Mexican food at home

The Mexican restaurant scene in Australia is a pretty sorry state of affairs. If it wasn’t for the free flowing tequila and relaxed pouring of the margaritas who would ever go?

But don’t be fooled by these hoaxes that pretend Mexicans are munching on Doritos with salsa all day and night. There is so much more to Mexican food than rice in a burrito. I often attempt Mexican restaurants to re-live the year I lived in Mexico, the only good thing going is the corn tortillas, there is nothing like the smell of corn tortillas to take you back. And blue corn is the ultimate, not only is it higher in protein and contains anthocyanins, which are the worlds best antioxidant, they are so tasty you can’t help but smile while you eat. So I was on the hunt for blue corn tortillas for my next dinner party and thankfully I found it in Balmain and bought all of the stock they had.

I have never enjoyed my own food as much as last night. I think I might have mastered the hand made blue corn tortilla much to the delight of my guests taste buds. There was a lot of margarita making going on, but I’m sure the delight was from the food!

Each region of Mexico has its own cuisine style and also its own chili. The secret to real Mexican food is in the different kinds of chilies used for each dish and the combination of chilies for dishes. I just discovered three new types of chilies, habanero, chipotle and mulato.

The habanero chili is the hottest you can get, besides something called Bhut Jolokia from Bangladesh. And unless you are doing a Jackass skit I’d probably stay away from those. I opened a jar of habaneros yesterday and didn’t want to put my finger in it to taste the hotness so I just put the tip of my tongue into the jar. Major error, was like someone putting a cigar out in your mouth. Hurty.

I used these to make an amazing Salsa Verde using tomatillos, another essential Mexican ingredient. They are tiny green tomatoes, which come wrapped in their own brown leaves. The habaneros as mentioned are hot hot hot. Warn your friends and load it onto the plates of your foes for some entertainment.

The second and best discovery of the day was the Mulato chili which is used to make Mole sauce, it has a sweet and smoky flavour with chocolate undertones. It’s hard to get them fresh in Australia so you need to soak them in water for an hour before you make a sauce. I used these with chipotle chilies which is a smoke dried jalapeno, famous for the Tex Mex flavours used in Mexican restaurants. I soaked these also and sliced them up and put them in a blender with the water to make a smoky sauce for refried beans.

The term ‘refried beans’ is a mistranslation, ‘frijoles refritos’, actually means well fried beans. You really need pork lard to make sure they are full of flavour but a chorizo will do the trick if you cut it really fine. The pinto beans need to be soaked for a few hours, I put some seaweed in the water to assist the process. Then boil the beans and reduce to a simmer for an hour or two. When they are soft drain them. Fry up the chorizo pieces in some oil and then put the beans in the pan with some salt and the mulato-chipotle mix. Mash it all slowly and keep frying till you think it is done for you. Use the water from the boiling beans if you need to make them softer.

As for the blue corn tortillas, they are a secret for now and I’m still experimenting, when I completely perfect it I’ll make it public.

Hasta luego caballeros!