Post by blackcrowheart on Jun 5, 2006 10:28:09 GMT -5
Reflections of a culture
Mexico City's rollicking marketplace mirrors the nation's history
By Hugh Dellios
Chicago Tribune
MEXICO CITY -- On her long trek across the city--first on the bus,
then in the subway--Alicia Bones de Enriquez passes all kinds of
markets where she could buy ingredients for the mole sauce her
family loves.
She passes the street markets that have checkered the metropolis
since pre-Aztec times and are still known by their indigenous name,
tianguis. She probably passes specialty markets, too, some of which
cater to fine European tastes.
Bones, 72, has a holiday meal in mind, and the expectations at home
are high. That's why she appears in front of the cascades of purple
chilies spilling from the stalls of La Merced, the cavernous,
chaotic central market that offers the richest selection of Mexico
City's spice and intrigue.
As the diableros, or handcart "devils," buzz around her, Bones
lovingly searches out the corner stall of second-generation chili
peddler Jose Juan Jimenez. She carefully selects from his eye-
watering ancho and guajillo chilies, then the smoky pasillas and
nearly black mulattos. She takes a scoop of sesame seeds from the
bin, and a cone of the sticky raw sugar called piloncillo.
The almonds and chocolate are waiting at home. So are the
grandchildren.
"The piloncillo and the chocolate are the most important," she says,
her husband Efren, 75, looking over her shoulder. "You have to know
how to dissolve it and add it right at the end for that smooth,
exquisite seasoning.
"It takes us two hours to get here and the trip is awful, but it's
worth the pain," Bones says. "Here you can choose, and you're sure
your mole will come out just right because of the quality you're
buying."
It's a trip that mole perfectionists and everyday cooks have been
making to the city center since pre-Colombian times, knowing they'll
find the best nopales (cactus leaves), huitlacoche (corn fungus) and
tamale-wrapping plantain leaves. Until just 50 years ago, it all
made its way into the city on gondolas up the Aztecs' water canals.
La Merced is perhaps the largest retail produce market in the world.
Inside are not only pyramids of carrots, mountains of cabbage and
chili peppers from all over the republic, but a video-game arcade,
telegraph office, two bank branches, a beauty salon, at least
one "witch's den" where tarot cards are read, and a subway stop
where passengers smell the onions underground and emerge upon a
stall full of crackly sheets of deep-fried pig skin, chicharron.
It takes 20 minutes to walk uninterrupted from one end to the other,
if you are able to keep walking. You pass red bananas next to yellow
bananas next to macho plantains that are ripe only when they are so
black they look rotten. Want a tomato? Then you'll have to know your
tomate from your tomatillo from your jitomate from your jitomate
bola.
You pass piles of dime-sized kernels of corn used in rich pozole
stew, and the occasional pile of deep-fried grasshoppers--15 pesos
per sardine-can scoop and popped into the mouth like peanuts. "I'll
give you two cans for 25!" barks one peddler dressed in her
indigenous attire from Oaxaca.
Five-foot statues of the Virgin of Guadalupe stand beneath gigantic
pinatas of Mr. Incredible. And the aromas are absolutely
mouthwatering. The delicate cilantro, the pungent guayaba and the
lethal arbol chilies are enough to turn a bag salesman into a poet.
"The nature of the fruit just absorbs you, even for those of us who
work here daily," said Eduardo "Lalo" Amaya, 58, who is known
as "the philosopher of La Merced" and who sells bags at
his "strategic" spot on the market's central aisle. "The smell is
indescribable. It traps you like love. You can't define it but you
feel it."
The people are just as colorful and varied. Some of the peddlers
have occupied the same 2-by-4-foot space every day for 40 years, and
inherited it from their parents before that.
The diableros come whizzing down the aisle with 30 boxes of tomatoes
on their carts and they're not stopping for anything.
Knives flash everywhere. Corn kernels are carved from cobs.
Mushrooms are diced. An army of workers scrape the spines from nopal
leaves, which arrive stacked up in barrellike formations wrapped in
canvas. Some men spend the whole day carving plantain leaves into
perfect squares to be wrapped around moist Oaxaca-style tamales.
"What I like most is the magic of seeing all the people working, how
they all are doing their part," said Patricia Quintana, a well-known
Mexican chef, cookbook author and owner of the city's Izote
restaurant.
Historic marketplace
In its fourth incarnation, the city's central market has had a long
history that parallels the history of Mexico and its dreams, its
modernization efforts and its great mestizo mix of European and
indigenous cultures and all their human and gastronomic expressions.
From the gourmet to the everyday, the market offers "something for
every pocket," as the Mexicans say. They clearly mark la primera
goods from la segunda, while the volume and movement of goods mean
the freshest produce comes in and departs just as quickly.
"It's a souk," said Luis Ignacio Sainz, administrative secretary of
the National Institute of Anthropology and History, who has written
books about La Merced and other markets.
"More than a market, it is the most authentic zone of cultural
intermixing in the city. It's very representative of Mexico. All the
good and the bad of our society is there."
While the tiangui street markets flourished in Aztec times, the
city's first central market after the Spanish conquest was outside
La Merced convent. At first, it was because the water canals passed
that way and the Spanish monks bought the best foods. But with time,
the peddlers set up shop there because they felt protected near the
walls of the convent.
Trouble brewed after the election of reformist President Benito
Juarez, who suspected the priests of conspiring against him. So he
made a public plaza out of the area, which lasted until the dictator
Porfirio Diaz restored the market to its full prominence just before
the advent of the 20th Century.
Later, the market was moved next to the National Palace on the
city's main plaza, and carried the La Merced name with it. Then it
moved to its current home in the Venustiano Carranza neighborhood in
1957, when the city regent decided it was too dirty and chaotic to
be that close to the seat of government.
"He didn't see the beauty of it," Sainz said. "He didn't see it as
part of the city's patrimony.
He only saw it as a relic."
Pockets of activity
Today La Merced is a complex that occupies several warehouses called
naves, a word also used for ships that ply the oceans or outer
space. One nave trades in produce, another cooked food, another
galvanized metal tools, another candy.
The commerce spills out the exits, where small stores and eateries
line the surrounding streets and take advantage of the masses
passing by. Big produce trucks line the curbs after their run in
from the citylike central supply warehouses established on the
eastern edge of town in 1982.
That's where the majority of La Merced's produce begins the day
after all-night truck journeys in from the provinces. Beginning at 3
a.m., many of La Merced's peddlers join the city's restaurateurs
there to select the freshest and best-priced goods.
For a foreigner, some of the market's products can be a bit scary.
Turn one corner and you find a stack of dried, stringy meat with a
sign above that says chito. The seller might try to tell you that
it's horse meat, but don't believe her. It's donkey, cooked and
eaten in guajillo sauce by those who can't afford horse meat.
Then there's the huitlacoche, a grayish, purplish fungus that grows
like a cancer on corncobs. Elsewhere it might be considered ghastly;
here it's a delicacy with a rich, smoky, mushroomy, not-quite-sweet
taste that garnishes many an omelet, quesadilla and, more recently,
ravioli in upscale restaurants.
"It doesn't look like much, but it's tasty," said Martin Alonso, 45,
a peddler with a knack for understatement who has been selling
onions and fungus since he was 15 from a spot where there's barely
enough room to turn around.
His other product is flor de calabasa, the golden-orange squash
blossoms that cooks stuff with white Oaxaca cheese. They sit next to
mounds of cilantro and epazote, the Mexican herbs that one always
associates with the best soups and ceviches.
"It [epazote] is one of Mexico's hidden spices," said Jordi Sales, a
well-traveled Spaniard who lives in Mexico City, knows the world's
markets and rarely settles for second-rate cuisine.
"You taste it, you like it, but you don't know where it comes from."
By far, the biggest spectacle in the market are the dried chilies.
The biggest challenge is knowing which has which taste, and which
will make your tongue forever regret you didn't know before biting
into it.
There are at least 40 varieties, typically stacked next to each
other in stalls with all the other ingredients for making mole: bins
of almonds, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, pistachios, sesame seeds and
cinnamon sticks. There, too, are the dried shrimp heads and the
whole oregano buds.
Here they say that every mole is different, whether to be served
with chicken, pork or turkey, and that every cook has her secret
special something that she slips inside.
"There are those who like to grind up the sesame inside, and there
are those who just like to sprinkle it on top," said Petra Gutierrez
de Romero, a peddler squeezed between a mound of guajillo peppers
and boxes of dried shrimp. "The most important is the almonds.
That's what gives it the flavor."
Today, in some stalls, buckets of prepared mole are sold. The
peddlers say it's for shoppers in a hurry, or a younger generation
that never learned how to make their own. That's understood, but
it's also frowned upon-like the little arbol chilies that have now
begun appearing in the market from China.
"It's the more demanding people who buy the real ingredients" said
Reyna Garcia, whose family has run the Casa Coronel stall for 30
years.
That's the case with Bones, who laments that her daughters don't
spend the time in the market and kitchen with her, but who says she
still hasn't given up hope.
"I do it out of love. I learned from my mom," she says, before
slipping off quietly for the two-hour ride home from La Merced. "I
enjoy the little compliments I get when my family is eating. That's
why I am more and more painstaking each time.
Green ceviche marinated in orange and lime with cascabel infusion
Preparation time: 20 minutes
Marinating time: 2 hours
Cooking time: 2 minutes
Servings: 4
--This recipe is the brainstorm of a young Mexican chef named Daniel
Bravo Garibi, who has worked at several restaurants in Mexico City.
Most recently he has been cooking on a ship for the Greenpeace
environmental group.
Ceviche (pronounced sah BEE chay):
3/4 pound red snapper fillets
1/2 cup each: orange juice, lemon juice
2 tsps. olive oil
1/2 tsps. salt
Freshly ground pepper
Green paste:
2 serrano chilies, stemmed, seeded, optional
1 clove garlic
1/2 cup each, fresh: mint leaves, basil leaves
1/4 cup each, fresh: parsley leaves, cilantro leaves
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4 tsp. salt
Chili infusion:
6 dried cascabel chilies
1 clove garlic
1/4 cup olive oil
1/8 tsp. salt
Garnishes, optional:
Blue and white tortilla chips
4 strips orange zest
Cilantro, parsley, mint and basil leaves
1. For the ceviche, press or pound the fillet to flatten; chop into
small pieces. Place in a medium bowl or food-storage bag. Add
juices, olive oil, salt and pepper to taste; toss to coat fish.
Refrigerate at least 2 hours.
2. For the paste, combine the serrano chilies, garlic, herbs, olive
oil and salt in a blender; blend until it forms a paste, adding
water if necessary. Set aside.
3. For the infusion, place the cascabel chilies and garlic in a dry
skillet over medium-high heat; cook, stirring, until fragrant, about
1-2 minutes.
Place in a blender; add olive oil and salt. Blend until a paste
forms, adding more as necessary.
4. Put the ceviche in wine glasses. Top with 2 teaspoons of the
paste on one side and 1 teaspoon of the chili infusion on the other.
Garnish with tortilla chips, orange zest and herbs.
Nutrition information per serving:
542 calories; 60 percent of calories from fat; 37 grams fat; 5 grams
saturated fat; 30 mgrams cholesterol; 30 grams carbohydrates; 26
grams protein; 595 mgrams sodium; 13 grams fiber.
Mole negro with chicken and pork
Preparation time: 2 hours, 30 minutes
Cooking time: 1 hour, 30 minutes
Servings: 6
--This sauce recipe is adapted from Petra Gutierrez de Romero, whose
family operates a stall in La Merced market, selling chilies and
other dried goods. She has worked in the market for 30 years, and
also worked as a cook for 17 years. Serve this with warm tortillas.
Ingredients:
1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 small chicken, cut into pieces, 2 1/2-3 pounds
2 pounds pork country ribs, trimmed, separated
1 small ripe plantain, peeled, chopped
1/4 cup each: chopped peanuts, chopped almonds, raisins, packed
brown sugar
3 cups chicken broth
1 small corn tortilla
1 stick cinnamon
4 Maria cookies or vanilla wafers
1 concha-style bread roll or other yeast roll
2 Tbsps. chopped Mexican-style chocolate
1 tsp. ground pine nuts
4 to 8 dried ancho chilies
2 to 4 dried mulatto chilies
1 to 2 dried pasilla chilies
1. Heat a large dry skillet over low heat; cook the sesame seeds
until they are fragrant, about 3 minutes. Transfer to a small bowl.
Cover; set aside.
2. Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in the skillet over medium-high
heat; add the chicken. Cook, turning chicken occasionally, until
golden brown, about 3 minutes per side; transfer to a platter. Add
pork ribs to the skillet; cook, turning, until ribs are browned,
about 3 minutes each side. Transfer to the platter.
3. Add 3 tablespoons of the oil to the skillet. Add plantains; cook,
turning often, until golden, about 3 minutes. Transfer with a
slotted spoon to a large bowl; set aside. Repeat process, separately
cooking the peanuts, almonds, raisins and brown sugar, adding a bit
more oil as needed. Stir mixture together. Puree half of the mixture
in a blender with 1/2 cup of the broth. Pour through a strainer;
reserve liquid. Repeat with the remaining half of the mixture in a
blender and 1/2 cup of the chicken broth. Pour through a strainer;
reserve liquid. Set aside.
4. Process tortilla, cinnamon stick, cookies, roll, chocolate and
pine nuts together in the clean blender until crumbly; set aside.
5. Heat a small skillet over medium-high heat; add the ancho
chilies. Cook, stirring, until very fragrant, about 2 minutes;
transfer to a medium bowl. Repeat with mulatto and pasilla chilies.
Pour boiling water over cooked chilies to cover; set aside 30
minutes. Puree in a blender. Pour through a strainer into a Dutch
oven; discard solids.
6. Add remaining 2 cups of chicken broth to the Dutch oven. Heat
mixture to a boil over high heat; reduce heat to a simmer. Add the
chicken, pork, plaintain-nut mixture and tortilla mixture to the
Dutch oven; cook until pork is tender, about 2 hours. Set aside to
cool, about 20 minutes. Remove meat; shred meat with a fork. Stir
shredded meat into the sauce; pour into a serving bowl or platter.
Decorate with reserved sesame seeds.
Nutrition information per serving:
950 calories; 61 percent of calories from fat; 65 grams fat; 16
grams saturated fat; 159 mgrams cholesterol; 44 grams carbohydrates;
51 grams protein; 622 mgrams sodium; 7 grams fiber.
Cactus-paddle salad
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes
Servings: 4
Ingredients:
3/4 tsp. salt
4 medium fresh cactus paddles (nopales), trimmed, scraped, cut into
strips or 1 jar (12-15 ounces) cactus pieces, drained
1 large tomato, cored, diced
1 small onion, diced
6 cilantro sprigs, chopped
3 Tbsps. olive oil
1 Tbsp. balsamic or cider vinegar
1/8 tsp. each: oregano, salt
8 Romaine lettuce leaves
3 Tbsps. crumbled Mexican queso fresco or feta cheese
2 pickled jalapeno peppers, drained, sliced
8 radishes, thinly sliced
1. Heat 6 inches of water and 1/2 teaspoon of the salt to a boil in
a Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the cactus. Boil, uncovered,
until tender, about 20 minutes. Drain; transfer to a large bowl. Add
tomato, onion and cilantro; set aside.
2. Whisk together the oil, vinegar, oregano and salt; pour over the
vegetables. Toss to combine. Line a platter with lettuce leaves; top
with salad. Sprinkle with cheese; garnish with jalapenos and radish
slices.
Nutrition information per serving:
142 calories; 69 percent of calories from fat; 11 grams fat; 2 grams
saturated fat; 4 mgrams cholesterol; 8 grams carbohydrates; 3 grams
protein; 645 mgrams sodium; 3 grams fiber.
Sources
Ingredients:
Mexican markets and specialty stores located throughout Chicago and
the suburbs are the best source for authentic ingredients. In
addition, many supermarkets have expanded their Mexican-food aisles.
Online ingredient sources include:
Mexgrocer.com
Gourmetsleuth.com
Amazon.com
Cookbooks:
"Authentic Mexican," by Rick Bayless and Deann G. Bayless
"The Essential Cuisines of Mexico," by Diana Kennedy
"The Taste of Mexico" and "Mexico's Feasts of Life," by Patricia
Quintana.
Note: These books are out of print; used copies are available
through online booksellers such as barnesandnoble.com or
abebooks.com
Mexico City's rollicking marketplace mirrors the nation's history
By Hugh Dellios
Chicago Tribune
MEXICO CITY -- On her long trek across the city--first on the bus,
then in the subway--Alicia Bones de Enriquez passes all kinds of
markets where she could buy ingredients for the mole sauce her
family loves.
She passes the street markets that have checkered the metropolis
since pre-Aztec times and are still known by their indigenous name,
tianguis. She probably passes specialty markets, too, some of which
cater to fine European tastes.
Bones, 72, has a holiday meal in mind, and the expectations at home
are high. That's why she appears in front of the cascades of purple
chilies spilling from the stalls of La Merced, the cavernous,
chaotic central market that offers the richest selection of Mexico
City's spice and intrigue.
As the diableros, or handcart "devils," buzz around her, Bones
lovingly searches out the corner stall of second-generation chili
peddler Jose Juan Jimenez. She carefully selects from his eye-
watering ancho and guajillo chilies, then the smoky pasillas and
nearly black mulattos. She takes a scoop of sesame seeds from the
bin, and a cone of the sticky raw sugar called piloncillo.
The almonds and chocolate are waiting at home. So are the
grandchildren.
"The piloncillo and the chocolate are the most important," she says,
her husband Efren, 75, looking over her shoulder. "You have to know
how to dissolve it and add it right at the end for that smooth,
exquisite seasoning.
"It takes us two hours to get here and the trip is awful, but it's
worth the pain," Bones says. "Here you can choose, and you're sure
your mole will come out just right because of the quality you're
buying."
It's a trip that mole perfectionists and everyday cooks have been
making to the city center since pre-Colombian times, knowing they'll
find the best nopales (cactus leaves), huitlacoche (corn fungus) and
tamale-wrapping plantain leaves. Until just 50 years ago, it all
made its way into the city on gondolas up the Aztecs' water canals.
La Merced is perhaps the largest retail produce market in the world.
Inside are not only pyramids of carrots, mountains of cabbage and
chili peppers from all over the republic, but a video-game arcade,
telegraph office, two bank branches, a beauty salon, at least
one "witch's den" where tarot cards are read, and a subway stop
where passengers smell the onions underground and emerge upon a
stall full of crackly sheets of deep-fried pig skin, chicharron.
It takes 20 minutes to walk uninterrupted from one end to the other,
if you are able to keep walking. You pass red bananas next to yellow
bananas next to macho plantains that are ripe only when they are so
black they look rotten. Want a tomato? Then you'll have to know your
tomate from your tomatillo from your jitomate from your jitomate
bola.
You pass piles of dime-sized kernels of corn used in rich pozole
stew, and the occasional pile of deep-fried grasshoppers--15 pesos
per sardine-can scoop and popped into the mouth like peanuts. "I'll
give you two cans for 25!" barks one peddler dressed in her
indigenous attire from Oaxaca.
Five-foot statues of the Virgin of Guadalupe stand beneath gigantic
pinatas of Mr. Incredible. And the aromas are absolutely
mouthwatering. The delicate cilantro, the pungent guayaba and the
lethal arbol chilies are enough to turn a bag salesman into a poet.
"The nature of the fruit just absorbs you, even for those of us who
work here daily," said Eduardo "Lalo" Amaya, 58, who is known
as "the philosopher of La Merced" and who sells bags at
his "strategic" spot on the market's central aisle. "The smell is
indescribable. It traps you like love. You can't define it but you
feel it."
The people are just as colorful and varied. Some of the peddlers
have occupied the same 2-by-4-foot space every day for 40 years, and
inherited it from their parents before that.
The diableros come whizzing down the aisle with 30 boxes of tomatoes
on their carts and they're not stopping for anything.
Knives flash everywhere. Corn kernels are carved from cobs.
Mushrooms are diced. An army of workers scrape the spines from nopal
leaves, which arrive stacked up in barrellike formations wrapped in
canvas. Some men spend the whole day carving plantain leaves into
perfect squares to be wrapped around moist Oaxaca-style tamales.
"What I like most is the magic of seeing all the people working, how
they all are doing their part," said Patricia Quintana, a well-known
Mexican chef, cookbook author and owner of the city's Izote
restaurant.
Historic marketplace
In its fourth incarnation, the city's central market has had a long
history that parallels the history of Mexico and its dreams, its
modernization efforts and its great mestizo mix of European and
indigenous cultures and all their human and gastronomic expressions.
From the gourmet to the everyday, the market offers "something for
every pocket," as the Mexicans say. They clearly mark la primera
goods from la segunda, while the volume and movement of goods mean
the freshest produce comes in and departs just as quickly.
"It's a souk," said Luis Ignacio Sainz, administrative secretary of
the National Institute of Anthropology and History, who has written
books about La Merced and other markets.
"More than a market, it is the most authentic zone of cultural
intermixing in the city. It's very representative of Mexico. All the
good and the bad of our society is there."
While the tiangui street markets flourished in Aztec times, the
city's first central market after the Spanish conquest was outside
La Merced convent. At first, it was because the water canals passed
that way and the Spanish monks bought the best foods. But with time,
the peddlers set up shop there because they felt protected near the
walls of the convent.
Trouble brewed after the election of reformist President Benito
Juarez, who suspected the priests of conspiring against him. So he
made a public plaza out of the area, which lasted until the dictator
Porfirio Diaz restored the market to its full prominence just before
the advent of the 20th Century.
Later, the market was moved next to the National Palace on the
city's main plaza, and carried the La Merced name with it. Then it
moved to its current home in the Venustiano Carranza neighborhood in
1957, when the city regent decided it was too dirty and chaotic to
be that close to the seat of government.
"He didn't see the beauty of it," Sainz said. "He didn't see it as
part of the city's patrimony.
He only saw it as a relic."
Pockets of activity
Today La Merced is a complex that occupies several warehouses called
naves, a word also used for ships that ply the oceans or outer
space. One nave trades in produce, another cooked food, another
galvanized metal tools, another candy.
The commerce spills out the exits, where small stores and eateries
line the surrounding streets and take advantage of the masses
passing by. Big produce trucks line the curbs after their run in
from the citylike central supply warehouses established on the
eastern edge of town in 1982.
That's where the majority of La Merced's produce begins the day
after all-night truck journeys in from the provinces. Beginning at 3
a.m., many of La Merced's peddlers join the city's restaurateurs
there to select the freshest and best-priced goods.
For a foreigner, some of the market's products can be a bit scary.
Turn one corner and you find a stack of dried, stringy meat with a
sign above that says chito. The seller might try to tell you that
it's horse meat, but don't believe her. It's donkey, cooked and
eaten in guajillo sauce by those who can't afford horse meat.
Then there's the huitlacoche, a grayish, purplish fungus that grows
like a cancer on corncobs. Elsewhere it might be considered ghastly;
here it's a delicacy with a rich, smoky, mushroomy, not-quite-sweet
taste that garnishes many an omelet, quesadilla and, more recently,
ravioli in upscale restaurants.
"It doesn't look like much, but it's tasty," said Martin Alonso, 45,
a peddler with a knack for understatement who has been selling
onions and fungus since he was 15 from a spot where there's barely
enough room to turn around.
His other product is flor de calabasa, the golden-orange squash
blossoms that cooks stuff with white Oaxaca cheese. They sit next to
mounds of cilantro and epazote, the Mexican herbs that one always
associates with the best soups and ceviches.
"It [epazote] is one of Mexico's hidden spices," said Jordi Sales, a
well-traveled Spaniard who lives in Mexico City, knows the world's
markets and rarely settles for second-rate cuisine.
"You taste it, you like it, but you don't know where it comes from."
By far, the biggest spectacle in the market are the dried chilies.
The biggest challenge is knowing which has which taste, and which
will make your tongue forever regret you didn't know before biting
into it.
There are at least 40 varieties, typically stacked next to each
other in stalls with all the other ingredients for making mole: bins
of almonds, peanuts, pumpkin seeds, pistachios, sesame seeds and
cinnamon sticks. There, too, are the dried shrimp heads and the
whole oregano buds.
Here they say that every mole is different, whether to be served
with chicken, pork or turkey, and that every cook has her secret
special something that she slips inside.
"There are those who like to grind up the sesame inside, and there
are those who just like to sprinkle it on top," said Petra Gutierrez
de Romero, a peddler squeezed between a mound of guajillo peppers
and boxes of dried shrimp. "The most important is the almonds.
That's what gives it the flavor."
Today, in some stalls, buckets of prepared mole are sold. The
peddlers say it's for shoppers in a hurry, or a younger generation
that never learned how to make their own. That's understood, but
it's also frowned upon-like the little arbol chilies that have now
begun appearing in the market from China.
"It's the more demanding people who buy the real ingredients" said
Reyna Garcia, whose family has run the Casa Coronel stall for 30
years.
That's the case with Bones, who laments that her daughters don't
spend the time in the market and kitchen with her, but who says she
still hasn't given up hope.
"I do it out of love. I learned from my mom," she says, before
slipping off quietly for the two-hour ride home from La Merced. "I
enjoy the little compliments I get when my family is eating. That's
why I am more and more painstaking each time.
Green ceviche marinated in orange and lime with cascabel infusion
Preparation time: 20 minutes
Marinating time: 2 hours
Cooking time: 2 minutes
Servings: 4
--This recipe is the brainstorm of a young Mexican chef named Daniel
Bravo Garibi, who has worked at several restaurants in Mexico City.
Most recently he has been cooking on a ship for the Greenpeace
environmental group.
Ceviche (pronounced sah BEE chay):
3/4 pound red snapper fillets
1/2 cup each: orange juice, lemon juice
2 tsps. olive oil
1/2 tsps. salt
Freshly ground pepper
Green paste:
2 serrano chilies, stemmed, seeded, optional
1 clove garlic
1/2 cup each, fresh: mint leaves, basil leaves
1/4 cup each, fresh: parsley leaves, cilantro leaves
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4 tsp. salt
Chili infusion:
6 dried cascabel chilies
1 clove garlic
1/4 cup olive oil
1/8 tsp. salt
Garnishes, optional:
Blue and white tortilla chips
4 strips orange zest
Cilantro, parsley, mint and basil leaves
1. For the ceviche, press or pound the fillet to flatten; chop into
small pieces. Place in a medium bowl or food-storage bag. Add
juices, olive oil, salt and pepper to taste; toss to coat fish.
Refrigerate at least 2 hours.
2. For the paste, combine the serrano chilies, garlic, herbs, olive
oil and salt in a blender; blend until it forms a paste, adding
water if necessary. Set aside.
3. For the infusion, place the cascabel chilies and garlic in a dry
skillet over medium-high heat; cook, stirring, until fragrant, about
1-2 minutes.
Place in a blender; add olive oil and salt. Blend until a paste
forms, adding more as necessary.
4. Put the ceviche in wine glasses. Top with 2 teaspoons of the
paste on one side and 1 teaspoon of the chili infusion on the other.
Garnish with tortilla chips, orange zest and herbs.
Nutrition information per serving:
542 calories; 60 percent of calories from fat; 37 grams fat; 5 grams
saturated fat; 30 mgrams cholesterol; 30 grams carbohydrates; 26
grams protein; 595 mgrams sodium; 13 grams fiber.
Mole negro with chicken and pork
Preparation time: 2 hours, 30 minutes
Cooking time: 1 hour, 30 minutes
Servings: 6
--This sauce recipe is adapted from Petra Gutierrez de Romero, whose
family operates a stall in La Merced market, selling chilies and
other dried goods. She has worked in the market for 30 years, and
also worked as a cook for 17 years. Serve this with warm tortillas.
Ingredients:
1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 small chicken, cut into pieces, 2 1/2-3 pounds
2 pounds pork country ribs, trimmed, separated
1 small ripe plantain, peeled, chopped
1/4 cup each: chopped peanuts, chopped almonds, raisins, packed
brown sugar
3 cups chicken broth
1 small corn tortilla
1 stick cinnamon
4 Maria cookies or vanilla wafers
1 concha-style bread roll or other yeast roll
2 Tbsps. chopped Mexican-style chocolate
1 tsp. ground pine nuts
4 to 8 dried ancho chilies
2 to 4 dried mulatto chilies
1 to 2 dried pasilla chilies
1. Heat a large dry skillet over low heat; cook the sesame seeds
until they are fragrant, about 3 minutes. Transfer to a small bowl.
Cover; set aside.
2. Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in the skillet over medium-high
heat; add the chicken. Cook, turning chicken occasionally, until
golden brown, about 3 minutes per side; transfer to a platter. Add
pork ribs to the skillet; cook, turning, until ribs are browned,
about 3 minutes each side. Transfer to the platter.
3. Add 3 tablespoons of the oil to the skillet. Add plantains; cook,
turning often, until golden, about 3 minutes. Transfer with a
slotted spoon to a large bowl; set aside. Repeat process, separately
cooking the peanuts, almonds, raisins and brown sugar, adding a bit
more oil as needed. Stir mixture together. Puree half of the mixture
in a blender with 1/2 cup of the broth. Pour through a strainer;
reserve liquid. Repeat with the remaining half of the mixture in a
blender and 1/2 cup of the chicken broth. Pour through a strainer;
reserve liquid. Set aside.
4. Process tortilla, cinnamon stick, cookies, roll, chocolate and
pine nuts together in the clean blender until crumbly; set aside.
5. Heat a small skillet over medium-high heat; add the ancho
chilies. Cook, stirring, until very fragrant, about 2 minutes;
transfer to a medium bowl. Repeat with mulatto and pasilla chilies.
Pour boiling water over cooked chilies to cover; set aside 30
minutes. Puree in a blender. Pour through a strainer into a Dutch
oven; discard solids.
6. Add remaining 2 cups of chicken broth to the Dutch oven. Heat
mixture to a boil over high heat; reduce heat to a simmer. Add the
chicken, pork, plaintain-nut mixture and tortilla mixture to the
Dutch oven; cook until pork is tender, about 2 hours. Set aside to
cool, about 20 minutes. Remove meat; shred meat with a fork. Stir
shredded meat into the sauce; pour into a serving bowl or platter.
Decorate with reserved sesame seeds.
Nutrition information per serving:
950 calories; 61 percent of calories from fat; 65 grams fat; 16
grams saturated fat; 159 mgrams cholesterol; 44 grams carbohydrates;
51 grams protein; 622 mgrams sodium; 7 grams fiber.
Cactus-paddle salad
Preparation time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes
Servings: 4
Ingredients:
3/4 tsp. salt
4 medium fresh cactus paddles (nopales), trimmed, scraped, cut into
strips or 1 jar (12-15 ounces) cactus pieces, drained
1 large tomato, cored, diced
1 small onion, diced
6 cilantro sprigs, chopped
3 Tbsps. olive oil
1 Tbsp. balsamic or cider vinegar
1/8 tsp. each: oregano, salt
8 Romaine lettuce leaves
3 Tbsps. crumbled Mexican queso fresco or feta cheese
2 pickled jalapeno peppers, drained, sliced
8 radishes, thinly sliced
1. Heat 6 inches of water and 1/2 teaspoon of the salt to a boil in
a Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add the cactus. Boil, uncovered,
until tender, about 20 minutes. Drain; transfer to a large bowl. Add
tomato, onion and cilantro; set aside.
2. Whisk together the oil, vinegar, oregano and salt; pour over the
vegetables. Toss to combine. Line a platter with lettuce leaves; top
with salad. Sprinkle with cheese; garnish with jalapenos and radish
slices.
Nutrition information per serving:
142 calories; 69 percent of calories from fat; 11 grams fat; 2 grams
saturated fat; 4 mgrams cholesterol; 8 grams carbohydrates; 3 grams
protein; 645 mgrams sodium; 3 grams fiber.
Sources
Ingredients:
Mexican markets and specialty stores located throughout Chicago and
the suburbs are the best source for authentic ingredients. In
addition, many supermarkets have expanded their Mexican-food aisles.
Online ingredient sources include:
Mexgrocer.com
Gourmetsleuth.com
Amazon.com
Cookbooks:
"Authentic Mexican," by Rick Bayless and Deann G. Bayless
"The Essential Cuisines of Mexico," by Diana Kennedy
"The Taste of Mexico" and "Mexico's Feasts of Life," by Patricia
Quintana.
Note: These books are out of print; used copies are available
through online booksellers such as barnesandnoble.com or
abebooks.com