Frijoles (beans)

Along with corn another staple New World food are beans. There are a variety of ways to serve beans and prepare dishes made with beans but there is a core way to cook beans which I will discuss here. There  are a variety of common beans than are often used in Mexican food and this is often dictated regionally by the varieties common to the indigenous peoples of the area. In Arizona pinto beans are the prevalent variety, elsewhere black beans and white beans can be found in dishes in Central and Southern Mexico. Nonetheless the methods for the basic preparation is the same. For the methods below I will be using an Italian variety of bean that is quite close in appearance and flavour to the pinto bean.

Beans

pinto beans after the fast soak method

So one of the most important steps to making beans is soaking. Soaking does a few things: It shortens the overall cooking time while producing a softer less gritty bean; it also removes much of the soluble  carbohydrates which feed the bacteria responsible for gas production... less flatulance. So take a pound of beans (500 grams) and sort through them to check for stones or any other foreign material. Next add enough water to cover the beans by a couple volumes, the beans will soak and nearly double in volume so add enough water that they remain covered. From here you can go one of two ways. The first is overnight soaking for 12+ hours in water, drain and wash the beans before cooking. The other is the "fast soak" method where you cover with water as before, but then immediately begin heating the beans and bring it to a boil for 15 minutes, then turn off the heat and let the beans sit for an additional 45 minutes covered. Next drain and wash the beans.

Pinto beans with onion and poblanos before cooking

After you have your soaked beans by either method it is time to cook them. Cover them again with as much water as you used for soaking. Add one yellow onion, quartered, some hot green chiles like jalepenos as well as some milder chiles. Then a little smoked pork (a few oz; 50-100g), this can be bacon, smoked pork hock, etc. Now turn on the heat and sit back, add water to keep the beans covered it will take several hours until the beans are soft... unless you have a pressure cooker then it takes under an hour. After soft add salt to taste. There is the basic process for beans. Here are some variations:

Frijoles rancheros (ranch beans, recipe I stole from my friend's aunt): After your beans are done cooking, in a skillet fry up some bacon until crispy, remove the bacon. In the grease fry up diced red onion until soft, then add chopped tomato. After the mixture is hot, chop and add the bacon back then use this to top a bowl of beans with some chopped cilantro (fresh coriander). Serve with tortillas and salsa.

Frijoles refritas (Refried beans):

Despite the name these beans are never fried. They are just smashed beans with fat, lard is the best (you can use vegetable shortening or butter). I take the beans, prepared as above, add a tablespoon of lard and blend with a hand blender. If they are too thin you can keep heated until they evaporate enough (if you plan on making refried beans I try to adjust the liquid before blending as it is much easier to burn the beans after blending). These go with almost everything, for instance burritos with chile verde (below). Tortillas from previous post, salsas and chile verde to come...

Tortillas de maiz... the corn tortilla.

Corn tortillas are something that I often took for granted. It seemed no matter where I went in the U.S. I could find good to fantastic corn tortillas. Norway has few options: import tortillas or make your own. I had originally been bringing masa and tortillas from the US but I was not quite satisfied with the results from masa. Therefore I decided to start from scratch.

Corn tortillas are made from corn yet the process is not so straight forward. As a kid I tried making them from corn flour/meal with unsuccessful results. The reason for my failure was that the corn had not been treated/processed before it was ground. This process is called "nixtamalization" and this can be done at home. Nixtamalization utilizes an alkaline solution to denature proteins in the corn to make them bio-available (digestible) to us humans. It also makes the resulting dough sticky, allowing it to be used for a tortilla. For this process you can use calcium hydroxide (CaOH) also referred to as pickling lime (this is what I use) as well as wood ash (I have not tried this yet).  Here is the process:

Nixtamalization (for tortillas, tamales, sopas...)

You'll need:
1kg or 2lbs Dried corn (not popcorn nor sweet corn)
CaOH 1 tablespoon
Water

Combine a tablespoon of CaOH (careful this is caustic) with a few oz or a dl of water mix in a stainless bowl and set aside. In a stainless steel pot add the corn and enough water to cover the corn by 1.5 volumes (for example if you have corn filling the pot to 1 liter then fill with water to 2.5 liters).  Add the CaOH solution and set on the burner and bring to a boil for 10-15 minutes. Cover and let the corn sit overnight, 12+ hours.

White corn after sitting overnight in CaOH solution.

White corn before nixtamalization (left) and after (right).

Now the corn is treated the next step is wash the corn and remove the shell. This is done by rubbing the kernels together until most of the shell (the shell should be like peeling skin from a sunburn) is removed (below). 

Grinding the corn 

So this was a bit of work finding a grinder/mill but I ended up finding an antique that works pretty well, although you can also purchase a Corona Corn Grinder at brewer supply companies in Norway or a good food processor might work. Here's a short video of mine at work: 

Here is the resulting flour:

After ground I take warm water and dissolve enough salt until the water tastes like sea water. Here is an important note: too much water and your tortilla will stick to everything and won't stick to itself. So add water slowly until the dough just comes together.

finished dough

Almost there.

Preheat a griddle or pan, you may want to lightly oil the surface to begin with. Next take make a small ball (golfball size) by rolling between your hands. The place between two pieces of plastic and press to a thin tortilla (see below).

Carefully peel back the plastic and set on the very hot griddle

when the tortilla begins to bubble, flip once for another 30-60 seconds depending on heat and remove

Done... here is the basic corn tortilla. We will come back to these in the future to make a variety of  tacos, chips, tostados and other dishes. 

I will next be adding some other basic staples such as beans, rice and salsas so you can start putting together some dishes. 

Spices, ingredients, etc...

Making some dishes here in Norway can be quite difficult because there hasn't been much demand for the necessary ingredients and I find myself importing chiles, corn and other items when I return from visits to the U.S. Although recently I have been finding more and more ingredients at specialty shops in Oslo and I will point out where to get the things you need throughout this blog.

CHILES
Below is a selection chiles/peppers. To the left are fresh green poblanos; moving to the right are anchos, aka pasilla (dried poblano after turning red); next New Mexico Chiles, then Gaudillos these and the aforementioned chiles are quite mild and sweet and are generally used in sauces. The next four can be quite hot and smell smokey. To the right of Gaudillos are chile tepin (spherical, small and pretty hot); below them are chile pequin (pretty similar to the tepin, perhaps slightly smokier); moving to the left are chipotles which are smoked, then dried red jalapenos. To the left again are Chile de Arbol, they are quite hot and I use them in a lot of my salsas.

BEANS and CORN

Beans and Corn are staples in Mexican food and many varieties exist in the Americas. Indigenous farmers have traded, grown and through selection, adapted varieties to local growing climates. In Africa for instance Corn (Maize) has become a staple throughout Africa and new varieties are under continual development for cultivars which are better adapted in terms of yield, drought/disease resistance, etc. to specific localities. Want to know more? Here is a paper from some colleagues: http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0047832   

Pinto Beans (left) and Borlotti Beans (right). I have not been able to find pinto beans in Norway but they grew really well here last summer; the Italian Borlotti bean is a great substitute and can be found in many "grønnsaker torg/buttiker" in Oslo.  

Black Beans (the black ones), White Beans (the white ones) and Borlotti (in the back).

Giant White Corn (right) and Blue Corn (right) used for corn tortillas, posolé (type of soup), etc.

OTHER GOOD STUFF...

Tomatillos "little tomato" these are used in salsa and other sauces and have a distinct citrus/apple taste. A friend said they found these at Thulasy Daglivare in St. Hanshaugen otherwise they grow like weeds in this country. You will need two or more as they do not self-pollinate well... need seeds I have some.

Mexican oregano (Lippia graveolens), while it smells like oregano (Origanum vulgare) the taste is actually quite different and is one of my favorite herbs. 

Bay leaves or laurel can be found everywhere and used in everything...

Flour Tortillas...

One of the most important Mexican food staples is the tortilla. It was actually subsidized in Mexico until 1999. When talking about tortillas there are two types: corn and flour (wheat). Although corn is the most popular in Central/Southern Mexico, the flour tortilla is perhaps more popular in the greater Yuma region. Therefore we will start with flour tortillas then move our way to corn (since I haven't mentioned it yet, everything in this blog will be from scratch... or from seed and guidelines, not so much exact amounts). So flour tortillas "tortillas de harina"...

You will need (one dozen 10 inch (24cm) tortillas):
-Salt
-Water
-Fat- which can be lard (traditional I use lard here), vegetable oil, etc. 
-Flour (pref. bread flour, but all-purpose works nearly as well)

Rule # 1 keep the dough warm! (it's hot in the desert and it will make a difference, I'll explain later)

The first thing I do is heat water in a kettle until it is nearly boiling, then I pour (roughly 2 cups +/- 25%) into a metal bowl and combine ~ one tablespoon of salt (Fig. 1, 2: I'm using rock salt here). The hot water will help dissolve the salt and when dissolved the water should be salty like sea water. 

figure 1

figure 2

figure 3

Next, add the fat. How much? Well I use 20-30% fat for the total volume of liquid. For example if you use 2 cups of water, 1/2 cup will give you 20% and just shy of a cup will give you 30% (higher fat tortillas are easier to roll and usually keep better). Since the water is still hot the fat will melt and bring the temperature of the water down (fig. 3). Set this aside and do two things: first turn on the oven and let it heat for a minute or two until it is roughly 95 F (36 C) then boil water in a small pot until it begins steaming. Place the pot in the bottom of the oven (make sure oven is off). This will create a warm and steamy environment for the dough.

figure 4 (above) fig. 5 (below)

Back to the dough. Now start adding flour. I usually start with a cup and mix the whole thing together, which will make it the consistency of a thick batter. Now I add flour and knead it into the dough until it becomes elastic, firm and does not stick to your hands (fig 4). Continue to knead the dough for a couple of minutes then let it rest in the oven for 5-10 minutes. Pull the dough out and knead it just a few times. Notice anything? The dough should have gone from a little grainy to very elastic and smooth (fig.5). 

Take out a casserole dish and lightly flour the bottom. Now to divide the dough. I eyeball it (1" diameter for tacos, 2" burritos, 3" for burros) you can use a scale or whatever you like. Take heed, from here on the

Figure 6

roundness of the balls will impact the roundness of the tortillas. To get the dough into perfect round balls pinch or pick-up one of your pre-weighed pieces and form a circle with your thumb and forefinger and place the dough in the palm of that hand and begin pushing the dough through the circle with your index finger on your opposite hand (fig 6). 

figure 7

What you are trying to do is create bag or a sock that is folded into itself, image taking a sock and rolling it into itself whereby you continually stretch the outer sock by stuffing the rest of the sock inside it. Once it is round set it on the floured dish and after you're done dividing all the dough, set it in the oven for 30 minutes (fig. 7). *Allowing the dough to rest in a warm place will insure it easy to roll out.*

It's time to make the tortillas (sequence left to below). Heat a pan (high heat, it will smoke), I use cast iron or high carbon iron. Flour the counter top and a ball of dough begin to flatten the ball with palm of you hand until you have made it into a small disc (here is where it really pays off to have warm dough). Next use a rolling pin to roll out the tortilla. I roll away from myself by starting in the center rolling outward. After every stroke I turn the dough 1/4 turn and repeat until the tortilla is very

thin. Shake off any excess flour then into the hot pan. Bubbles will form turn the tortilla when the spots turn dark brown or black. And repeat on the
other side. I directly stack my tortillas it will keep them warm 

I use the pan upside down to make X-large tortillas

and from drying out.

     

Introduction

the Sonoran Desert outside Yuma

Growing up in Yuma, Arizona on the border to Mexico and California is actually quite unique when talking about Mexican food culture. Regionally the food in Mexico changes quite a bit due to culture, emigration and  available ingredients due to growing climate. Yuma, at the nexus of Baja California, California, Arizona and Sonora, is in many respects unique as the local cuisine is a blend of these styles with constant influences coming from Mexico and the U.S. It has been a while now since I have called Yuma home but I still get homesick for hot weather and spicy food. Here I will be showing you how I have overcome latter by giving you the recipes and techniques to make Sonoran style Mexican food (even here in Norway).

Enjoy!