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June 05, 2007 02:43 pm
Simple Ingredients made brilliant
Mexican food made from scratch is both elegant and accessible.
By Jeff Walker
CNHI News Service
SAN MARCOS, Texas — Very soon after moving to Central Texas, as I enjoyed my first chorizo taco, my first authentic enchiladas suizas and my first tomatillo-based green sauce, Mexican food to me took on a whole new meaning.
It was no longer just a pick-and-choose-your-own combo platter at some fabricated Tex-Mex venue.
The real cuisine became a curious fascination.
Visiting local establishments, I began to appreciate the vibrant colors of the food, the multitude of chiles that most any dish was laced with and the magic of simple ingredients made brilliant.
But I had never cooked it. At least, not the right way.
Short of dumping some pre-made, under-spiced and over-salted sauce from the grocery store over a pile of cheese-filled corn tortillas, preparing Mexican food seemed too daunting and too time consuming for this want-to-be cook.
But the crisp, sweet and spicy taste of a freshly made green sauce kept this potential meal in my mind. And recently, I blocked off a weekend, invited a few friends and decided to make it happen.
Flipping through the pages of “Rosa’s New Mexican Table,” an in-depth resource for the techniques and ingredients involved with Mexican food, I discovered that this cuisine isn’t as unhealthy as most people perceive. There is little butter used, very little cream (though my specific recipe was doused with it), no flour-based sauces and a heavy emphasis on vegetable purees.
And while the meal was time consuming — I was up well after 2 a.m. simmering black beans, popping in “Exile on Main St.” to keep my adrenaline up — nothing was too complex. The handiest gadget in the whole process was a simple blender.
I prepared my sides the night before the dinner party, beginning with arrozo adobado (red rice), a brick-colored rice with a hefty chili arbol kick. I followed by preparing soupy black beans, accented by epazote stalks and a large jalapeno. By preparing black beans from scratch, I avoided the unappetizing grey color and the musty, funky flavor that typically results from a can.
It took a lot of time, but the payoff was worth it.
Using a cooked green salsa as a base, I then went to work on a plate of enchiladas suizas. The green sauce was created by blending boiled tomatillos, garlic, cumin and jalapenos together in a jar and then simmering.
From there, I added heavy cream and poblanos to the mixture for a thickened, hearty green sauce that drenched my enchiladas in absolute goodness.
To fill and roll tortillas, imagine a line dividing each tortilla horizontally in half. Spread the filling evenly over the bottom half of the tortilla. Fold the bottom edge of the tortilla up over the filling, then roll up the tortilla.
By the time the guests arrived and the margaritas were poured, the food was prepared with the kind of simple elegance that makes Mexican food so accessible to us all. The cuisine is unpretentious, but the chiles and sauces and spices can make it simultaneously unpredictable.
Jeff Walker writes for San Marcos (Texas) Daily Record.
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