fish or chicken out of the freezer for dinner that I would be done. It’s only after that fish or chicken is ready to eat that usually John will say “So, what are we having with this?” So one-pot meals have always appealed to me in that the meat and the veggies are all taken care of in one dish. In my defense, I am starting to get better at meal planning. I made a pretty big leap in this area over lent when I gave up meat. I knew I had to plan more than one thing for each meal and that has carried over. That and we’re trying to eat less meat in general (reading Michael Pollen’s books have convinced me that for the most part the veggies should be the center with meat as a side complement) so I’m trying to make sure that we have good sides.
What was I talking about? Oh yeah, Red Chile-Braised Chicken. I had John quarter the whole chicken for me (he really is better at poultry deconstruction than I am) and the pieces were browned in oil and set aside. Then you make the flavor base which in this recipe was EF10 Essential Sweet-and-Spicy Ancho Seasoning Paste. I have made this once before with the simple red mole enchiladas. The paste is combined with broth to make a sauce and the chicken, potatoes, and greens (in our case, collards) are cooked in the sauce. This is then all served together. This, too, was excellent. The chicken was moist and the sauce had a very nice spicy, earthy, tangy flavor. I am also a fan of greens; I feel so healthy when I’m eating them. And when they’re smothered in a yummy sauce, so much the better My only complaint was that the potatoes were just slightly under cooked. Instead of halving them I would try quartering them the next time.

I’ll just make a couple of notes about the Creamy Lime Pie, made by Kristi. She made all of the substitutions of the more authentic ingredients: shortening instead of lard in the crust, all-purpose flour instead of masa harina and creme fraîche instead of Mexican crema. Here’s how I would rate the result. I think the crust made with lard was a little more flaky. The filling, however, tasted just as I had remembered mine tasting. That said, her pie didn’t firm up in the oven and after exceeding the cooking time waiting for it to firm up, we took it out (also, the crust was starting to get a little too brown). But by the time we cut it into pieces, though, it had firmed up and so was fine. There was also a little bit of a lag between preparing the filling and getting it into the oven, so maybe that had an effect. She made the filling at home and we cooked it chez moi so that it would be warm for serving (as recommended by Rick).