MEXICAN MOMENTS

 

There has been Mexican madness sweeping the country of late and we enjoy a taco or a fajita as much as the next person. Inspired by the delicious Quinoa & Bean Burritos w/ Slaw & Green Tomato Salsa at Veggie Num Num I have been playing with different Mexican feast combinations ever since. As part of the spread I’ve been making our own tortillas, which are delicious and really are the star of the meal.  They do take time and you need to rest the dough so If you’re time poor or it’s an after work dinner you should buy some pre made.  I have been seeing more authentic tortillas and tacos without all the preservatives at the whole food/organic stores.

This feast consisted of a Corn, Coriander and Capsicum Salad, Salsa, Chargrilled Chili and Lime Chicken, Salsa and Guacamole. Essential supporters are plenty of limes, jalapenos, Mexican hot sauce (I use Cholula), coriander and in my case plenty of serviettes for all the optimistic tortilla stuffing.

I’ve been tempted to buy a taco press but think that might be going one step to far in the land of gadgets that don’t come out very often but take up a lot of space. Do you have an appliance that fits that description? I often think at Christmas time what happens to all the donut and Dutch pancake makers in the New Year.

CORN, CORIANDER AND CAPSICUM SALAD

2 corncobs

Spanish onion chopped

Half a bunch coriander leaves chopped

1 tomato chopped

1 red capsicum chopped

Juice of 3 Limes

2 tablespoons of olive oil

Bring a large saucepan of water to the boil and cook the corn for 15 minutes. Drain and cool. Once cooled run a knife down the edge of the corn and the cob, repeating until all the kernels are removed. Combine all the ingredients and season to taste.

SALSA

1 red capsicum

1 chopped tomato

½ cup of chopped coriander leaves

½ chopped Spanish onion

1 birdseye chilli or to taste

Salt to taste

Blitz all the ingredients in a food processor until it is a thick salsa consistency

Adapted from Veggie Num

GUACAMOLE

1 avocado

1/2 finely chopped tomato

Handful of chopped coriander leaves

Juice of one lemon

¼ finely chopped Spanish onion

Salt to taste

Mash avocado with fork and combine all ingredients. Adjust lemon and salt to size of avocado and to taste.

CHARGRILLED CHILLI AND LIME CHICKEN

6 chicken skinless chicken thighs

½ cup of chopped mint leaves

½ cup of chopped coriander leaves

1 birdseye chilli or to taste

Juice of 3 limes

3 garlic cloves finely chopped

1 tablespoon of sugar

40ml olive oil

Salt to taste

Combine all of the ingredients in a bowl, cover and refrigerate for an hour or as long as time permits.  Cook the chicken on a barbecue or griddle pan until cooked through, approx twenty minutes. Slice chicken on the diagonal to serve.

 

FLOUR TORTILLAS

2 cups of all-purpose flour

1-½ teaspoons of baking powder

¾ of warm almond milk

2 teaspoons of canola oil

1 teaspoon of salt

Combine the dry ingredients and the oil. Slowly add the almond milk, stirring until a loose ball is formed. Flour a work surface and knead the dough for two minutes. The dough should be soft and firm.

Place dough in a bowl and cover with a damp cloth or tea towel for twenty minutes.

After the dough has rested, divide the mixture into eight and roll into balls. Place them on a plate with space in between and cover with a damp cloth or tea towel for ten minutes. It’s important to rest the dough, don’t skip this bit! Working with one ball at a time place the dough onto the floured surface and press down with your palm until it’s around 4 inches wide. With a rolling pin, roll it out until it’s about eight inches wide and thin. Don’t overwork the dough. Keep tortillas in slightly damp tea towel until they are ready to cook. Flour each one so they don’t stick together. Heat a fry pan till hot and cook the tortillas for about thirty seconds each side, they will start to puff and bubble when ready. Keep tortillas wrapped in dry tea towel until ready to serve. Reheat in foil in the oven if need be but I leave the tortillas till last while the chicken is cooking.

Adapted from Home Sick Texan

Serves 2 hungry people. Enjoy

OLIVE HARVEST

We have three Kalamata olive trees espaliered to the fence in our tiny backyard which we normally harvest quite a bit of fruit from, enough to pickle and keep us going for months. This year I think I had a total of eight olives which was pretty miserable. I’m not sure if it’s due to the lack of attention and water from our first year as being parents or just that fruit trees often have alternating years and last year was plentiful.  My inlaws came to the rescue with a delivery of olives picked from Nonno’s olive tree, so all was not lost. If you don’t have olive trees there is always a lot available from garden nurseries and fruit shops or you could always offer to pick them for a friend for a share of the bounty.

It’s nice to have a store of olives in the fridge for eating and sharing with visitors but pickling does take some effort, time and a lot of salt so you need to love olives. This recipe is adapted from Kymira Olives and the results are fantastic, I’ve stuck at the same method for years. A lot of home pickling doesn’t remove the bitterness, the key is changing the water and salt each day.

Pick the olives when they are green or black, I normally do half, half.  With a knife slice two lengthways cuts through the skin, on opposite sides. These cuts allow the salt to penetrate the olive and remove the bitterness.

Put the olives in a large mixing bowl or container and fill with roughly ten cups of water and half a cup of salt. Place a plate on top of the olives to ensure they are all underwater. Pickling takes around ten to fifteen days depending on the ripeness, it’s best to taste them to make sure the bitterness has almost disappeared.

Bring ten cups of water and one cup of salt to the boil and then allow to cool. Place the olives in jars and pour over the salt solution.  Top the jars with a centimetre of olive oil and ensure that none of the olives break the seal. Store in a cupboard for at least six months. Pour out the salt solution and fill with water and refrigerate for twenty four hours. Time to add some flavour, my favourite combination is a handful of fresh thyme, oregano and two peeled garlic cloves.


I'm returning to work this week so if my posts become sporadic you'll understand why. It's a good thing that I've been pickling food, if times get tough we can always eat from the jars! Enjoy

MAPLE SYRUP AND POMEGRANATE PANCAKES

After a lot of tossing and turning from being woken at 5.30am we decided that sleep was futile and that the only appropriate course of action was something delicious for breakfast to compensate. The stocktake of the pantry didn’t yield great results; no eggs, bacon or bread… not a wonderful start, but I did buy maple syrup the previous day so that was inspiration for this stack of pancakes.


They were very easy and quick to prepare and I can guarantee that they will hit the spot when a breakfast indulgence is required. If you are still enjoying cow’s milk just supplement the milk and butter in the same quantities. Choose your pancake topping, my other favourite is the classic lemon juice and caster sugar. The recipe was adapted from Food 52. Enjoy

2 cups of plain flour

4 teaspoons of baking powder

1 ¾ cup of almond milk

¼ cup of dairy free spread, I used Nuttelex

2 eggs

1 tablespoon of sugar

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

Teaspoon of salt

Maple syrup

½ pomegranate

In a mixing bowl beat the eggs, vanilla and milk on high speed for two minutes until the mixture looks frothy. Sift all of the dry ingredients and add them to the  milk mixture. On the lowest speed mix until you remove all the lumps. Carefully blend in the melted butter, try not to over mix.

Melt a tablespoon of butter in the pan on a medium heat until the pan is hot. Use a soup ladle to pour in the pancake mix to the pan. When bubbles appear flip the pancake and cook the other side. Pour over maple syrup. Cut pomegranate in half and with a wooden spoon hit the skin to release the seeds onto the pancakes.