gulfporter

This is a series that began earlier this year but we just happened upon it. Watched the 1st show of season about pizza and enjoyed it. Fast moving with lots of debate about WHAT a pizza is. From Brooklyn to Naples to Tokyo to.......Domino's. Host is Chef David Chang of Momofuku fame.

Local blueberries....kids walk around selling from cardboard boxes (our version of a farmers market). Never seen them this big before. We couldn't find any US coins for a proper size comparison so used a Bic pen cap.

On our first trip to New Mexico in the early 1980s we found ourselves outside Los Alamos (great museum BTW), in a hurry and hungry and saw a Pizza Hut. Any port in a storm. Well, they offered Hatch chilies as a topping....our first taste of them. Blown away is putting it mildly. When I made pizza in Arizona I always topped with roasted Hatch chilies (or other green chilies) as there were chili roasters set up outside a few grocery stores in Douglas and Sierra Vista nearly year round.

We don't see mustard used with pizza here....many things in MX are local. Yes to pickled jalapenos....I have asked for raw jalapenos but never found a place that had them. Same with hamburguesas.....always pickled. On hamburguesas, yes mustard used by the locals and LOTS of it.

When we first began visiting Mexico in 2006 I did my best to learn "food" words first. Quite proudly one night in San Miguel de Allende I phoned in a pizza order, un grande con salchicha, correctly translating sausage. Well......salchicha on a pizza in Mexico turned out to be hot dogs. Not crisped up or blackened or grilled or even fried....just warmish thick rounds of sliced, cheap hot dogs. FFWD 10+ years and nowadays most MXN pizza menus include topping listing for both salchicha and another for salchicha Italiano. All orders of pizza still come with ketchup packets 😝

I am a natural southpaw but I play all sports right-handed as my Dad and brothers taught me sports as a kid. They never had issues with my writing and eating with my left hand. I was a quiet kid with good grades, until I came home from 3rd grade with my first report card, that had an F in penmanship. I had never told my parents that this teacher would not let me write with my left hand. My parents, neither of whom graduated HS and didn't speak English until age 7, had never challenged a teacher before (I had 2 older brothers). But they went to the school the next day and talked to the principal. I was allowed to write with my left hand after that. This was in the early 1960s.

We always have fresh quince here this time of year. A town just to the north of us is called Ixtlahuacan de los Membrillos (Membrillos = Quince).....they just had their annual fiesta which features quince in all forms, shapes and sizes. The woman from whom I bought the ate' (paste) is from there. I bought so much of it I am trying to come up with other uses for it and we don't see chutney for sale here (other than high-priced imports). I am hoping the ate' will add the quince flavor to what would otherwise be an apple chutney. I don't recall seeing dried apples here but can't say that I have looked for them. Here is a recent story on the annual July fiesta in Ixtlahuacan. We have gone to it in the past and like all small town fiestas, it is a wondrous experience. https://theguadalajarareporter.net/index.php/expat-living/expat-living/lake-chapala/community-news/52141-ixtlahuacan-hosts-summer-festivities

Known here as Ate de Membrillo. There was a woman selling her homemade quince paste on the street today. I bought way too much, though it was only 20 pesos worth. We like it as part of a cold plate with prosciutto or smoked salmon, etc. I also insert it into a grilled ham and cheese sandwich with a spicy mustard. Now I am thinking of using it as part of a chutney. Had a quince tree at our Bisbee AZ home and made quince chutneys a lot. But this time I would be using quince paste, not the fruit. Maybe simmer some onions, raisins and jalapenos with vinegar and spices (cardamom and ginger for sure), add diced fresh apple toward the end (like when they keep a bit of their shape). Let it cool down then add the diced quince paste. I think the mouth feel of the soft quince paste will be good, though I could just add it to the hot ingredients instead, and let it melt down??? Any opinions on this? Or any ideas on other uses for the paste?

Will be in CDMX for a week next month. Apartment is in Roma Norte near Chapultepec Park. Haven't been to the City for a few years. Have eaten at Pujol, Azul Condesa and Contramar but looking for newer adventures. Has anyone been to the new (to us) MercadoRoma? Also there is/was a full-time culinary school that served meals a few days a week....I cannot find the name after a day of googling. Anyone know this place? It was in the Condesa neighborhood but school was on break last time we tried to eat there. Any other restaurant recommendations would be much appreciated.

I baked madeleines this morning. Tonight.....and this is Big News from my little Mexican village....we are going to the grand opening of a French restaurant (only 2 blocks away). The couple (he's French and she's Mexican) have been open almost a year with a divine bakery and also serving breakfast; while we never go out for breakfast, their bakery is extraordinary. They are doing a prix fix meal (pate' or salad; coq au vin, beef bourguignon or ratatouille; and dessert (I forget the selections). Are you celebrating Bastille Day with a French treat or two?

I just remembered that for my Dad's birthday, his cake was a scratch Red Velvet with a Crisco-based fluffy frosting (that started with a sort of roux).

CNN reporting this now. Apparent suicide. In France filming and found in hotel room by his friend Chef Eric Ripert. RIP.

I sometimes buy Diet Squirt here in MX, but mostly we 'brew' decaf iced tea in the sun and drink it unsweetened. Or agua mineral which is cheap and everywhere. I prefer agua mineral with lunches when I am not having a wine. While wine pairs well with foods and IMO enhances the dining experience, I never drink a flavored beverage (not even iced tea) with meals when not having wine (or beer which I drink with spicy meals, nothing else).

The birthday cakes of my siblings and all my cousins in the 1950s to early 1960s was always a Duncan Hines white layer cake mix with homemade peanut butter frosting. No idea how that evolved considering neither my mother nor aunt were cooks who went outside the norms of the day. Was it the norm for other families of that era??? BTW, when my mother made the Duncan Hines white cake mix at other times during the year, she always used the whole egg. Only separated the egg whites for birthday cakes.