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What else do you all serve with your Christmas tamales. Are there other
traditional sides dishes that are served with them. |
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![]() Rhonda wrote: > What else do you all serve with your Christmas tamales. Are there other > traditional sides dishes that are served with them. One is Mexican Hot Chocolate. Look he http://rollybrook.com/champurrado.htm |
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![]() Rhonda wrote: > What else do you all serve with your Christmas tamales. Are there other > traditional sides dishes that are served with them. Enchiladas and chiles rellenos and Mexican rice and refried beans and tortillas? Omigawd, Rhonda, you're all screwed up in your notions of what a Mexican Christmas dinner might consist of, if it was served to a Mexican family who weren't peasants on welfare. Tamales are classed as "antojitos", which is Spanish for "little whim", or "trifle". You can take a tamale, peel off the corn husk, and eat it out of hand. You don't need to serve *anything* with a tamale, you just eat it casually, without ceremony. They stick together better when they are cold. If you make too many tamales, you can sell them for $0.75 each in front of Wal*Mart, if the other Mexican women don't get there first, with *their* tamales. When I was a kid, we never had to make our own tamales, the Mexicans next door always gave us their extra tamales and we ate them out of hand. Tacos of all descriptions, enchiladas, empanadas, taquitos, etc., are also antojitos. Antojitos are fiesta food, snacks, or appetizers to be served while the real main course is cooking. Antojitos are something to be given to the children to quiet their demands for food while a steer or a pig is roasting. Antojitos are something the guy with the push cart sells to people watching the religious statues being paraded from the church on a saint's day. But Americans have been fooled into thinking that tamales, tacos, enchiladas, taquitos and other antojitos are an *entree*, something that a Mexican meal is built around. So they go into a taqueria that calls itself a "Mexican restaurant" and they read the menu on the wall, they order a #10 combination plate, and they have *no idea* that a "combination plate" is a gut busting, intestinal gas producing assortment of what are basically hors d'oeuvres! A prosperous Mexican would never fill up on antojitos, any more than you would make a meal of the crudites and hors d'oeurves served before a dinner party! A real Mexican Christmas dinner served in a prosperous home would start with a salad, which would be followed by a wet sopa (soup), a dry sopa (pasta), one hearty main dish of fish, fowl, or meat (tamales are NOT a main dish!) or two smaller main courses, with various vegetables on the side, a postre (dessert), then the gentlemen would retire to coffee, brandy, and cigars in another room. A sopa made with rice can be a dry sopa or a wet sopa, the rice sopa gets wetter the further south you travel in Mexico. And the refried beans are brown in the north of Mexico, while they are made with black beans in the south. I told my Mexican friend (a huero, who works as a makeup artist in Hollywood) that I like refried black beans, and he called them "caca de coyote"... |
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Thanks for clearing that up for me. I knew there had to be more than
just tamales. I guess I was "screwed" up on that one. I loved your response. Your answers are always so detailed and I learn allot from you. Now I know what to do with those wonderful tamales I have learned to make. Oh, I don't sell my leftovers at Walmart, they freeze well and make great snacks for me and the children far beyond Christmas. I just put them in a zip lock bag and pull them out and reheat them as needed. The corn husks wrapped around the tamales seems to prevent them from freezer burn, since they last for many months. |
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Thanks Rolly. I plan on trying this Mexican Hot Chocolate this year
with the tamales. |
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![]() Rhonda wrote: > Now I know what to do with those wonderful tamales I have learned > to make. Oh, I don't sell my leftovers at Walmart, they freeze well and > make great snacks for me and the children far beyond Christmas. I just > put them in a zip lock bag and pull them out and reheat them as needed. > The corn husks wrapped around the tamales seems to prevent them from > freezer burn, since they last for many months. Yes, tamales can be eaten cold, or heated and eaten in any season. If you want to eat them out of hand like a candy bar, that's perfectly OK, the traditional homemade steamed tamale is inherently portable. Or you can eat it off a plate with other antojitos and you can drizzle your favorite mole over the tamale to give it a lot more zest. Americans, having grown accustomed to taquerias masquerading as ristorantes have come to expect brown mole on their tamales. The majority of Americans, if they know what a "mole" is, tend to think that there are chicken moles and pork moles, but that's a total misconcept. A mole is a thick chile sauce with chiles and garlic and cilantro and sesame seeds or pumpkin seeds or whatever "secret" ingredients grandma used to add to make an "heirloom" recipe mole. The secret ingredients generally add *texture* to the mole. There are at least eight different traditional moles made in the Mexican state of Oaxaca, and they are defined by their *color*, not by the meat or fowl that is covered by the mole. One of the better known moles is Mole Poblano, which is the traditional brown mole of Pueblo. It has chocolate and sesame seeds in it for crunchiness. Americans who have vaguely heard of Mole Poblano tend to think that it is only made with turkey and eaten only at Christmas, but you can eat it anytime you want, and you can apply the mole to whatever meat or fowl you desire. The color of the mole is determined by whatever vegetable is added to the chiles. Tomatos make a red mole, tomatillos make a brown mole. Green vegetables make a green mole, yellow vegetables make a yellow mole. I suppose you could make an orange mole out of carrots if you wanted. When you get some store bought moles (like Dona Maria) in a jar, they're concentrated and a little goes a long way. You have to add water. Other commercial moles (like Knorr's) aren't concentrated, and you can just pour them over your meat or fowl after it's cooked. Or you can stew your meat or fowl in the mole. Or you can seal the juices in by searing the meat or fowl and then *finish* the crispy morsels in the packaged mole. Pan fried chicken pieces with Knorr's chipotle mole poured over them are satisfyingly juicy and crunchy. |
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Thank you so much for this information. You have really sparked my
interest now. I will try some of the purchased moles and even try cooking some of my own. The pumpkin seeds and sesame seeds sound like great additions to moles. The use of moles with meats has me intrigued as well. The fried chicken with the Knorr chipoltle mole is a good thing for me to try to get me started in that direction. |
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![]() "The Galloping Gourmand" > wrote in message oups.com... > > Rhonda wrote: >> Now I know what to do with those wonderful tamales I have learned >> to make. Oh, I don't sell my leftovers at Walmart, they freeze well and >> make great snacks for me and the children far beyond Christmas. I just >> put them in a zip lock bag and pull them out and reheat them as needed. >> The corn husks wrapped around the tamales seems to prevent them from >> freezer burn, since they last for many months. > > Yes, tamales can be eaten cold, or heated and eaten in any season. If > you want to eat them out of hand like a candy bar, that's perfectly OK, > the traditional homemade steamed tamale is inherently portable. > > Or you can eat it off a plate with other antojitos and you can drizzle > your favorite mole over the tamale to give it a lot more zest. > > Americans, having grown accustomed to taquerias masquerading as > ristorantes have come to expect brown mole on their tamales. > > The majority of Americans, if they know what a "mole" is, tend to think > that there are chicken moles and pork moles, but that's a total > misconcept. > > A mole is a thick chile sauce with chiles and garlic and cilantro and > sesame seeds or pumpkin seeds or whatever "secret" ingredients grandma > used to add to make an "heirloom" recipe mole. > > The secret ingredients generally add *texture* to the mole. > > There are at least eight different traditional moles made in the > Mexican state of Oaxaca, and they are defined by their *color*, not by > the meat or fowl that is covered by the mole. > > One of the better known moles is Mole Poblano, which is the traditional > brown mole of Pueblo. It has chocolate and sesame seeds in it for > crunchiness. > > Americans who have vaguely heard of Mole Poblano tend to think that it > is only made with turkey and eaten only at Christmas, but you can eat > it anytime you want, and you can apply the mole to whatever meat or > fowl you desire. > > The color of the mole is determined by whatever vegetable is added to > the chiles. Tomatos make a red mole, tomatillos make a brown mole. > Green vegetables make a green mole, yellow vegetables make a yellow > mole. > > I suppose you could make an orange mole out of carrots if you wanted. > > When you get some store bought moles (like Dona Maria) in a jar, > they're concentrated and a little goes a long way. You have to add > water. > > Other commercial moles (like Knorr's) aren't concentrated, and you can > just pour them over your meat or fowl after it's cooked. > > Or you can stew your meat or fowl in the mole. > > Or you can seal the juices in by searing the meat or fowl and then > *finish* the crispy morsels in the packaged mole. > > Pan fried chicken pieces with Knorr's chipotle mole poured over them > are satisfyingly juicy and crunchy. Rachel Laudan has an interesting perspective on this: http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issu...connection.htm and as I understand there are Mole that do not use nuts as a textural component. now a question, In the vernacular, wouldn't the dish we know as Chili, a spiced meat dish, be a mole or in SouthWest Asia, a curry? |
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![]() "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote in message .. cut for brevity... > and as I understand there are Mole that do not use nuts as a textural > component. > > now a question, In the vernacular, wouldn't the dish we know as Chili, a > spiced meat dish, be a mole or in SouthWest Asia, a curry? > One of our favorite subjects for discussion is the difference between Tex-Mex, Mexican, and other world recipes using chile. We know San Antonio is where Texas chili was born, with the chile-girls selling their tasty morsels in the central plaza back when the West was the West. And we know that Birria in Guadalajara resembles Texas chili with the main difference being goat instead of beef, and few of us equate mole with anything but mole because it is unique in the world. Mole in it's purest uses the oldest turkey in the flock to stew in the sauce for at least two days. The sauce itself is made of a dozen different dried chile pods, peanuts, chocolate, sesame seed, pumpkin seeds and a list as long as your aunt's foreleg for the rest of the spices and condiments such as tomato, onion, and the rest. But not cumin!!! No cumin in south of the border Mexican food please. |
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![]() Wayne Lundberg wrote: > Mole in it's purest uses the oldest turkey in the flock to stew in the sauce for at > least two days. Mexican cooking evolved without the benefit of refrigeration, and whatever meats were used weren't hung to allow them to tenderize. Whatever animal went into the stew was usually cooked the same day as it was slaughtered to avoid spoilage. Mexican meats and fowl tend to be of lower quality and not as tender as what Americans would expect to find on saran-wrapped styrofoam trays in their local supermarket. Mexicans tend to cook their meat and poultry longer than Americans would. Chile sauces and moles cover up any gamy flavors. > The sauce itself is made of a dozen different dried chile pods, peanuts, chocolate, > sesame seed, pumpkin seeds and a list as long as your aunt's foreleg for the > rest of the spices and condiments such as tomato, onion, and the rest. I made a mole with ancho or pasilla chiles, garlic, onion, cilantro, peanut butter, and an ounce of instant chicken bullion that contained monosodium glutamate. It was awesomely delicious, and I haven't tried making the same mole without the MSG to see if it's as delightful. Stweing chicken in chicken broth is an excellent trick to preserve and enhance the flavor of the bird. > But not cumin!!! No cumin in south of the border Mexican food please. I'm north of the border, and I grew up enjoying pinto beans and ham hocks with fresh flour tortillas made by my Mexican neighbors. Cumin gives the pinto beans that special flavor of my childhood, so I use cumin when I cook beans. |
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Thank you Gunner. That was very interesting.
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![]() Gunner wrote: > Rachel Laudan has an interesting perspective on this: > http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issu...connection.htm That was a worthwhile read which just begins to explain some of the mysterious foods that are beginning to appear in American supermarkets as the Mexican population of California increases. > now a question, In the vernacular, wouldn't the dish we know as Chili, a > spiced meat dish, be a mole or in SouthWest Asia, a curry? I think Rachel Laudan's article would tend to support your thesis. The spicy sauces of those three dishes would be made from ground peppers. |
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![]() "Wayne Lundberg" > wrote in message ... > > "Gunner" <gunner@ spam.com> wrote in message > .. > > cut for brevity... > >> and as I understand there are Mole that do not use nuts as a textural >> component. >> >> now a question, In the vernacular, wouldn't the dish we know as Chili, a >> spiced meat dish, be a mole or in SouthWest Asia, a curry? >> > One of our favorite subjects for discussion is the difference between > Tex-Mex, Mexican, and other world recipes using chile. We know San Antonio > is where Texas chili was born, with the chile-girls selling their tasty > morsels in the central plaza back when the West was the West. And we know > that Birria in Guadalajara resembles Texas chili with the main difference > being goat instead of beef, and few of us equate mole with anything but > mole > because it is unique in the world. Mole in it's purest uses the oldest > turkey in the flock to stew in the sauce for at least two days. The sauce > itself is made of a dozen different dried chile pods, peanuts, chocolate, > sesame seed, pumpkin seeds and a list as long as your aunt's foreleg for > the > rest of the spices and condiments such as tomato, onion, and the rest. But > not cumin!!! No cumin in south of the border Mexican food please. Why no cumin? I see it in cook books authored in Mexico by Mexicans all the time. It's safe to say that many Sopas contain camino seed, as well as other meat and vegetable dishes. Maybe there was no cumin in recipes before the Spanish conquest, but that would make them native foods, not Mexican. Consider that Pasta was not a part of italian cooking until fairly recent, as well as tomatos. That does not mean Pasta and Tomatos are not in Italian food. |
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The Galloping Gourmand wrote:
> Rhonda wrote: >> What else do you all serve with your Christmas tamales. Are there other >> traditional sides dishes that are served with them. > > Omigawd, Rhonda, you're all screwed up in your notions of what a > Mexican Christmas dinner might consist of, if it was served to a > Mexican family who weren't peasants on welfare. > > Tamales are classed as "antojitos", which is Spanish for "little whim", > or "trifle". Well, when I was in Guatemala, I was told that at Christmas tamales were an essential and important part of the big meal, not an appetizer or joke. Just like, for example, black-eyed peas in Texas. Our fancy Christmas dinner had several different kinds. Doug McDonald |
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![]() Doug McDonald wrote: > The Galloping Gourmand wrote: > > Tamales are classed as "antojitos", which is Spanish for "little whim", > > or "trifle". > > Well, when I was in Guatemala, I was told that at Christmas > tamales were an essential and important part of the big > meal, not an appetizer or joke. Did you ever see that "Married With Children" episode, where the kids were ecstatic about being served vienna sausages, because it reminded them of when they were broke and living in their car with their mother? When you're "running on empty", anything you can get to eat tastes wonderful. Family traditions and memories of the times when families were together are wrapped around food, and sometimes that food was poverty food. If tamales and frijoles are all a family can afford for Christmas dinner during hard times, they are going to have tamales every Christmas to remind them of what kept them together. As I explained elsewhere, tamales and tacos and burritos are *antojitos*, and an antojito is a whim, it's a dish that is cheap and easy to prepare (unless you have delusions of authenticity, and want to grow and harvest and grind and nixtamalize your own corn). It takes me an hour to make all the tamales I can stand to eat, once a year. But, I have a modern kitchen and use commercial masa to make a huge tamale casserole in the microwave. I'm not trying to *sell* my tamales on the street corner to make extra Christmas money, so a tamale casserole works just fine. Fifteen minutes on high in the microwave, then let it steam itself for 45 minutes and it's ready to eat. You can't tell any difference from a corn husk-wrapped individual tamale. This site has an extensive listing of all the antojitos imaginable: http://www.lomexicano.com/mexicanfoodrecipeglossary.htm The reason that I dwell on the antojito topic, is that this group is stuck in The Great Taco Swamp. It's mired so deeply down in antojitos, nobody ever offers any recipes or discussion of anything that isn't an antojito. If they talk about a Mexican "restaurant", it's usually a glorified taco stand. And, with the large numbers of impoverished immigrants from Mexico and Central America bringing their own poverty cooking with them, Americans are tending more and more to believe that Mexico cooking is all about tacos. When I was on Cozumel island, our group was looking around for a decent Mexican resturant that served authentic regional specialties. The other tourists were thinking that any Mexican restaurant was going to be just another taco joint, and I was trying to tell them that there was more to Mexican cooking than just tacos. So the other tourists asked the pimply-faced young Mexican tour guide what the heck Mexicans ate. And the guide said, "Oh, we eat a lot of tacos." Naturally, he ate a lot of tacos. He was an impoverished Mexican, struggling to make a living off the generosity of the tourists. He was all, "Si, si, señor." And his hand was always ready for the tip, so he told tourists what they wanted to hear. "Oh, si, señores y señoras. This way to the tacos, por favor...." The restaurant we finally settled on did have regional specialties. I enjoyed my cochinita pibil, while the rest of the tourists chewed on sad-looking tacos... |
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![]() The Galloping Gourmand wrote: > > The restaurant we finally settled on did have regional specialties. I > enjoyed my cochinita pibil, while the rest of the tourists chewed on > sad-looking tacos.. So, what do you eat for breakfast in Mexico? I know my favorites... just interested in other's regional breakfast treats. Hopefully, it's not Huevos Rancheros! Somehow, I doubt it... not trying to insult you. Jack |
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![]() Jack Tyler wrote: > So, what do you eat for breakfast in Mexico? I know my favorites... > just interested in other's regional breakfast treats. Hopefully, it's > not Huevos Rancheros! Somehow, I doubt it... not trying to insult you. Well, I've certainly eaten Huevos Rancheros many times. That offering is ubiquitous on Mexican breakfast menus for gringos. The tortilla base is not my favorite part of the dish. But I eat it anyway. I eat Huevos Mexicanos in local restaurants, and often make Huevos Revueltos con Chili at home. I did a websearch for "tipicos desayunos mexicanos" -rancheros and found out that ordinary Mexicans eat tamales and atole for breakfast, or have chilaquiles or molletes, or maybe have hot chocolate with a churro to get going in the morning. And, I'm not knocking the Mexicans for eating something quick and inexpensive for breakfast, that's the nature of the meal. One has to consider the upscale restaurateur's decision whether or not to cater to the breakfast trade. The customer who has spent $50 on his meal the night before may be stingy about parting with $5.00 for his breakfast, and he may not feel as adventurous about trying something unfamiliar that might add to his gastrointestinal burden. Short order cooks and waiters and busboys hate the breakfast crowd, they have to bust their ass to get the job done, and the guy who was throwing money around last night is stingy about tipping in the morning. Upscale restaurants don't even *try* to cater to the breakfast trade, they are closed until just before the lunch crowd shows up for antojitos and cerveza. I usually eat breakfast at whatever tourist hotel I'm staying at, where the menu offers the American Bing Crosby breakfast of bacon-and-eggs or ham-and-eggs accompanied with *Florida* orange juice ( AKA "western breakfast") or I eat on the cruise ship, where the breakfast menu does tend to be a little better than the average tourist hotel. I can have kippered herring or prosciutto with melon and an assortment of fresh tropical fruit on board the ship, so why go poking around little Mexican joints early in the AM and settling for "que hay?" When I stayed in Merida and Cancun, I remember eating Huevos Motulenos and I had something called Huevos Albaniles in Acapulco. When I ate in tourist hotels in Cancun, I remember cursing at the inability of the Mexicans to make a crispy slice of toast. Their version of "toast" is something called "pan dorado" which is still moist inside, and doesn't dunk in egg yolk very well. |
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![]() The Galloping Gourmand wrote: > When I stayed in Merida and Cancun, I remember eating Huevos Motulenos > and I had something called Huevos Albaniles in Acapulco. > > When I ate in tourist hotels in Cancun, I remember cursing at the > inability of the Mexicans to make a crispy slice of toast. Their > version of "toast" is something called "pan dorado" which is still > moist inside, and doesn't dunk in egg yolk very well. Week before last, I was at the Ritz-Carlton in Cancun. Breakfast buffet with a bottle of water to take back to the room is $45.00 (most good hotels don't supply free bottled water anymore, as their water is filtered. I still drink bottled water, though.). You can imagine what dinner costs there. Huevos Motulenos is (are) my favorite breakfast dish in Mexico. The dish has become popular across the country, instead of just the area around Motul. Jack |
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Per prior partially-stated post below, might the original poster be willing
to share the name of the restaurant found in Cancun serving 'cochinita pibil?' Or maybe that's standard fare? My first visit to Cancun is next month, would appreciate any direction. Thanks! The Galloping Gourmand" > wrote in message oups.com... When I was on Cozumel island, our group was looking around for a decent Mexican resturant that served authentic regional specialties. The other tourists were thinking that any Mexican restaurant was going to be just another taco joint, and I was trying to tell them that there was more to Mexican cooking than just tacos. So the other tourists asked the pimply-faced young Mexican tour guide what the heck Mexicans ate. And the guide said, "Oh, we eat a lot of tacos." Naturally, he ate a lot of tacos. He was an impoverished Mexican, struggling to make a living off the generosity of the tourists. He was all, "Si, si, señor." And his hand was always ready for the tip, so he told tourists what they wanted to hear. "Oh, si, señores y señoras. This way to the tacos, por favor...." The restaurant we finally settled on did have regional specialties. I enjoyed my cochinita pibil, while the rest of the tourists chewed on sad-looking tacos... |
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![]() "Jack Tyler" > wrote in message oups.com... > > The Galloping Gourmand wrote: >> When I stayed in Merida and Cancun, I remember eating Huevos Motulenos >> and I had something called Huevos Albaniles in Acapulco. >> >> When I ate in tourist hotels in Cancun, I remember cursing at the >> inability of the Mexicans to make a crispy slice of toast. Their >> version of "toast" is something called "pan dorado" which is still >> moist inside, and doesn't dunk in egg yolk very well. > > Week before last, I was at the Ritz-Carlton in Cancun. Breakfast > buffet with a bottle of water to take back to the room is $45.00 (most > good hotels don't supply free bottled water anymore, as their water is > filtered. I still drink bottled water, though.). You can imagine what > dinner costs there. > > Huevos Motulenos is (are) my favorite breakfast dish in Mexico. The > dish has become popular across the country, instead of just the area > around Motul. > > Jack Other than England and the US I have not found many countries where Breakfast is a big meal or a big deal. 45$ for a R/C breakfast in Mexico, wow!, recent headlines had the median entree hit $40 here in the US. Sure put a perspective on the saying "Putting on the Ritz" Jack, I am curious are you comp'd in this travel business of yours? |
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![]() Gunner wrote: > Jack, I am curious are you comp'd in this travel business of yours? Much of the time. I publish a travel magazine. www.MexicoTravelAndLife.com I also pay for a lot of my travel... but there are always "fam" trips paid for by Mexican states, cities, resorts and airlines. I fact, there are more than I have time to go on. Jack |
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![]() DaveTwo wrote: > Maybe there was no cumin in recipes before the Spanish conquest, but that > would make them native foods, not Mexican. Consider that Pasta was not a > part of italian cooking until fairly recent, as well as tomatos. That does > not mean Pasta and Tomatos are not in Italian food. I would beg to differ with the statement that food of the native (Maya, Toltec, Aztec) is not Mexican food. If anything, that food left behind by conquering visitors is Spanish, or French. The food that was cooked and eaten by the Indian natives of Mexico is true Mexican food. As far as cumin is concerned, the equivalent of it in native Mexican cooking would probably be achiote. In Mayan villages I've been in, every home has an achiote bush in the yard and it is used in a lot of dishes. Jack |
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![]() "Jack Tyler" > wrote in message oups.com... > > Gunner wrote: >> Jack, I am curious are you comp'd in this travel business of yours? > > Much of the time. I publish a travel magazine. > > www.MexicoTravelAndLife.com > > I also pay for a lot of my travel... but there are always "fam" trips > paid for by Mexican states, cities, resorts and airlines. I fact, > there are more than I have time to go on. > > Jack Yes, Jack, I know you publish a travel mag. You have mentioned that previous and that is why I asked. As a photog I am just looking into the business model again and seeing the boon and bane of the Internet over the last 11 years. de |
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![]() Gunner wrote: > As a photog I am just looking into the business model again and seeing the > boon and bane of the Internet over the last 11 years. > > de Although we will be printing 100,000 copies of a paper magazine, we have a website, also. I travel on every trip (fam trip) to Mexico with at least one or two writer/photographers who have no hard copy magazine... just a website. I am amazed that they are sent on trips with writers from the NY Times, Travel and Leisure, etc.... but it works. An example is www.travellady.com I traveled with her in Merida and Campeche and she will be going to Villahermosa with me later this month to the cacao plantation and chocolate factory. It's pretty easy to do a website or blog. It's not easy to sell ads and make a living at it, but one can do a lot of traveling. Jack |
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![]() "Jack Tyler" > wrote in message ups.com... > > DaveTwo wrote: > > Maybe there was no cumin in recipes before the Spanish conquest, but that .. snip for brevity.... Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achiote Wayne |
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![]() Wayne Lundberg wrote: > "Jack Tyler" > wrote in message > ups.com... > > > > DaveTwo wrote: > > > Maybe there was no cumin in recipes before the Spanish conquest, but > that > . > snip for brevity.... > > Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achiote > > Wayne Thanks for the info, Wayne. I had known that achiote was a common taste in Mayan and Mexican cuisine, but hadn't bothered to look up its origin. Interesting, Jack |
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![]() Jack Tyler wrote: > Thanks for the info, Wayne. I had known that achiote was a common > taste in Mayan and Mexican cuisine, but hadn't bothered to look up its > origin. Achiotl is in recado rojo for the red *color*, not the taste. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recado_rojo Recado rojo or achiote paste is a popular blend of spices from Mexico. Originally a Mayan blend, it is now strongly associated with the Mexican cuisine of Yucatan. The spice mixture usually includes annatto, Mexican oregano, cumin, clove, cinnamon, black pepper, allspice, garlic, and salt. The annatto seeds dye the mixture red, and this gives the meat or vegetables it seasons a distinctive red hue. |
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![]() Rhonda wrote: > What else do you all serve with your Christmas tamales. Are there other > traditional sides dishes that are served with them. Rhonda, I think of Christmas tamales and pozole as a perfect match. That's the answer to your questiojn, now for the OT part. I grew up in San Antonio, and now live here again, and I can't think of the holiday season without tamales. Mainly because of getting together with family and friends to make them, a party called a 'tamalada.' When I was about ten-years-old or so, my dad had a friend who was a hunter and who gave us some venison and javelina meat. We made tamales with that meat, and I remember those tamales as the best I ever had, and I've been wishing I could get some javelina meat ever since. But, also, I've been making them ever since, no matter where I've lived. Once, in Seattle, a friend said, "You're inviting me over to make what?" There is a play, "La tamalada," that is produced in our region during the holidays. It has to do with younger women getting together to make tamales while their ghostly ancestors are hanging over their shoulders telling them how they used to do it. (I wish I were more bi-lingual, because there are some obviously funny lines that I don't understand.) Anyway, I hope you enjoy your Christmas tamales, no matter what you have with them. I'll do the same! David |
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![]() dtwright37 wrote: > I grew up in San Antonio, and now live here again, and I can't think of > the holiday season without tamales. Mainly because of getting together > with family and friends to make them, a party called a 'tamalada.' Yes, and an informal party where nothing but tamales and tacos and other antojitos are served would be called a "taquiza". But it's still not a multicourse formal *comida*, which would have a salad, wet soup, dry soup or pasta, one large main dish (or two smaller ones), pastry and coffee, followed by brandy and cigars and talk of revolution. |
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Thanks you David. Great to hear from you.
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![]() The Galloping Gourmand wrote: > dtwright37 wrote: > > > I grew up in San Antonio, and now live here again, and I can't think of > > the holiday season without tamales. Mainly because of getting together > > with family and friends to make them, a party called a 'tamalada.' > > Yes, and an informal party where nothing but tamales and tacos and > other antojitos are served would be called a "taquiza". > > But it's still not a multicourse formal *comida*, which would have a > salad, wet soup, dry soup or pasta, one large main dish (or two smaller > ones), pastry and coffee, followed by brandy and cigars and talk of > revolution. Thanks for that, but that's not what I was writing about, is it? David |
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![]() Rhonda wrote: > Thanks you David. Great to hear from you. Thanks to you, too, Rhonda. I think you, and I, and Wayne, and Jack, will know what we're talking about. David |
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![]() dtwright37 wrote: > The Galloping Gourmand wrote: > > Yes, and an informal party where nothing but tamales and tacos and > > other antojitos are served would be called a "taquiza". > > > > But it's still not a multicourse formal *comida*, which would have a > > salad, wet soup, dry soup or pasta, one large main dish (or two smaller > > ones), pastry and coffee, followed by brandy and cigars and talk of > > revolution. > > Thanks for that, but that's not what I was writing about, is it? How do you celebrate St. Patrick's Day, then? Do you cook up your Mulligan Stew in a tin can over an open fire, underneath a railroad trestle, just to be "traditional"? |
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![]() The Galloping Gourmand wrote: > How do you celebrate St. Patrick's Day, then? Do you cook up your > Mulligan Stew in > a tin can over an open fire, underneath a railroad trestle, just to be > "traditional"? Snide comment noted. |
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![]() Rhonda wrote: > What else do you all serve with your Christmas tamales. Are there other > traditional sides dishes that are served with them. Hey Rhonda, We serve them with Pinto Beans, rice, some nice hot salsa. We make pork, cheese and jalapeno and some sweet ones. My daughter and I are making lots in a couple of weeks. If anyone is going to make them I have a tip for spreading the Masa on the corn husk. (up until a couple of years ago, I still made them like my grandmother/mother did. They used a spoon to spread the masa) Go to a hardware store and get a wallpaper spreader. Plastic piece about 4 inches long or so... put the husk on the table, using the spreader take a scoop of masa and spread. using even pressure starting at the top and work down. You'll be surprised how fast it makes the process. It only took a couple of tries to get the hang of it. Made our tamale making alot easier. Chilichick |
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Thanks Chilichick. That is a great tip about using the wall paper
spreader. I will pick one up and give it a try this year. My grandchildren will be helping me with the tamale making. I may get adventurous this year and make some of the cheese and jalopeno as well as the sweet tamales too. So far we have only made pork and beef tamales. |
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![]() chilichick wrote: > My daughter and I are making lots in a couple of weeks. If anyone is > going to make them I have a tip for spreading the Masa on the corn > husk. (up until a couple of years ago, I still made them like my > grandmother/mother did. They used a spoon to spread the masa) > Go to a hardware store and get a wallpaper spreader. Plastic piece > about 4 inches long or so... put the husk on the table, using the > spreader take a scoop of masa and spread. using even pressure starting > at the top and work down. You'll be surprised how fast it makes the > process. It only took a couple of tries to get the hang of it. Made > our tamale making alot easier. > Chilichick Chilichick, I like that idea. We haven't made our tamales this year, but I have thought of putting those fake credit cards to use that come in the mail so often. My wife likes to use them as palette knives, so I wanted to think of a way to use them in cooking. Making tamales was the first thing that came to mind. Have fun with your tamalada! David |
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![]() dtwright37 wrote: .. put the husk on the table, using the > > spreader take a scoop of masa and spread. > David In Tabasco this week, I had the best tamales I have ever had. The only difference was that they used banana leaves instead of corn husks to wrap them. The banana leaves allowed the steam to get in, but held the moisture inside and made the most moist tamales ever. Those living north of here might have a problem getting the banana leaves, but in Houston, they are readily available. It's worth a try for a change of pace. Jack |
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![]() Jack Tyler wrote: > In Tabasco this week, I had the best tamales I have ever had. The only > difference was that they used banana leaves instead of corn husks to > wrap them. The banana leaves allowed the steam to get in, but held the > moisture inside and made the most moist tamales ever. Actually, the moisture inside the corn husk wrapped tamale probably escapes through the permeable leaf. If you wrap your tamales with something impermeable, and you get the moisture content (and the time of cooking) just right, they will steam themselves from the inside out and the masa will turn orange from the chile sauce. |
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