Last night I conducted the second class of Mexican cooking aof the 6 week course I am presenting at Wairarapa College. I have the great good fortune of a group of 12 who are friendly, dynamic and enthusiastic about learning a new style of cooking. Last Monday as an introduction we made several salsas: salsa mexicana, salsa ranchera, salsa verde and a lovely guacamole.
This week was a bit more complex. When I was at the Mexican Cooking School in Tlaxcala last year Estela taught us how to make sopes with chicken tinga. The sopes are made from corn masa, or in our case, masa masa harina, which is the only way you can make tortillas, or masa based recipes in New Zealand. I had always found the Maseca unsatisfactory but have finally found that it is much better if I ignore the instructions which advise the use of 1 1/4 cup of water to 2 cups of masa harina. I now use that as a base, but add water bit by bit until the mixture starts to come together into a soft dough. I also add a capfull of oil as I think this makes it more pliable. The secret is to knead it as you would bread dough, until it is soft and supple. I test it by rolling a small ball and pressing it flat between my palms. If the edges split, it requires more water, maybe as little as rinsing your hands under the tap and kneading it again. Once you can flatten a small ball of mix without the edges splitting, you’re ready to go.
I introduced the class to my favourite chile – chipotle. Chipotles are jalapeno chiles left to ripen until they are red (fresh they are eaten gren ) and then smoked. You can buy the smoked and dry or, as in this recipe preserved in adobo, which gives you extra sauce for flavouring. Chipotles in adobo are the chief flavouring for Estela’s Tinga recipe, and to use up the tin once it was open, we also made a tomato salsa flavoured with Chipotle.
The sopes I made in Mexico. Frankly, I think last nights were better!
The sopes are constructed by pinching a lip around them after they are cooked, to hold the ingredients which included refried beams smeared on the sope, topped with the chicken tinga, and a selection of ingredients including the salsa, coriander, lettuce and sour cream. They were delicious, and I’m pretty sure everyone agreed. So it was a great class and I’m already wishing it was longer than 6 weeks. Because it is such a receptive group of people I can think of dozens of things I would like to try with them.
Rather than publish the recipes in the body of this blog, I have a recipes page where I will post the recipes used in the classes, and also other things I cook that I love. Don’t feel squeamish about my predilection for offal, the way it is cooked in Mexico is so different from how you might have experienced it as a child. So ends my second blog. I am frustrated in my attempts to add more photos. Things will improve as I go long hopefully. Boy am I on a steep learning curve, in all aspects of my life – which is good!!!!
nzmexconnex 