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Mexican cuisine combines so many bright and juicy flavors! It still retains the traditions of the Aztecs, but the influence of Spanish culinary traditions is no less strong. The dishes of Mexican cuisine are spicy, unusual and beautiful. Their main feature is intricate sauces and an abundance of chili peppers, but if you are going to cook at home according to recipes of Mexican cuisine, you can always make the dishes less spicy so that your loved ones can enjoy them too.
Another advantage of these dishes is simple ingredients: cereals, legumes, vegetables and a variety of tortillas. Add South American notes to the home menu, and you will see that life has become much more interesting!
Poor people’s butter or a delicious snack?
Guacamole is an appetizer and at the same time a thick sauce. The Spanish conquerors, having got acquainted with the culture of the Aztec Empire, were surprised to find that the most popular food of the Indians was avocado pasta. Among themselves, the Spaniards called it oil for the poor.
Now this snack has many variations, so it will never get bored, but it is easy and fast to cook it.
Cut 2 ripe avocados in half, remove the pulp with a spoon, put it in a bowl and squeeze the juice of half a lime on top. Crush the avocado in a wooden mortar, add a pinch of salt and 1 tablespoon of olive oil. You should get a homogeneous puree.
Rub a pinch of cumin in a mortar, by the way, you can use a coffee grinder for this. Mix the avocado with cumin and a pinch of paprika, and then chop a small piece of green chili. Unripe pepper contains a record amount of vitamin C, which is very useful. Add to the fragrant avocado pulp a crushed clove of garlic, half a red onion, ground into a pulp, and a finely chopped bunch of parsley. Serve this royal snack with Mexican corn chips that can be used instead of a spoon! On our website you will find many recipes with photos of Mexican cuisine, which always turn out at home!
Mexican shawarma
Many fans of Mexican cuisine consider fajitos to be the pinnacle of the culinary art of the country. This dish is universal, because in recipes only the wheat tortilla is a constant ingredient, and the filling can change. Usually it is grilled and sliced into strips of meat with vegetables. Fajitos were very much loved by cowboys who lived on the Texas-Mexico border, but now this snack, somewhat similar to the usual shawarma, is adored all over the world.
The secret to making delicious fajitos is pre-marinating the meat — for example, in tomato sauce. Mix 150 ml of tomato juice with a small amount of mustard to taste and with half of the chopped red hot pepper. Cut 500 g of beef into long thin strips and immerse it in the sauce for several hours. It is best to put the meat in the refrigerator for this time.
While the beef is soaked in the aroma of spices, prepare the tortillas by mixing 2 cups of flour and 2 tablespoons of butter into a crumb. Add a pinch of salt and gradually pour in about two-thirds of a glass of warm boiled water, kneading the elastic dough. There may be a little less water — it all depends on the quality of the butter and flour. Let the dough rest for half an hour under a towel, and then make balls and roll out thin cakes from them. Fry them in a dry frying pan, then, when the dough begins to swell, turn it over to the other side.
Don’t forget about the filling! Chop 1 small onion into half rings, cut 2 peppers in half, and then cut the halves into strips.
Fry the vegetables until tender in a small amount of vegetable oil, stirring constantly. Put them in a bowl and fry the meat in the same pan until golden brown. Now return the vegetables to the pan, pour the remaining tomato sauce, fry for another 2 minutes and sprinkle with parsley leaves. You can fry vegetables with meat without sauce, serving it separately with tortillas. In addition to tomato sauce, sour cream, natural yogurt, salsa and guacamole are suitable for this dish. Usually vegetables, meat and sauces are served separately, so that everyone builds a fajito to taste.
For a hearty lunch
The unique posole soup is attributed to traditional Mexican food that is not adapted to the tastes of tourists. The Mexicans themselves have been eating salt for many centuries in a row. It is very interesting to try what kind of an outlandish dish this is!
Despite the fact that traditionally a pig’s head is taken for soup, you can use fillet from the shoulder blade. Cut 350 g of meat into cubes and fry it in a frying pan until brown. Put the meat in another bowl and fry the finely chopped onion in the same oil. A minute before cooking, throw 4 cloves of chopped garlic into the pan and fry for another minute. Return the pork to the onion and garlic, add 1.5 tsp ground cumin and 0.5 tsp ground red pepper.
Pour in 0.5 cups of beer, which can be replaced with ordinary water if you are cooking for children. Bring the contents to a boil and cook for about 10 minutes, until the liquid has completely evaporated.
Add 2 cups of chicken broth, cooked without salt, and 600 g of canned corn without liquid. If you like it sharper, pour in half a glass of salsa. As they say, to walk so walk!
Bring the soup to a boil, reduce the heat to low and cook for about an hour, until the pork is soft. Serve with any greens, lime slices and avocado, radish slices and corn chips. And don’t forget about the tortillas — without them, no self-respecting Mexican will even sit down at the table!
Tomatoes, sir!
When Europeans first saw tomatoes in Mexico, their hearts and stomachs were forever conquered by the taste of these bright and beautiful vegetables. At the same time, they first tried a dish of tomatoes, chili, avocado and pumpkin seeds, calling it salsa, which translates from Spanish as “sauce”. This bright and colorful dish can be served with meat, fish, vegetables, cereals, legumes and pasta. For us, salsa is more like adjika with coarsely chopped pieces of vegetables.
Mexican sauce can be thick or liquid, “raw” or cooked-there are many recipes for every taste. For example, this. Bake 2 bell peppers — green and yellow-in the microwave for 5 minutes. Place them briefly in a cellophane bag so that it is easy to remove the skin, and finely chop the pulp.
Cut into pieces 400 g of ripe, juicy tomatoes and chop them in a blender, and then mix with the peppers. Add to this mixture a few crushed garlic cloves, 1 tbsp each of ground cumin and paprika, a pinch of salt and the juice of half a lemon.
It is especially delicious to dip corn chips and Mexican tortillas in the sauce. With salsa, even ordinary fried eggs get a unique taste!
Tortillas with minced meat
The tacos snack is somewhat similar to fajitos, but there is one difference. Consumers make fajitos themselves, using the fillings, tortillas and sauces offered, and the tacos is already served on the table with delicious contents. This snack is also made from corn or wheat tortillas and meat filling with vegetables.
Try to cook corn tortillas, real, like in Mexico! Dissolve a pinch of salt in 120 ml of warm water and mix a glass of corn flour and half a cup of wheat flour. Combine the flour with water, add 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil and knead a soft dough. After half an hour of rest, form 8 balls from the dough and roll them into thin cakes, and then fry them on both sides in a dry frying pan until bubbles appear on their surface.
The filling is prepared simply. Fry 500 g of minced pork in a frying pan in vegetable oil, add 2 diced tomatoes and half a red onion, cut into thin half rings. Fry a little more and fill the tortillas.
To do this, you need to put minced meat with vegetables on half of the tortilla, cover with the second part and put it in the oven for 5 minutes, preheated to 180 °C. Sauces are usually not added to tacos so that they do not leak out, but tortillas can be dipped in sour cream or salsa. It’s impossible to break away!
Not just fried eggs
The Mexicans call the scrambled eggs “huevos rancheros” in a rustic way, although they serve it in their own way – with chili, bell pepper, beans and the invariable corn tortillas. Try to cook this delicious dish for breakfast — it’s worth it!
However, all the ingredients for the dish should be prepared from the evening — salsa sauce, tortillas and frijoles refritos-fried black beans. Recipes with photos of these Mexican dishes can be found just above.
Melt 100 g of lard or bacon in a frying pan and fry 2 finely chopped onions. Yes, do not be surprised, in Mexican cuisine they love pork very much and everything is fried in pork fat, even tortillas. Add a pinch of salt and 300 g of pre-cooked black beans to the onion (which can be replaced with dark beans) and mash them well or whisk them with an immersion blender.
Fry an ordinary glaze of 6 eggs for 2 tablespoons of corn oil, and then collect the snack as a sandwich. Put one corn tortilla on a dish, spread the bean paste on top and carefully place the scrambled eggs, trying to preserve the yolks. Decorate the dish with salsa, slices of white cheese and fresh herbs!
Looking at the photos of Mexican dishes, you will once again be convinced that Mexicans are temperamental and cheerful. With such dishes and sauces, it can not be otherwise!
What’s inside?
And yet the Mexicans love to wrap meat and vegetables in the dough! Otherwise, how can we explain such a variety of recipes with tortillas stuffed with various ingredients? Another interesting snack is tamales, the recipe of which is familiar to every Mexican woman.
Tamales are similar to corn cobs, because tortillas with meat filling with hot sauce are wrapped in corn leaves, avocado or banana.
Soak the corn leaves in cool water for 2 hours — as long as you plan to make tamales.
While the leaves are soaking, finely chop 500 g of boiled pork and 300 g of boiled chicken. In 80 ml of corn oil, dissolve the seasonings by a pinch-chili pepper, garlic powder, cumin, black pepper and salt. Pour half of the oil into the meat and mix well.
Pour a pinch of the same spices into 250 g of corn flour and do not forget about salt, and then pour a little meat broth and knead a fairly elastic dough, similar to soft plasticine.
Dry the soaked leaves, put 1 tbsp of dough on them, and on top-the meat filling. Roll the tamales into rolls, tie them with a thread and cook in a steamer for 1.5 hours.
If you do not have corn leaves, feel free to use waxed paper placed on foil. Ready-made rolls are released from the “clothes”, and the fragrant filling is poured with any hot sauces. You can add vegetables and cheese to tamales — it will be even tastier!
Three milks
The Latin American dessert tres leches (“three milks”), tender and incredibly delicious, is soaked in three types of milk, while condensed milk and cream are mandatory ingredients, and the third milk can be any — cow, soy, nut or coconut. The advantage of this biscuit is that it is not cloying, light, juicy and loose-perfect.
Beat 4 eggs and 1 cup of sugar with a mixer until a fluffy foam appears. Mix 1 cup of flour with 10 g of baking powder and mix into the dough, continuing to beat. Combine 3 tablespoons of boiling water and the same amount of vegetable oil, pour into the dough and whisk again. Pour the resulting mixture into a greased form, put it in a preheated 180 °C oven and bake for half an hour.
Mix 200 g of milk, 10% cream and condensed milk in a bowl, stir well. Put the cream on the sponge cake, piercing the surface with a match so that it is soaked. Sprinkle with orange zest and put the dessert in the refrigerator overnight.
Tender cake “Tres leches” according to this recipe is prepared very quickly. The original dessert will decorate the festive table, causing the admiration of the guests!
They say that another culture is easy to learn through its cuisine. Cooking and tasting national dishes, you can touch the history and traditions of the country. And everyone can make this little journey in their own kitchen…