Nancy in Pátzcuaro

We've stayed in our share of Walmart parking lots. The best, however, was on the way home from buying our Pleasure-Way van (from Tampa to Colorado). We inquired at a small truck stop if we could park overnight, and they said OK. So we maneuvered the van into a level spot kinda in the middle of a big open lot. I don't even remember where this was. It had been a long day figuring out how to drive the van, how to hook up, how to winterize on the fly (this was in early January, and there were freeze warnings as far south as Biloxi.) So we climbed into bed and immediately fell asleep. The next morning we opened the curtains and realized that we were surrounded by semis, some of them running their generators. Fortunately we had a path to get out. Adventures in RVing! The first of many in our case.

My grandfather was born in El Paso in 1895. Every time I think about that I can almost imagine the dusty streets and the hot dry climate. He rode a horse as if he'd been born on horseback. Time marches on, however, and El Paso has too.

Glad to hear that you ultimately located some Mennonite cheese. We can get it here at Costco in large blocks, but I've seen the signs along the highway in Chihuahua advertising cheese from Mennonite farms. It's very mild, except for the one with chiles in it, and it melts well. (One of these trips we should stop to see if there are other flavors, but by that time in the trip we're heading for the border and are reluctant to stop.) Around here we use queso fresco for chiles rellenos. Somewhere in the archives is a post I made several years ago called My Spanish Teacher's Chiles Rellenos. They're finished in a light tomato broth that doesn't make them soggy. I agree that it's a real production to make them--roast and peel the chiles (and be sure to buy flat ones, not curved or curly because they're easier to roast and peel), stuff them with queso fresco, batter them (separate the eggs and beat the whites), fry them, and then finish them in the tomato broth. Not something you do for everyday consumption but very delicious for a special occasion. In fact you can spread out the steps over several days, including frying them and putting them in the fridge to be finished later in the tomato broth. When I make them I put on some good music and plan to spend a couple of hours on the process. The beauty part of these chiles rellenos is that they are also delicious the next day. In fact my Spanish teacher actually prefers them the second day. She taught me a good trick for roasting poblanos--rub each chile with a very light coating of oil. It makes the skin pop off faster so that the chile doesn't overcook. I make a chile relleno casserole-type dish for breakfast that has all the same ingredients (roasted chiles, queso fresco) but deconstructed: tear the chiles into thick rajas (strips), layer them with slices of queso fresco, mix eggs and milk together with S&P and some red or green ground chile, pour over the chiles and queso, crumble queso fresco on top and bake. It's always well received, even when people are somewhat leery of spicy food. Every now and then you'll find a poblano that's hotter than most, of course. As for cheese specific to Michoacan, I can't think of one. Given the quantity of goats around here you'd think someone would be making cheese, but they raise these goats for meat, not cheese making. In general Mexican cheese is disappointing, especially considering the vast variety of fine cheeses in the rest of the world. In general cheeses are used for cooking but not as part of a cheese plate, for instance.

I'm showing my age here, but do you remember when tables in "ladies' tea rooms" had hooks on the corners so you could hang your purse there? That was the equivalent of the perchera. As to the spelling, I've only just heard the word, not read it. And it may be the feminine form because it's primarily for women's purses, less so for men's hats. In many ways it's really a miniature coat rack, isn't it? Spanish uses many words in different ways--very economical. Context is very important when using the same word to mean something different.

It's called a perchera ( may have the spelling wrong) and it's for hanging purses or hats or jackets, anything that you don't want to have on the table. They are in every Mexican restaurant. It's considered bad form or possibly bad luck to put your purse on the floor.

Nick Danger. God, I miss Firesign Theater!

Yes, but consider the consequences. Many an deceased old drunk made that mistake.

I am trying a new philosophy this year. Normally in Colorado I'd have started my tomato seeds in early March to plant out in early/mid June, but because the summer here is very rainy I had to plant them in pots under the portal of my house to avoid the inevitable rot from too much water. This year I started my seeds in January and have planted out 4 plants in the garden--Yellow Pear, Mexico Midget, Cherokee Purple and Juliet. All but Juliet are open pollinated and all are indeterminate. The plants are growing lustily, blooming and starting to set fruit. I hope this schedule works because tomatoes grown under a roof (albeit with plenty of light) in pots have proved to be adequate at best and sometimes downright disappointing. However I'm having the same problems as some of you in getting pepper seeds to germinate. I have one feeble little shishito with its first true leaves, but nothing more. I'll try again but I'm not sure what difference it will make. I haven't' had this problem before.

I'm going to have to order that book--the table of contents convinced me. There's a kind of "cute-cute" quality that is annoying (at least to me) but I can overlook that if the recipes are worth it. I have it on my wish list but I may jump the gun if friends can bring it when they come. Or I'll order it to be sent to our US address and tell my sister she can use it until we get there in June.

No to fish and cheese in general. Specific recipes can be good, but as a rule I don't like this combination.

No--bucatini is hollow and this pasta was not. If bigoli weren't made with whole wheat flour, that would be the most likely. Thanks, though.

It was solid.

There was The Blue Parrot, a restaurant I used to go to many years ago in Louisville, CO (louis-ville not looeyville) where my favorite was thick spaghetti with red sauce and a sausage patty. Not fancy, but a family place where old Italian miners used to come to drink grappa in a corner booth, eat the food of their youth, play dominos and argue. I'm afraid the old joint, if it still existed after all these years, burned in the Marshall fire a year ago. So much of that town burned, but perhaps the center was spared. I sure hope so. I could go for some thick spaghetti with red sauce and a sausage patty right now, but unfortunately I'm over 1,500 miles away. (Actually, there were 2 Italian restaurants in town, probably owned by members of the same family. The other one was, I think, named Colacci's. Both are probably gone now, either overcome by the newer ways of cooking, or buned.) What is the name of that thick spaghetti? I'm sure the shape has a name--they all do.

That reminds me of a story I read in the New York Times earlier this week. I thought it was a real howler, and at least some of the commenters thought the same thing although others were far too shirty about it. (I stopped reading comments after about the 10th one.) I give you, as a gift from a NYT Subscriber, this great read from Caity Witter: I Lived the #VanLife. It Wasn't Pretty. My husband and I both thought it was a set-up. I mean, really? A reluctant, inexperienced, frightened driver with a lousy sense of direction and a mistaken idea of life on the road, prone to claustrophobia and and unable to park. What could go wrong? As someone who has traveled and lived in a van--admittedly larger and better equipped than the one in the story--for months, it's quite a bit better than this. But I'm sure it was deliberately contrived to be very humorous for its intended audience. I thought she sounded like a complete twit.

There have been so many food discoveries that it's hard to choose just one. Snails, what a friend described as "an excuse to have garlic butter"; avocados, which my parents thought tasted like soap; artichokes, already mentioned; Chinese food, especially Sichuan; Mexican food from all parts of the country, though my first experience at age 10 was tacos at a small restaurant somewhere in Arizona; the many varieties of "International" foods changed my palate forever. But if I have to choose just one, it would have to be rare beef. My parents were from Chicago and the tiniest hint of pink meant the meat wasn't "done." So in place of dry, chewy, tasteless lumps of coal I learned how beef was supposed to taste. (By the way, I quit cigarettes in 1977, on a trip to Scotland, and that improved my ability to enjoy my food. Though I never could cozy up to haggis.)

Friends of ours have a 10,000 acre ranch in New Mexico, between Gallup and Grants and adjacent to the Zuni reservation. They raise organic grass-fed beef that they sell through a co-op. Every time I eat their beef I'm reminded that this is what beef should taste like. We don't eat much beef, but when we do we want it to be good. Often people complain that grass-fed beef is tough and gamy, but that depends on how the cattle are handled on the range and in the rendering plant. A cow that's had a lot of exercise immediately before slaughter will be tough. The stress of being crammed into a cattle car also affects tenderness (or the lack thereof). There's a reason that the term "cattle car" has gotten such a bad reputation--3 levels of cattle with no room to turn around plus the fear that accompanies the road trip. Our friends harvest a few cows at a time and they transport them to the slaughterhouse in Moriarty in their own much smaller stock trailer. As happy as a cow can be, given that they ultimately end up on our plates, their cows are content. They also have carefully created their own genetic line, selecting for tenderness and fat content (which can be measured by ultrasound), so they're reluctant to leave the cattle business and therefore losing that valuable genetic profile. They're getting older and have a second home near us in Patzcuaro, so they're gradually selling off the herd to ranchers that they know will value that genetic line.

Has anyone ever read M. F. K. Fisher's How to Cook a Wolf? Published in 1942 in the midst of serious rationing, and revised by the author in 1951. There's some recipes in that book that look good even now. She's always been one of my favorite food writers.

Love it! If I shop in our local mercado I will find only white-skinned and red-skinned onions, and occasionally smaller white ones like you'd use to pickle. Never scallions or shallots. I can find yellow onions in large grocery stores in Morelia if I happen to be there. I've just grown accustomed to using the white and red ones. Almost all white onions are sold with their greens still attached, though you pay for that (they're sold by weight). The vendor always asks if you want to have the tops removed, which they generally do by just ripping them off by hand. I have a huge amount of garlic chives in the garden. Their delicate flowers are a nice addition in mixed flower arrangements. But they have very little garlic flavor or aroma so I use them in place of regular round chives.

Depending on how coarse (or fine) your molcajete is, it may take a very long time to prepare it for real use. Some are made from fine grained stone, but the best ones in terms of usage are a little coarser. We did the white rice grinding for ours and have used it for years to make guacamole and salsas. I've never heard about molcajetes made from concrete either. I would look for a good one at Mexican stores, like a carnecerIa. My only advice is to keep on grindin', baby! Over time and consistent usage it will become smoother and smoother. I'm sure we ingested some bits of stone over the years but it hasn't done us any harm as far as I can tell. Every Mexican household has one (or more). Of course, if you don't want to keep grinding, you can always use it as an attractive decorative item, but my husband refuses to make guacamole without one.

That's true. I was so taken by the concept of chicken testicles that I diverged from the topic. But of course they have testicles--don't know why it surprised me.

I was talking about cattle, although many ranchers probably have a few chickens. They are generally not interested in harvesting chicken "dainties," and I'm sure most young roosters are eaten with their testicles intact. Bull calves are routinely castrated to turn them into steers, which are meat animals. Only the best calves are left intact as breeders, and not very many of those. Too many bulls in the pasture makes for a lot of trouble, as you can well imagine. Most ranchers only have a few, depending on the size of their herds, and the bulls are generally kept separate from the cows except during breeding. At least they were where I grew up in Colorado.

Where I come from, they're also known as "bull fries." Many years ago there was a barbecue restaurant near Glenwood Springs (CO) that served them, but you'll be hard pressed to find them on many menus these days. Ranchers, of course, have ample access to them. I'll have to ask our rancher friends if they ever eat them. I would think a day of castrating calves would kinda put you off anything like that, though.

I'd serve it with cole slaw and corn bread. I don't think rice is usually served with chili, but guacamole is always welcome.

It's ubiquitous here in México. I find it particularly refreshing in hot weather.

I just read on the King Arthur Baking blog that using crust dust--a 1:1 mix of flour and sugar--sprinkled evenly on the bottom crust of a fruit pie can prevent the dreaded "soggy bottom." It seems eminently reasonable to me, but I wonder if anyone else does this? Does it work? I trust the King Arthur people but I'm interested in other peoples' experience.