It was a rainy weekend here in North Carolina. Not so much the rain-all-day sort of rain, but more like the sporadic-unpredictable-downpour sort of rain that leaves you unable to make any reliable plans for outdoor activities. Fortunately, I had big plans for doing some Mexican cooking. Inspired by the recent Cinco de Mayo holiday, the Food Network show, "Mexican Made Easy" with Marcela Valladolid, and the Mexican-inspired Fiesta last weekend, I couldn't wait to try out some new recipes.
Over the years, I've found cooking new recipes to be a great source of cheap entertainment. It's an opportunity to be creative, learn new skills, gain insight into another culture, and spend time with friends. And at the end of the night, you've got a tangible product that provides a sense of accomplishment and can be shared with others.
As I mention above, Marcela Valladolid's show was one of my inspirations for this weekend's cooking activities, and her website is where I found my recipes. A link to her page can be found here: Mexican Made Easy. Links to the individual recipes are provided below.
On Saturday night, I set out to prepare Chicken Enchiladas with tomatillo salsa. While I do a lot of "Mexican" cooking (eg., fajitas, tacos a la Americana, etc.), I rarely follow a recipes or make anything that could truly qualify as authentically Mexican. This recipe, however, most definitely qualified as authentic. My first clue that this recipe was going to be amazing were the Tomatillos. If you aren't exactly sure what a tomatillo is (and I certainly wasn't), it's definitely worth clicking on the link to check out the Wikipedia page. Interesting little fruit, the tomatillo. Sure, you could simplify things and call it a green tomato, but a quick realization of the fact that it has a husk is likely to make you think otherwise. I had seen them on display on recent trips to my local grocer and their unusual appearance had piqued my curiosity, so I was excited to finally have a reason to buy a few.
After steaming the tomatillos, onion and serrano pepper in a shallow pot of water, they all went in the blender along with a couple cloves of garlic and fresh cilantro from my patio garden (which has been doing very well, considering it's still early in the season). Within seconds I had a beautiful green salsa that was noticeably fresher (and rightly so!) than the canned version at the supermarket. This salsa would go great with any number of dishes, and it was super easy to make (no chopping required!). Shopping tip: Food Lion (for North Carolina folks) has great prices on produce - way better than Harris Teeter or Whole Foods, and in my experience, they've always been exceptionally fresh. If you're worried you'll have trouble finding Mexican-specific ingredients at your local supermarket, try shopping at a store in a neighborhood with a high concentration of Latinos. Even the larger chains will tailor their inventory to the local shoppers, making it more likely you'll find those tomatillos!
Having prepared the sauce for the enchiladas, it was time to roll up the chicken into tastily fried corn tortillas. The recipe had called for rotisserie chicken, but I substituted some good ole' Bojangles fried chicken breast (meat plucked from the bones, skin removed). At 9pm on a Saturday night, it was the quickest solution we could find, and it worked out great. Top it all off with some Mexican cream (which is literally what its sold as in the store), a little more cheese, and you're on your way to a delicious, authentic, home-cooked Mexican meal.
To get a head start on the brunch I had planned for Sunday morning, I gathered all my ingredients to make Mom's Homemade Granola, most of which I bought from Whole Foods. While it can get pricey to do all your shopping at Whole Foods, they actually have great prices on certain staple food items, which are sold under their in-house label, 365 Everyday Value®. Along with their great selection of bulk spices, they also have lots of other bulk products. If you've never bought in bulk, it's a great way to buy items when you only need an exact amount (eg., 2 cups of oats, nothing more, nothing less), or if you're buying something for a recipe that you would otherwise never have any use for (this didn't apply for this recipe, but the past example that comes to mind is crystallized ginger, which I used to make a cranberry relish at Thanksgiving).
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| Honey, Vanilla, Butter, Cranberries, Oats, Almonds, Brown Sugar, Cinnamon |
The recipe was super easy to throw together, and quick too. So far I was having really excellent luck with this whole new Mexican cooking adventure, so maybe it was inevitable that something would go wrong. About 15 minutes in to the 20-25 recommended cooking time, I peeked in the oven to take a few photos.
Things were looking a little toasty, but I just figured that was how it was supposed to look. After all, this was my first time making granola, and I was well within the prescribed time frame (and temperature). Well, something was obviously off with the instructions or the manner in which I executed them, because a few minutes later I took the granola out of the oven, and the finished product looked like this:
Not edible. Although I kept trying to convince myself that it was, even to the point of serving it at brunch the next day (at which point it was confirmed to be inedible). Feeling the need for immediate redemption for the early failures in my granola making career (and thankful for the fact that I still had extra ingredients leftover), I attempted the recipe again on Sunday morning (after brunch), and TOTALLY redeemed myself (important note: cooking time should be more like 10 minutes!!!). The second batch came out looking much better than the first, and after sampling it numerous times this afternoon, I can confirm that it is delicious! What an
amazing (and easy) recipe for a healthy snack:
For my Sunday brunch menu, I always like to have something sweet and something salty. Normally this translates into store-bought cinnamon rolls and bacon. But since this was a special Mexican brunch, the menu consisted of granola (well, sorta), served with vanilla yogurt and fresh North Carolina strawberries for the sweet, and Chorizo Hash Browns for the salty.
Chorizo is another one of those typical Mexican ingredient that I have always been curious about, but never really had a reason to cook with. Knowing this might be a tough ingredient to find in my local supermarket, I first stopped by my local Mexican market to see if they carried it. Sadly, the carnicería (butcher shop) was no longer there. The butcher at Whole Foods normally carries it (so I'm told), but they didn't have any when I stopped in (the butcher offered the pre-cooked, pre-packaged version instead, which is NOT what you want; it needs to be the raw kind). Fortunately, my local Food Lion carried the Johnsonville version of Chorizo, which was totally sufficient for my purposes.
The method of preparing the hash browns was new to me, so I was pleased to learn something new that I could use for future hash brown making attempts, with or without chorizo. After grating the potatoes, the potato shreads are rinsed and and dried in a towel. This really does make perfect sense, considering the watery, milky nature of fresh cut potatos, but I had never really put the whole process together before. Also aiding in the congelation of the hashbrowns, is a little flour and egg (again, why didn't I ever think of that?).
The finished product was mighty tasty, even without adding salt and pepper (the chorizo is packed with flavor). Definitely not the most healthy thing I had all week, but a great Sunday morning treat!
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| Chorizo Hash Browns |
