Vacationing in the madre tierra

Photo grabbed from here.

I'm back in Arizona visiting with my family and enjoying a reprieve from the Indiana humidity.  In my opinion, the hot, dry weather is great and not as tiring as the humidity back in the midwest.  Then again, I'm always in air-conditioned areas, or my parents' pool, so that probably has something to do with it.

Tomorrow I'm going to make green rice for our traditional Sunday dinner.  Generally that involves my dad grilling outside, my sisters' amazing pies or cakes, and everything that is good about food.  I'll post the green rice recipe tomorrow and then maybe later on next week I'll get back to some more recipes once I'm back in IN. 

A pic I took of a storm coming over the Estrella mountains.  I definitely miss the mountains when I'm in the flat midwest.

Saludos!
-Jose

Tostadas and a dissertation on cultural relativity

Okay, not a dissertation in the sense of the doctoral dissertation I'm not writing but one none the less, just shorter.  But first tostadas.  Tostadas are one of my wife's favorite foods.  I grew up eating them pretty frequently and they never excited me that much.  I don't make them too differently these days, but Rosie's excitement must've been contagious because they are now one of my favorite meals.  For one, they are a healthy dinner.  Baked corn tortillas, homemade refried beans and all the lettuce, tomato, avocado (and homemade salsa) you can pile on.  And they're incredibly satisfying.  What's not to like?  They're also very leftover friendly.  If you wanted to use up some leftover chicken, just chop it up and throw it on.  Also, if you want the extra protein and want to make them a little heavier add a fried egg.  Awesome...

So what is a tostada?  Tostada means 'toasted' in Spanish but here it's a noun, not an adjective (since it's feminine, it's probably referring back to tortilla - 'the toasted tortilla/the thing that is toasted').  I've just finished teaching a 2 month long course on Spanish grammar for non-Spanish speakers (grad students who need to fulfill a language requirement who learn how to translate academic articles) and as a result my mind is stuck in the intricacies of the Spanish language.  So back to that big what is a tostada question, and my whole thing.  Cultural relativity is the kind of thing I think about when I'm writing about European colonization of the "New" World.  So when I frequently hear that a tostada is an "open-faced sandwich", I have to disagree.  An open-faced sandwich is an open-faced sandwich, a tostada is a tostada.  Or, instead of submitting a culturally distinct cuisine to our own culinary standards, we could say that a tostada is like an open-faced sandwich.  An obsession with political correctness?  Maybe.  But at the same time, why not let terms have their own referents?  By the way, did you know that the pineapple, indigenous to the Americas, so astounded 16th century Spanish historian and 'ethnographer' Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo that he found himself unable to describe it?  So astounding and original was its flavor that Oviedo could find no European referents, no equivalents and literally no words to describe it.  Face to face with something so foreign (okay, so the Indians were much more foreign to him and he was a pretty ignorant dude), Oviedo named the fruit based on its appearance - piña, because it looked like a pine cone.  Imagine, he could have named it 'artichoke fruit' because he also thought it looked like an artichoke.  Wow, okay.  Tostadas are tostadas, enough.  Maybe Gertrude Stein would say a tostada is a tostada is a tostada.  Hah hah...
Let's get on with the recipe!

Tostada Shells:
We bake our corn tortillas to cut back on the oil from frying while keeping the nice crispy texture.  Set the oven on 400 degrees, and lightly brush tortillas with some vegetable oil.  Place tortillas on a flat baking sheet.  To avoid tortillas curling, I put an upside down cooling rack over the tortillas while they bake.  It keeps them nice and flat.  Bake for 15 minutes, remove from oven, turn tortillas over and bake for another 8-10 minutes until brown and crisp.

When crisp, top with any of the following ingredients (pay attention to the order!)
Refried Beans
Salsa
Sour cream
Sliced avocado
Grated cheese of your choice
Chopped lettuce

Rosie has the system all figured out.  Forget the picture you see in the post, salsa and sour cream on top only cause messy tostadas and fingers.  Put your runny stuff down first and then the loose ingredients.  Rosie's good at figuring these things out, although she has to remind me about her system every time we have them.

Buen provecho!

Friijole beans (easy ones!)

So, refried beans are a necessary accompaniment to a lot of the eating we do around here.  Sadly, I only recently stopped buying the canned stuff.  In the years that I've been cooking I've never really gotten the recipe down right.  Last Summer a friend of mine made some great cooked beans (not refried) that went really well with the barbecue chicken and rice.  So I took his recipe and changed it a bit and now we eat them all the time.  They fry really well and the recipe is pretty adaptable.  Cooked slowly with garlic, onion, and cilantro (and a bottle of beer) the beans take on a nice rich flavor.  Right before I mash them I add a little butter, cumin, and dried chile powder.  Extra bonus, they freeze really well for future eating.

Ingredients
1 lbs pinto beans
1 large onion, chopped
1 cup chopped cilantro
3+ garlic cloves, minced
1 bottle of beer
freshly ground pepper
2 t. guajillo chile powder

extra possibilities for flavoring: reserved bacon fat, cumin, butter

Rinse beans and sort out for stones or the dried up, cracked beans.  Put in a large soup pot and add onion, cilantro, garlic.  Add pepper and chile powder.  Empty beer into the pot and add about 15 cups of water.  Bring to a boil and then turn heat to low.  Simmer for 3-4 hours (if I'm going to mash them up, I generally let them go about 4 hours). 

(No worries, I still have ones to drink).
When they're soft, stir in a tablespoon of sea salt (at this point I also added a tablespoon of bacon fat). 
To re-fry: Put two cups or so of the beans into a pan with a little liquid.  Mash them with a potato masher over medium heat.  If there's a little excess liquid, just continue to heat until liquid has reduced. 

Another good thing is that you can freeze beans (with a little liquid) for future use.  No more canned beans!

Enjoy!

Banana Oatmeal Pancakes

A brief rest from Mexican food today.  One of my favorite blogs is Ameet Maturu's Rice of Life.  He comes up with really creative, healthy and mostly gluten-free recipes.  While he doesn't post too often, it's always quality when he does. 

This recipe comes from Ameet's Oatmeal Kefir Pancake recipe.  Kefir is like yogurt although thinner and with a slightly sour flavor.  But, it's got tons more probiotics than yogurt.  Forget Activia, this is the stuff (and it doesn't have the artificial sweeteners).   Normally we make smoothies with it, adding bananas, strawberries or any other fruit.  Most recently, we've been making whole milk kefir smoothies with peaches and bananas.  They're great and keep you full for a while. I found the recipe last Spring when I was searching for gluten-free pancakes that might use kefir.  Ameet makes the very good observation that kefir has a buttermilk-like quality to it which makes it great for pancakes.  I was sold on his recipe and I've made it so many times since that I realized it has to show up here.  When Rosie and I first started thinking about cutting back on wheat, gluten etc, I thought I wouldn't be able to stop eating pancakes.  There's something really wonderful about pancakes for breakfast, and yet I'm not all that thrilled about loading up on flour for breakfast.  So these pancakes, which are predominately oats (and in this case almond meal), are full of protein and fiber and a great way to start the day. 

Don't be turned off by the kefir in this recipe.  If you don't make it, or want to buy it, yogurt should work pretty well.  Because I make so many smoothies with it, I decided to try using kefir smoothie in place of the kefir.  I love banana pancakes so banana-kefir smoothie was the logical choice.  I was right, these were great.  Topped with some toasted walnuts or blueberries, this is an awesome breakfast. 

Ingredients
1 cup of whole milk kefir/yogurt
1 banana
3/4 cup rolled oats
1 egg
1 T. vegetable oil
1 T. agave nectar or other sweetener (honey, maple syrup)
1 t. vanilla extract

1/4 cup almond meal (I use Trader Joe's brand ground almond meal)
1 t. baking soda
1 t. salt
1/8 t. nutmeg
1/8 t. cinnamon
chopped toasted walnuts for garnish

Blend kefir and banana until smooth.  Since Ameet's recipe calls for a cup of kefir (and you end up with a little more after the addition of fruit), measure out just a cup (you can always drink the rest).  Put the oats in a bowl with kefir and let sit for 20 minutes.  Beat egg, oil, agave and vanilla in a small bowl and add to oats. 

Combine almond meal, baking soda, salt and spices in a small bowl with a fork.  Add to wet ingredients and mix well. 

Spoon onto the griddle.  Cook over medium-low heat until bubbles begin to open.  (Note: these pancakes are a little harder to turn than wheat pancakes so keep your eye on them.  I'm used to the difficulty of pancakes with a gas stove).  Top with chopped walnuts and or blueberries and real maple syrup.

Enjoy!

Sweet Potato Ricotta Enchiladas in Chipotle Sauce: Real Food

Elitist enchiladas!  This is my first attempt to expand my blog into the greater online world of cooking blogs.  I made this recipe for Two for Tuesdays Blog Hop Carnival (something I was originally made aware of by another blog that I read from time to time).  The theme is 'real food' and girlichef describes it like this:

...slow food, traditional food, hand-prepared food, nourishing food...food that is NOT processed....food that doesn't come from a package...food that your great-grandmother would have made &/or eaten.  REAL food is homemade. REAL food is from scratch.  REAL food has recognizable ingredients.  REAL food is made from traditional ingredients.  REAL food is food you make with your own hands...from food grown, milled, raised by you or by people (not machines).  Think family farmer.  Think farmer's market.  Think garden.  Think local grain mill.  Think REAL.



I'd like to think of the food I like to eat and cook as real food, but the challenge was a good one.  And I try to support local growers whenever possible: the sweet potatoes come from our favorite co-op, poblanos and onions from our Farmers' Market, and the chipotles from a local Mexican restaurant/grocer.   I believe pretty strongly in local and organic ingredients and I always avoid processed foods with ingredients I can't pronounce.  That said, I don't think my grandmother ever made sweet potato enchiladas.  But the flavors work together really well.  I think the idea came to me a year ago when Rosie and I made pumpkin filled ravioli and then reused the filling for an enchilada 'casserole' of sorts.  It was such a great combination and I've been wanting to try it again, but with sweet potato instead of pumpkin.  While I guess these enchiladas are sort of enchiladas meet manicotti, the truth is that I don't believe in culinary essentialism: no one country has ever produced a great dish without other influences, right?  But anyway...
Alright, on to the recipe.


Sweet potato filling:

1 large sweet potato, cubed and roasted
2 garlic cloves, roasted
2 roasted poblanos, peeled and chopped
2 green onions, chopped
1/3 cup cilantro, chopped
1/2 cup ricotta (or cottage cheese)*
Chipotle Sauce
8 corn tortillas

To make filling:
Peel and cube sweet potato.  Drizzle with a little vegetable oil.  Roast at 400 for about 20 minutes or until crisp.  You can put the poblanos in at the same time if desired (they will take longer, up to a half hour).  Garlic takes little time to roast (maybe 8-9 minutes).
Once cooled, place sweet potatoes, coarsely chopped poblanos and garlic in a food processor.  Process until smooth, scraping down the sides when necessary.  Add cilantro, green onion and a couple of tablespoons of olive oil and process again.  Finally add the cheese and process until smooth.  (This can be done in advance and refrigerated for 24 hours).

To make enchiladas.  See my post here to read how I prepare corn tortillas for rolling in a way that cuts back on oil.  Ladle enough sauce to cover a 9 x 13 baking dish.  How much filling you want to use is up to you, I'd say about 1/4 cup.  When you fill the dish (8-10 enchiladas), ladle the rest of the sauce over the enchiladas and garnish with some grated cheese if desired.  Bake at 350 for about 15 minutes.
Enjoy!  We sure did!





* - So while it may be less of a foodie ingredient, I've found a cottage cheese that I love and I think it offers a great alternative to ricotta.  But ricotta sounds a little more upscale so it's in the title.  But if you are cottage cheese-phobic (as I once was), you should know that the Michigan Brand cottage cheese is great with a nice sharp flavor and not at all watery.  We eat it with corn chips, mix it with eggs, bake it into quiches, etc. etc.  Give it a try, you won't even notice a cottage cheese texture in this.  

chipotle sauce

It was definitely time to try a new enchilada sauce.  This sauce goes with an enchilada recipe I'll be posting shortly.  I decided to throw out the chile powders for this one and use actual dried chiles.  Chipotles are a spicy, smoky dried chile that work in a lot of dishes.  This one worked well with the addition of a little cinnamon and some oregano. 

The veg route:
So we have some friends who are vegetarians and great cooks.  They shared this bouillon with us and it works pretty well.  When simmering the dried chiles on the stove, I put a small teaspoon full this base into 2 cups of water.  It helps flavor the chile water (which you'll use later on to thin out the sauce).  It's a little salty so get to know it before you use it in place of regular chicken broth.  If you want to go the veg route, I do suggest this.

Ingredients:
4-6 chipotles (the dry ones, number varies depending on how hot you want it)
1 guajillo chile
1 small onion, chopped coarsely
2 cloves garlic, sliced
1 can tomato sauce
oregano, cinnamon, white wine, salt for taste. 

Stem and rinse chiles.  Remove any seeds that you can.  Put chiles in a pot with 2 cups of broth (vegetarian, regular...).  Throw in the onion and garlic.  Bring to a boil and simmer for 30 minutes.   When soft, pull out seeds and place in blender with tomato sauce with 1/2 cup of chile water.  Process until smooth adding chile water until desired consistency is reached. 
After this step, I put the sauce onto the stove in a sauce pot and add a dash of cinnamon, 1 t. finely ground oregano and 2 T. white wine.  Simmer for a few minutes tasting the sauce until it tastes right.  If you get it terribly hot, you could always add some more tomato sauce or if it's too mild you can add some dried chile powder. 

Enjoy!

Mad Scientist Infusion Experiments: Rasberry, strawberry vanilla and more craziness...

Seeing as it's berry season, a season which is much too short, I've been thinking of things to do with my raspberries, strawberries, blueberries etc.  A few months ago, searching for various recipes for how to make your own vanilla extract from vanilla beans and vodka, I came across some infusion recipes that were pretty intriguing.  Of course, the idea is to drink the vodka and have it taste like fruit, but I'm not a big fan of fruit-tasting alcohol or even really vodka.  I do, however, really like whiskey.

Returning to the point, I had thought that these infusions might make great 'extracts'.  You can make orange essence from orange peel and vodka, why not just let the raspberries sit longer and have raspberry flavoring in addition to (or as an alternative to) vanilla?  I'm a big fan of the chocolate ganache on top of a chocolate cake.  What if it were raspberry flavored?  Triple sec in a chocolate ganache was a breakthrough to me and it's worth exploring these ideas some more.
So today, after the obligatory trip to the farmers' market, I made three infusion/extracts.

#1.  (Far left): Raspberry extract.  I placed a little more than a cup of raspberries in a pint jar filled with vodka.  I figured this will be a nice way to flavor pretty much any kind of chocolate frosting, sauce, or even baked brownies.  We'll see how strong the raspberry flavor is.

#2. (Middle and pictured here again to the right, sorry for the poor quality): My real mad experiment: Cinnamon orange extract with vanilla beans and part of a dry guajillo chile (torn up a little, seeds preserved).  I can't even give this one an easy title because of all of the ingredients.  But I thought this one through pretty well.  Of course orange and cinnamon go well together, and vanilla would help make this richer.  But I'm most excited about the guajillo chile.  It is a pungent chile and I think it's really versatile.  In its powdered form, it always ends up in my red chile sauce and I've also pureed it into my chicken stocks for posole or just a nice hearty stew.  I believe it's necessary to strain at least the orange after a few days, but I'll leave the other ingredients in, hoping they don't overpower the orange flavor.  I thought this would be a great flavoring for rice pudding, shortbread cookies or pretty much anything.  I will update on how this turns out.

#3. (Far right and pictured again here): Strawberry vanilla extract.  What would you not use this for?  Again, it seems like a nice way to flavor melting chocolate, possibly a pudding, or who knows what else.  This one just had to happen because we had a huge box of strawberries and I wanted to make sure we eat them fast enough.   The vanilla beans are recycled from a pint of vanilla extract I started back in January.  The stuff you make is really a lot better than store-bought vanilla and a lot cheaper.

Okay, enough madness.  Coming up next is an enchilada 'casserole' based the call-out I read in this blog post.  I'm looking forward to trying to interact more with the cyber world.  We'll see how it goes.