Mexican Food

[Zarathustra]

I did a quick search, didn't really find what I needed in the Cinco de Mayo thread.

We're doing Mexican for New Years. The works. Grilled flank steak, chicken, and shrimp for fajitas. Homemade salsa and guacamole (I'd put mine up against *anyone's*. Seriously. Both the salsa and the guac.). Refried beans and rice. Tacos for the 6-yr-old. Shrimp-stuffed jalapenos with bacon and cream cheese.

Here's my question: do you all have recipes for refried beans and Mexican rice? What about marinades for the chicken and steak with a Mexican ? Any other Mex dishes you like to make?

[Zarathustra]

Alright, fine. Be that way. (Completely silent, that is.) I'll just have to wing it.

[Menolly]

Malik, I apologize.

Mexican is not a cuisine I am experienced at, although I like the copy cat version of Chilie's steak fajitas well enough. I should have stated that instead of remaining silent.

I was hoping BGB might have some suggestions, but perhaps he doesn't have any recipes to share either?

[Zarathustra]

Oh, I was just teasing. No problem. I found some stuff online. Not much time to marinate meat, anyway, but at least it will have about 5-6 hours.

[aliantha]

Sorry, just checked in. I *love* Mexican food! I do have a recipe for refried beans from scratch (unfortunately it calls for about 2 cups of bacon grease -- if you've already got that lying around the house, then no prob! If not, start fryin' bacon NOW!) and one for Cuban black beans. Both, of course, are at home, and I'm at work. So if this is for tonight, I can't help you. If it's for New Year's Day, let me know and I'll post tonight.

My marinade for fajitas is easy: it's just minced garlic cloves, olive oil, and bottled lime juice. Can't remember the measurements offhand -- I think it's a couple of garlic cloves, 1/4 c. oil, and maybe 1/2 c. lime juice. But don't quote me.

I'm not a fan of Mexican rice so I don't have any recipes for it. Plain white rice works just fine.

[stonemaybe]

This one on BBC food sounds nice...

Cooking time 30 mins to 1 hour

Ingredients

1 tsp vegetable oil
125ml/4fl oz water
1 onion chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
110g/4oz mushrooms, sliced
2 green peppers, chopped
125g/5oz long-grain rice
1 can (796g/28oz) red kidney beans drained
1 can (540g/19oz) tomatoes
1 tbsp chilli powder
2 tsp cumin
a pinch cayenne pepper
110g/4oz grated low-fat mozzarella cheese

Method

1. In large saucepan, heat oil with water over medium heat. Add onion, garlic, mushrooms and green peppers; simmer, stirring often, until onion is tender, about 10 minutes.
2. Add rice, beans, tomatoes, chilli powder, cumin and cayenne; cover and simmer for about 25 minutes or until rice is tender and most of the liquid is absorbed.
3. Transfer to baking dish and sprinkle with cheese. Bake in 18OC/350F/Gas 4 oven for 15 minutes or microwave at high (100

heehee the emoticon is one hundred and eighty Celsius

Edit: care to share the wonderful recipes for salsa and guac? I used to make a mean salsa with a twist - but it was ages ago and I'd have to experiment to get reipe, but it involved lots of cucumber, pineapple and sweetcorn and lime juice.

[wayfriend]

Mexican food is one of those cuisines where I don't find much of a difference between what I can make from scratch and what I can buy in a package, can, or envelope -- of which there is a good selection to choose from. It's just not worth spending energy on. Are refrying your own beans or making your own tortillas from corn meal worth the work? Selecting the meat and grilling it correctly are the only real concerns.

[edit to add] Exception: guacamole must be home made

[Zarathustra]

Mexican food is one of those cuisines where I don't find much of a difference between what I can make from scratch and what I can buy in a package, can, or envelope -- of which there is a good selection to choose from. It's just not worth spending energy on. Are refrying your own beans or making your own tortillas from corn meal worth the work? Selecting the meat and grilling it correctly are the only real concerns.

[edit to add] Exception: guacamole must be home made

If you're talking about the little packets of taco seasoning, maybe. But everything is better fresh. A jar of salsa vs fresh tomatoes, cilantro, garlic, and onions blended together in a food processor--there's simply no comparison. Even the next day, it's orders of magnitude better.

I didn't make homemade flour tortillas, but I should have. The tortillas were certainly the weak link in this meal. My mother used to make them all the time, and I sorely missed a fresh hot tortilla. Again, if you think the mass-produced crap that you buy at the grocery is just as good, then you haven't had a good homemade one.

I didn't try to make the rice. My wife made beans, but I didn't get around to that either. We had way too much food. I invited a friend over (who likes to cook as much as I do), and we were doing food prep and cooking for about 4 hours. After many beers and many grilled, bacon-wrapped jalapeno appetizers, we barely had room for our fajitas.

The steak turned out a little too "limey." I used an internet marinade recipe that smelled wonderful, but overpowered the steak. But it was wonderful with the chicken. The chicken breasts were thicker than the flank steak, so perhaps this was the difference.

We also bought a new food processor, to speed things up. Yes, this is my first food processor. I'm used to doing everything by hand. So I got some of the proportions of my ingredients a little off. It's too easy just to throw something in and push the button. It's so much fun to chop it to hell, that I got a little carried away. So my gaucamole didn't turn out like it usually does, and the salsa--while good--wasn't otherworldly good like it usually is. But I'll get the hang of the processor.

Anyway, we had a good time, and it managed to get us off the couch.

[Menolly]

It sounds like fun!!

[Zarathustra]

I was looking for a good thread on fajitas, and rediscovered my own thread. I've found a new technique that is out of this world. Instead of grilling all the meat, I put all the ingredients into the Crockpot and cook them for about 5 hours. Flank steak, garlic, onion, salt, cumin, chilli powder, salsa, lime juice, cilantro, peppers. This is unbelievably tender and juicy. This is the way I'll make fajitas from now on.

Edit: care to share the wonderful recipes for salsa and guac? I used to make a mean salsa with a twist - but it was ages ago and I'd have to experiment to get reipe, but it involved lots of cucumber, pineapple and sweetcorn and lime juice.

A little late, perhaps, but here's the answer ... I don't have a recipe. I combine, add, and taste. Fresh everything.

For salsa: Cherry tomatoes, vidalia onion, cilantro, couple cloves of garlic, chopped jalenoes. Mince the garlic, then chop up the rest and use a potato smasher to turn it into a sauce. [After using the food processor that one time, I never used it again. I didn't like the little air bubbles. I completely changed the consistency. So it's all hand smashed for me.] It doesn't take much seasonings, if any at all. Lousiana hot sauce is something I'll add sparingly. A little salt. But the simpler it is, the better.

For guacamole: 2-4 very fresh (squeezably soft) avacados. Vidalia onion. Lime juice. Garlic. Salt. Again, everything fresh, and mix to taste. Don't overdo it on the onion--having a mild, sweet onion helps. If you do add too much of something, having an extra avacado on hand can bring it back into balance. The lime juice is the key. Add it until it tastes great.

[aliantha]

I used to absolutely love Rojo's medium salsa. It tasted like homemade to me. Now I can't find it -- and judging from a quick review of online posts, they've changed the formula and it's not as good anymore anyhow.

Hadn't been a guac fan until the last year or so. Now I find it quite tasty.

Here's my Cuban beans and rice recipe (albeit a few years late):

2 cups water
6 oz. dry black beans (about 1 cup)
1 small green pepper, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, finely chopped (feel free to add more -- I always do!)
1 T. olive oil
1 bay leaf
3/4 t. oregano
1/2 t. cumin
1/2 t. salt
dash of pepper
2 c. hot cooked rice

Heat water and beans to boiling in 3-quart saucepan. Boil 2 minutes. Remove from heat, cover, and let stand 1 hour.

Saute green pepper, onion and garlic in oil until onion is tender; stir into beans. Add enough water to cover beans if necessary. Heat to boiling; reduce heat. Stir in bay leaf, oregano, cumin, salt and pepper. Cover and summer until beans are tender and most of the liquid is absorbed, 1.5 to 2 hours. Remove bay leaf. Serve over rice. Makes 4 servings.

[Linna Heartbooger]

Btw, made your cuban beans and rice. With many modifications.

(basically I just used your spicing schema on some pre-cooked pinto beans I had. and even then I made an error.)

Twas delish!

[TheFallen]

...and can I recommend a jalapeño margarita as the perfect accompaniment to any Mexican cuisine. First had this at an apparently authentic Mexican eaterie well off the Strip in Vegas and fell in love with the drink.

For those who don't know, a jalapeño margarita is exactly the same as a regular margarita, with the crucial exception that the tequila used has had dried chillis marinating in it for God knows how long. Gives the drink a wonderful oxymoronic simultaneous freeze and burn. And yes, it's dead easy to create at home... just load a tequila bottle up with dried chillis, let infuse in a dark place for a few weeks and then keep topping the tequila up as it's used.

[lorin]

I take talapia rub it with garlic, taco seasoning and olive oil and put it on the grill. Then I shred it and put it in tacos. I use shredded raw cabbage instead of lettuce (holds up to the heat better) and mango salsa. AMAZING!!!!!

[aliantha]

What have you got against black beans, Linna?

Actually, the veggies/spices work well with several types of beans -- black, pinto, pink.... And certainly you can use canned beans instead of dried -- just rinse them well to get the salt off.

I've also made quickie "Mexican" beans by mixing about a quarter-cup of salsa into canned beans (I prefer black, but pinto would certainly work). The formerly fabulous Rojo medium salsa worked especially well for this. You can add more spices (cumin, oregano, cilantro, pepper) if you feel the need (or if you don't want your beans to taste *quite* so much like salsa!).

TheFallen, I've never had a jalapeño margarita, but it sounds interesting....

[Linna Heartbooger]

Mostly just that... I ate them already! (I LOVE black beans. )

But I discovered I didn't have any more of the dried ones around the house, and they were $1.60 a pound when pintos were 80 cents a pound.

Mmm, yeah, some days when I realize, "Hey, i didn't cook anything," I love to go for melted cheddar, salsa and sour cream on beans & rice (or tortilla).

[Vader]

For guacamole: 2-4 very fresh (squeezably soft) avacados. Vidalia onion. Lime juice. Garlic. Salt. Again, everything fresh, and mix to taste. Don't overdo it on the onion--having a mild, sweet onion helps. If you do add too much of something, having an extra avacado on hand can bring it back into balance. The lime juice is the key. Add it until it tastes great.

I use red onions which are rather sweet. It might not be original but I also add a bit of chopped tomato, ground cumin and a hint of finely ground chili. Now send in the Federales to get me.

My favorite marinade for Mex style meat is a mix of good vegetable oil, lime juice, ground cumin, garlic, chilis and lots of chopped cilantro.

[aliantha]

I had chicken in mole for the first time over the weekend. I am now kicking myself for never having tried it before -- mole poblano is tasty. I've been looking around teh intarwebz for a recipe, but the ones that sound authentic all require either turkey broth or giblets or both. So I probably won't attempt to make it 'til Thanksgiving weekend.

[stonemaybe]

I eventually got hold of some tomatillos.

But i didn't buy what I thought I was buying. They're in tins, but almost like they're pickled. VERY vinegary and salty.

Nice to eat on their own, but the one recipe I tried them in, just ended up far too salty and vinegary.