Bunuelos

My Nana and I use to do these every Christmas together. I remember making the flour tortillas first, rolling them out and then having her tell me how to make the syrup. It was tradition. Her and I stood at the stove for about 3+ hours making these delicious crispy tortillas. We always started with one stick of sugar and added water and orange juice as we went. It was a science and before her passing I wrote it down. The last few years before she got sick we took a genius short cut. We used raw already made tortillas. Oh how this cut down on the time it took to make them. If you want to make your own tortilla from scratch go right ahead! My niece Ollie and I where in charge of making these awesome crispy bunuelos this year. And I must say they came out perfect. Her and I stood at the stove for close to 2 hours and we where tired for sure, but it was well worth it!

What you will need:

1. 4 pin Piloncillos (sugar cone)
2. a large orange
3. about 16 cloves
4. 2 dozen raw tortillas
5. 1/4 cup of water / piloncillo (you will add this a little at a time)

Prep:
Layout the tortillas so that they dry out a little. This way they do not pop some much in the hot oil.
In a big pot start to melt down the sugar. We did it one sugar cone at a time. You add the sugar, squeeze 1/4 of the orange and cut up the Rhine and add it, 4 cloves, and 1/4 cup of water. While this begins to melt down (on medium heat, be careful not to burn the sugar) you will add another cone of sugar and repeat the process until you have melted down all 4 of the sugar cones. This will take about an hour.

Once you have the last cone half way melted start heating your oil in a un-coated pan. Once you are ready you will fry the tortilla until golden brown, drain the oil and hand off to have the syrup poured over the hot tortilla, stack to cool. *we usually only put syrup on one side.

Melting down the sugar

Syrup ready

Frying the tortillas

Ollie and me; Ollie did a great job!

Pouring the hot syrup on the hot tortilla.

Here's to some good food!

Carnitas

My family never really made these at home.  We always went across the T.J. boarder to Mexico to go eat them.  I can remember our whole family going down there just to eat these tacos.  They where served with lime, cilantro and onions.  That is pretty much it.  The real way to cook these is to deep fry them in Lard.  There are usually huge copper pots outside with boiling lard and you place the meat directly in, deep frying the pork to where it is crispy on the outside and tender on the inside.  Carnitas are really all about the meat, the lime and the sides.  Pretty simple.  Here I will tell you how to make them in your slow cooker as I just can not bring myself to fry meat in lard.  I think they come out just as good and they are better for you.  Make sure you pick up a packed of little corn tortillas, the thicker ones of you can find them.  We did and they where awesome! Always invite friends over to eat when you make this because it is a lot of food and pork really isn't all that great as leftovers, so set an extra place for someone to join you!

What you will need:

• A few pounds of  Pork, shoulder.  You are looking for pulled pork with a bone.
• 1 whole onion peeled
• 8-10 garlic cloves 
• Chicken Bullion
• Salt and pepper
• Crockpot

Prep:

1. Trip to remove as much of the fat as you can, it is usually on the bottom of the shoulder where it will have the most fat.
2. Poke about 8-10 holes in the pork, all around it, and push the garlic into the pork.
3. Salt and Pepper
4. Sear the meat on all sides 
5. Place in Crockpot
6. Add the whole onion cut up in quarters
7. Add about 2 cups of chicken stock (you can make with with 1ts/cup of water)
8. Cover and cook on high for how ever the longest setting on your Crockpot is. Mine was High for 6 hours. 

Serve with:
Warm corn tortillas (please do not heat the tortillas in a micro wave, get your self an iron skillet)
Salsa Verde
Cilantro (chopped)
Green Onions (chopped)
Guacamole

Here's to some good food!

Our table:

Salsa Verde

This salsa was never made very often in our house.  My mom has really made it well.  Her secret? Avocado.  The more chilies you put in it the better it is.  I have come to love this salsa as I am making it better and better every time.  I made this the other day to go with my Carnitas that I will be posting.  

What you will need:

• 4 Big Tomatillos or 6 small ones
• 3 Jalapeno Chilies
• 3 Serrano Chilies
• 3 Yellow Chilies
• 3 Anaheim Chilies
• 1/2 Hass Avocado
• 1/2 Bunch of Cilantro
• 4 Green onions (use the whole stem minus the tips)

1. De-Stem all the chilies
2. Take the husk and little pit on the top of the Tomatillo off.

Boil:
All the chilies and Tomatillos (about 20 minutes)

Blend all ingredients until smooth. Add salt to taste.

Here to some good food!

Helpful Hint:
Tomatillo

Caldo de Res

Oh this has been a long time in the making.  A few weeks ago we spent the weekend with my mom and had a weekend of just making all our favorite foods.  Caldo was #1 on our list.  This simple soup always brought our family together.  No special occasion needed just a day that my Nana thought about making a huge post and telling everyone to come and eat.  It was often made during the summer, so you could be super hot while eating hot soup.  To this day I will never understand this but I really did not care as it was so good.  I can remember her preparing it all day adding everything into it at different times.  It was almost miraculous to watch all the people come and eat and there was always enough for everyone.  I enjoyed making this caldo with my mom.  My mom is now coming into her prime time of being a cook.  She never really cooked when we where kids.  With my Nana passing my mom stepped up to the plate and she has done well.

What you need:

• 2 lbs Hueso para caldo con tuetano es major (beef soup Bones)
• 2 lbs carne para deshebrar - pecho (Shedded Beef or flank steak, or Chest able to shred)
• 2 lbs chamorro ... (Beef Shank) has bone in the middle and meat around is round

Vegetables:

• ½ head of repollo - cabbage
• 3 chopped calabazitas - zucchini
• 4 peeled and chopped papas - potatoes
• 4 peeled and chopped zanahorias - carrots
• A bunch of Ejotes - green beans (make sure to chop the ends off)
• 4 chopped chayotes - Mexican fruit
• 3 peeled and chopped in 1/3 elote - white corn (only) tastes different with yellow corn
• 1 peeled cebolla Blanca - whiteonion
• 4-7 peeled and left whole ajo - garlic

Cooking instruction:

1. Boil for appx 2 hrs the meat, onion, garlic.
2. Add salt to taste and Knorr Suiza
3. Skim the top of the liquid so that all the foam is cleared.

After cooking for two hours on Medium/High, add vegetables.

Every 10 minutes add vegetables from longest to cook to least.(this is important, adding the veggies slowly)

· corn

· carrots

· green beans

· potatoes & chayote

· zucchini

· cabbage

Meat is washed and put in huge pot

This is a super important step, you will have to do this a few times in the first boiling stages

Cutting the corn

All the veggies soaking while the meat is cooking, not sure why they do this 

but my Nana always did so we still do it

Done!

My Tia Else serving

OUR FIRST TABLE

more people came to eat after we ate

Serve with rice, beans, guacamole and corn tortillas!
Here's to some good food!

Green Enchiladas

This dish has to be my all time favorites!  And it is actually one my mom makes and no one else makes them like her. Well, except for me now and hopefully you! I remember my Nana always trying to make these and well I have to be frank...they just sucked.  But when my mom put her hand in it they ROCKED!  I have searched high and low for an enchilada as good as hers and there is none.  Not green one anyhow.  So for the love of my mom and her green enchiladas here they are.  The best enchiladas you will ever have.  Thanks mom for making these and teaching me how to make them.  They are awesome.

So when I made these awesome enchiladas I was able to cook with my good friend Becky.  I packed up my chicken bullion and my kids and off to her kitchen we went.  It was so much fun.  I taught her to make beans, rice and these green enchiladas.  We where also able to make a batch of green enchiladas for her to freeze! Loved sharing the recipe with her and her family!  She said " They turned out great!!!"

Tomatillos

Blending the sauce.

Frying tortillas, not as easy as one might think!

Becky you totally perfected flying the tortillas!!!

Ready to bake!

 Served mine with a salad! It was great!

Ingredients
•    Tomatillos
•    Green onion
•    Cilantro
•    1 avocado
•    2 garlic cloves
•    1 jalapeño chile
•    1 Campbell’s cream of chicken
•    1tsp Knorr Suiza (chicken bullion)
•    Salt to taste
•    1 TBP sour cream
•    Monterrey Jack small block for covering enchiladas
•    4 large chicken breast
•    Cooking oil


Boil Chicken:
1.    Boil chicken with salt and pepper, a piece of celery & ½ an onion & chicken bullion (about 2 tsp).
       Boil for 15-20 minutes
2.    Take out chicken when done and shred and salt and pepper lightly again
3.    Dice green onions (set aside)
4.    Shred Monterrey Jack Cheese (set aside)

Boil ingredients for sauce:
Tomatillos
Jalapeño
Garlic Cloves

Don't let the tomatillos get too brown.... boil for about 1 minute or enough to get them soft so that they blend easily.

Blend for Sauce:
•    Tomatoes
•    Jalapeño
•    Campbell soup
•    Green onion (chop coarsely)
•    Cilantro (chop coarsely)
•    Garlic
•    1 avocado

After blending sauce pour into a frying pan with 1 TBP of hot oil. Add 1 TBP of sour cream & 1 tsp of chicken bullion, let it come to 1 boil.  Do not over boil.  Once it comes to a boil turn the burner off and let sit until you are ready to use.

Fry your tortillas and let cool a bit before you dip them into the sauce.

Assemble your enchiladas by adding chicken, cheese and some green onions.  Here we layered the enchiladas you can also roll them, which is the typical way to do it. Bake them for 15-20 at 375 degrees.

Serve with rice, beans, sliced avocados and some sour cream!




Here's to some good food!


Extra Help:

Tomatillo, Remove husk and wash before you boil

Look who is cooking with us...

Some good friends of mine from the OC where looking to make some guacamole. I introduced them to our blog and away they went cooking! Here is what my friend Karen wrote: "Tonight Steve made your guac, your salsa and your bisteck picado. One of the best meals I've had in a looong time. Yum!" Karen and Steve are long time friends and I was over joyed that they cooked from our recipes here. And they shared the wealth, gifting jars of salsa to family.

We love when people cook off the blog. We hope you enjoy cooking with us and continue to share our recipes with others.

Here's to some good food!

Bisteck Picado

This is one of my all time favorites. My Nana made it the best. She took her time to dice everything super fine and let it simmer. I on the other hand have a hard time simmering! This is a great summer dish and often we eat it at dinner but we have been known to eat it for breakfast as well. My mom likes to make it for breakfast. Here we made the steak for tacos and had them on corn tortillas with beans and guacamole. Great Taco Tuesday dinner to invite friends over to.







1 pound Flat Steak
2 Anaheim Green chile finely diced
1 Yellow chile finely diced
1/2 White onion finely diced
2 Tomatoes finely diced
1/2 cup Tomato Sauce
1-2 tsp Chicken Bullion

1. Dice up the meat as small as you can cutting off all the extra fat
2. Finely all the veggies
3. In a pan cook the meat -- pepper and garlic salt the meat while cooking (to taste)
   
4. Once meat is half way cooked add all the veggies and tomato sauce
5. Add 1-2 tsp of chicken bullion and stir
6. Allow to simmer on low for about 20 minutes. Watch carefully to not let the meat get dry.
   
7. if there is not enough liquid you can add 1/2 cup of chicken stock

• Serve with corn or flour tortillas, beans and guacamole.

Here's to some good food!

Fish Tacos

Thank you to Señor Hans from SF, guest chef, he is my brother-in-law with a master's hand in cooking. Oh how I wished I could have had one of these plates! He cooked up these awesome fish tacos which my sister Moni photographed and ate! Thanks Moni for being the "helper".

Señor HANS

All the goods!

CHIPOTLE CREMA (RED SAUCE) :

• Half a can of whole chipotle chiles
• Half Pint of Sour Cream

1. blend till creamy.

COLE SLAW (TOPPING):

• head of cabbage (chopped)
• half cup of mayo
• half cup of white wine vinegar
• zest and juice of one lime
• tablespoon of sugar
• teaspoon of salt
• handful of chopped cilantro
• one jalapeno (seeded and finely diced)

1. whisk all liquid ingredients
2. add cilantro and jalapeno
3. toss with cabbage

FISH:

• two filets of red snaper ( cut into strips)

COAT FISH WITH:

• one cup of flour
• tablespoon of salt
• half tablespoon of black pepper

1. fry in canola oil
2. drain on paper towels or be green like us and cut up an old grocery bag!!!
   

Serve on a warm corn tortilla with red sauce and Cole slaw.
Top it off with Nana's guacamole and a side of rice!!!

Here's to some good food!


Helpful Hints:

Finely diced

What you always need to have on hand in your kitchen!