rancho_gordo

I know next to nothing about preparing Asian food but I seem to remember black beans having something to do with fermented soy beans. Am I all wrong?

I also wanted to say how much I love Abra's photo. Those cooked Christmas Lima look really swell! Some people like to puree a cup of beans and add it back to the pot, but I love "pot liquor" just as is it. With these Christmas Limas, the flavor of the liquid is almost beefy. This is a shot of runner beans with trumpet mushrooms but the Christmas Limas would be just as comfortable in a pot of garlic and mushrooms.

I'm pretty lucky to have such supporters! I love hearing what is done with "my children" once they leave home. Ms Ducky says Believe it or not, I agree with you, sort of. Plain old kidneys, navys, Great northern, etc. are bred to produce quickly and a lot. They have none of the nuance of an heirloom bean. It's much like a hard, pink hot house tomato or a Cherokee Purple right off the vine. They are both tomatoes but there's a world of difference. Pintos I still love, if they are fresh. There are several strains of pintos but you want to make sure they are light when you buy them. the dark ones are probably old. I'm with Eilen re Red nightfall. These are sometimes called Mayflower beans and supposedly came to America with the pilgrims. This is a grand story but the bean is Phaelous vulgaris which means it's a New World plant. So much for a good story! But these beautiful little pink balls stay whole and then almost melt in your mouth. Tarbais are a low-yielding bean that I haven't had much luck growing. Their big plus is that they don't fall apart after hours of cooking in a cassoulet. But good substitutes would be marrow (aka marrowfat), Jacobs Cattle or Flageolet. A lot of people think Tarbais are essential to a cassoulet but if you check your Larousse Gastro, you will see there isn't a lot of fidelity on which bean to use. If you get the syndicated TV show In Wine Country on your local NBC affiliate, there's a story on Rancho Gordo on December 16. And another on Manresa's David Kinch as well.

Was this the one we stayed at? If so, Hotel Santa Prisca.

I do what I can! Pozoleria Tia Calla. Re: Izote. I've heard of people having less than stellar meals there but there is no way I would go back to DF without eating there again. For a point of reference, I couldn't care less about "fine dining" and and I really dislike the neighborhood. I cook a lot and love to be surprised. I can still taste the deer in the achiote paste, the ant eggs in tortillas, but most especially the shrimp in the fabulous mole of hibiscus flowers.

Somone PM'd me about this thread. I wish I'd known sooner. From my experience: Maseca is a fine product. Until you are really skilled at tamales I would recommend you use the tamal version (as opposed to the finer tortilla version) of Maseca. You have plenty of other things to worry about making tamales, like sourcing good manteca and folding techniques. If you insist on making your own masa, you need to find large field corn that is dried, soak it in water and Cal and then rub the skins off and then grind it (while moist). This is great but it's also for channel swimmers, if you know what I mean. My posole product is known as "prepared hominy". You soak it and simmer it and it explodes like a flower and is beyond delicious in a stew known by the same name. It is from the American southwest and indigenous to the Native Americans. I've never seen anything like it in Mexico. They tend to use a bigger kernel and more often than not, the product is canned. I think the posole is a nicer product and has a nicer "tooth" to it. The kernels aren't obscenly large, either. In Mexixo, pozole (with a "z") refers only to the dish. In the US, posole (with an "s") refers to the dish and to hominy. But unless you are an expert at masa textures for tamales, I wouldn't go this route. If you to have a tortilla factory near you, you will be able to buy masa para tamales, the coarser grain, but double check. There's a better than good chance they're using Maseca and then you might as well do it yourself.

Good value, great food, not great service and no wait to get in.

I know I'm going to regret this, but it's also a fact that you may cure starvation and disease through education, funding and charity. But Monsanto and ADM won't be making a profit on that. You could give a third world farmer an eduaction and some real seed that can continue through seed saving and really make a difference. Or you can give him seed that is going to cross with his pure corn and make the new seed sterile and the farmer dependent on Monsanto. Just my 2 cents.

Here's a link to a depressing story on the state of Mexican tortillas. More and more "fresh" tortillas are made from Maseca masa harina rather than masa. One taste will tell you this isn't progress.

I'm always afraid to mention this name because I often get my head bit off but what a room and what a view and I enjoy the wine!

You'll have to forgive us in the Texas forum about our general lack of knowledge on that other pico de gallo that people mention from time to time. To us, pico de gallo is the roughly chopped salsa. But the powdered chile stuff can be found in Austin if you look for it (at places like Fiesta). ← There's nothing to forgive! My first thought when I hear Pico de Gallo is salsa cruda or salsa fresca, but BigboyDan said it wasn't a salsa so I was confused and trying to think of other things it could be. Thanks for that link. It helps make the other meaning of Pico de Gallo make sense. I'll stick to salsa cruda for my own sanity!

Just want to be clear- I never used sprouts!

I haven't purchased store-bought salsa in 15 years! But I'm confused. Pico de Gallo is salsa fresca, salsa cruda, salsa whatever, right? It's just chopped by hand and not blended. But I was having the problem of the eggs not setting well. I think as BBDan has said, is that you have to do it at a lower heat, or as I did, scramble the eggs and then add the extras once set abit but not too firm. Well, if it matters, it was in Mexico! I'm learning more and more it's hard to say what is "Mexican" in such a regional place. Although I will admit I've yet to see sprouts on the avocados.

FWIW, Patricia Quintana includes guacamole in her book Mulli, El libro de los moles. Actually several recipes. I think when Yanks say mole, they mean mole Poblano. I used to think a martini was gin, vermouth and ice, stirred and strained in to a chilled cocktail glass. I just don't have the fight in me any more! I'm surprised Zarela would be so sloppy when she wrote a seminal book on Oaxaca!

Then what is it? I've see jicama dipped in chile powder called pico de gallo. Maybe it's a regional thing.

I made the dish using the first post as a guide (I guess I made mee-GUS instead of Migas!) and it was good except I had trouble getting the eggs to set with the salsa in it. I don't think this is a problem particular to this dish. Don't eggs scramble better without stuff in them? The next round I cooked the fresh salsa a bit, removed it and then scrambled the eggs in the leftover oil and when mostly set added the salsa back and the tortillas.

You could take it one step further and eat food actually grown in Napa at Grandpa Jacks Farm. They grow, sell and deliver in Napa. They sell at all the farmers markets as well.

Read the article One Armed Mirepoix at Leite's. What a great article. I found it really fascinating and of course felt a sense of pride knowing he was "one of us". To think, I knew him when.... Conratulations and I hope you keep writing. It's clearly a natural gift!

Since you asked: From a graphic design standpoint, it looks like three sections that don't go together. The top script looks loke Mistral, which is pretty overused as it comes with Word and every fancy office party invite uses it). The script with the wines names doesn't match the Mistral. Two different scripts on a page like this isn't always a good idea. Personally, I'd make the word CRU bigger and justified so it fills out the box (and suggests the GRAND that proceeds it). I like that your name and number seem to be the same font as the wine descriptions.

I'd suggest that you serve the carnitas on the side, along with sliced avocadoes, or make some quac. ← Carnitas and guacamole are divine. I guess the carnitas just ain't rich enough by themselves! I was going to make migas but I ended up making chilaquiles because I was a little confused by the migas recipe. Are the tortillas fried? Is that why they're crispy?

I tend not to go out a whole lot, but given the choice, this is the first place I'd go. I've been 4 or 5 times. You get the feeling you are eating the food of a chef, not a menu designed by a corporate marketing committee, which many NV restaurants seem to have. Disclaimer: Pilar is a client. It's a small valley!

For the record, I checked all my Diana Kennedy books and Bayless too and couldn't find a baked chilaquiles recipe. Kennedy's Guanajuato version (one of many)is heated through in the oven to melt the cheese. I found one reference to them baked and it was from a book by a Nortena, so that would make sense if chilaquiles are baked in the southwest. I'm going to try the Austin version of migas, if time permits, tomorrow morning.

There's still plenty of content in each issue. It's the only food magazine left that I'm actually happy to see, the others seem almost like work to make my way through.

I was a cocktail fanatic for years and started at a young age. I found The Gentlemen's Companion and The South American Gentlemen's Companion in a used bookstore and these were my bibles for both and food and drink. They hold up remarkably well. I even had a small career as a bartender and then a B-list media personality right before the whole lounge thing happened. At one pont I read David Embury's The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks and I came to the conclusion that there were lots of fun and silly drinks but there were really only five or so classics. I stuck with these for years but when the era of chocolate martinis and apple martinis and shaken martinis descended upon us, I sort of gave up and switched to tequila, beer or wine. I almost never drink cocktails anymore and I'm not sure why. Actually, I don't drink much at all. But I'll never say never and maybe there's another cocktail revival within me yet. This is my very long-winded way of saying that Embury's book was seminal for me and I don't know if it's still in print but my memory is that it's worth having.

I think the bigger point is the current system isn't working. It is being propped up artificially. If Whole Foods and Pollan and the rest of the food movement want to have adult conversations, listen, consider a few sides of the issue and really put their best minds to work, I don't see how that's a problem. It may be really easy to criticize but it's not a problem. It's a great thing.