Mexico Cooks!

Pozole Estilo Jalisco, in Memory of doña María Medina

Doña María López viuda de Medina, Tijuana, Baja California.  In front of her house, 1983.  We met at Mass in early 1981 and became fast friends over a pot of her home-made pozole.  Doña is an honorific for an older, respected woman--don is the masculine counterpart.

Traditionally, pozole starts with the head of a pig.  The head is always smiling as it hangs on your butcher's hook, waiting to go in the pot.  If you can't get a pig head from your butcher, use pork shoulder, pork butt, really meaty pork neck bones, or a combination of all three.

In early 1981, I tasted pozole for the first time.  My soon-to-be-dear friend, doña María Medina (RIP), who owned a five-stool working-man's food counter restaurant in Tijuana, invited me to her tiny kitchen to dine.  Doña María was originally from Jalisco and was shocked that I'd been in Mexico for all of three or four months and had never eaten the thick, rich, pork, chile and corn soup that I soon learned was pozole.  I was such a neophyte that until she asked me if I'd eaten it, I'd actually never heard of pozole, but I couldn't let doña María know that.  Because I knew doña María, I knew I was in for a treat, even though I had no idea what it was going to be.  We set a date for me to eat pozole at home with her.

The day arrived.  Doña María escorted me into her kitchen and sat me down at her table for two.  Large pottery bowls were at our places, ready for the dishing-up.  Meat, already sliced, lay on the counter next to a huge aluminum pot.  Next to the pot she had laid out bowls of thinly sliced radishes, onion diced small, shredded cabbage, whole dried Mexican orégano, and powdered chile de árbol.  She put several slices of meat into each of our bowls, ladled what seemed to me a bathtub of rich-smelling, steaming soup on top, and garnished each bowlful with the condiments.  Smiling proudly, she put the bowls on the table.  I thought she was ready to sit down with me, but no.

Instead, she looked at my bowl.  "Te falta carne."  (You don't have enough meat.)  She put my bowl on the counter again and picked up an extra-extra long two-tined fork.  Down into the soup pot it went, and up it came again.  To my horror, impaled on the fork was a huge pig head.  My eyes were the size of big white Mexican onions.  She sliced meat from the cheek and piled it into my bowl.  "Ahora sí, provecho!"  ("Now then, bon appetit!")  She sat down, and we dug in.

It's nearly thirty years and a lot of pozole later, but I still can't get the image of that first pig head out of my mind.  If you've toured with me in a market in Mexico, you've already heard that story.

Readers who are familiar with the southwestern United States might be confused by the Spanish word pozole.  In New Mexico and other parts of the southwest, the word is spelled "posole" and is the word used for the corn prepared for the soup.  Here in Mexico, the words for the corn are the Náhuatl words cacahuatzintle and/or nixtamal, while the soup itself is called pozole (with a 'z').

My good friend Rolly Brook (RIP) has once again given me permission to use some of his excellent photos to illustrate the preparation of pozole.  He photographed his friend Doña Martha (RIP) as she prepared this marvelous soup.  

Rolly and doña Martha lived in Lerdo, in the northern Mexican state of Durango.  Her pozole is slightly different from that of the central state of Jalisco, above all in its condiments, but the basic recipes are sisters.

Doña Martha puts the cleaned pig head into the pot with the spices and flavorings.  The prepared cacahuatzintle  and the chiles go into the pot last. 


Dried red corn kernels for making Jalisco-style pozole rojo.
          
Traditional Pozole from Jalisco State

Ingredients

1 cleaned pig head.  Leave the teeth and eyes in the head.  Ask the butcher to clean it for you.  At home, you simply have to wash the pig head well in cold water.

12-15 liters of water for cooking the broth, etc.

3 kilos (about 7.5 lbs) espinazo (pork backbone), shoulder, or butt, or a combination of the three meats.

1 kilo (about 2.2 lbs) nixtamal-ized cacahuatzintle (dried field corn, preferably red for Jalisco-style pozole), or an equal amount of corn for pozole, already prepared and preferably red.  You'll find prepared corn in the refrigerator section of many Latin grocers.  In a pinch you can use canned hominy, but it's not the same.  It's much too soft and bland.

10-12 chiles guajillo
6 chiles ancho
One large whole white onion, peeled
An entire large head of garlic, peeled
Cumin seeds, not too many as you don't want cumin to overwhelm the flavors of the pozole
Bay leaves
Sprigs of fresh orégano
Sprigs of thyme
A clove or two
A splash of vinegar
Sea salt to taste

Garnishes
Finely shredded cabbage
Thinly sliced radishes
Minced white onion
Avocados, to be sliced and added to the pozole by each diner
Limón criollo (key lime) to squeeze into the pozole
Salsa roja muy picante (really hot red sauce, preferably home made)
Mexican orégano to crumble into the pozole
Sea salt to taste

Serve with tostadas.

Preparation
Two days ahead of serving, begin to prepare the dried corn for the pozole.  This process results in nixtamal. 

Clean the dried corn kernels by picking through them and removing any stray corn husk pieces, rocks or other field rubble from them.  Rinse the kernels well and drain.

Put the water in a large pot over a high flame.  Add a tablespoon or two of calcium hydroxide (builder's lime) to the water.  

Put the corn into the water/calcium hydroxide mixture and bring to a simmer.  Allow to cook for about 45 minutes.  Do not boil, boiling will ruin the corn.  Remove from the pot from the heat and allow cool overnight in its liquid.

When the corn is cool, rinse it well under running water and rub it in a heavy towel (or in your bare hands) to remove the skin from the kernels.  The cooked kernels should be white or pale yellow.



OPTIONAL: Use your thumb nails or a small sharp knife to remove the hard pedicel (the little piece of the corn kernel that holds the kernel to the cob) from the narrow end of each kernel.  This step is hideously time-consuming and mind-numbingly boring, but removing the pedicel allows the kernels to "flower", or open up.  Many cooks in Mexico have stopped doing this part, but you might want to try it at least once.  I did this the first time I made pozole, in spite of the fact that my housekeeper said, "You're not really doing that!" and laughed at me the whole time I struggled at the job.  

Put the cleaned kernels back in the pot and cover with water to about 3" above the kernels.  Cook over medium heat until the kernels flower, about three hours.  Do not stir the corn while it cooks, but you might want to skim the top of the water from time to time. 

Once the corn kernels are tender, add salt to taste.  Many cooks don't add salt until the kernels are soft, saying that they will toughen.

Reserve the now-nixtamal-ized cacahuatzintle for later use in the pozole.

Grind all the spices except the chiles, the garlic, and the onion until they are fine powder.  Put the pig head into a large pot and add water to cover.  Add the fresh garlic, the ground spices and the whole onion.  Reserve the chiles and the corn for pozole for later use.

Trim the espinazo and pork butt or shoulder into large pieces.  Add this meat to the pot along with the whole onion.  Simmer the meats for approximately an hour and a half. 

Prepare the dried guajillo chiles by slitting them open and removing the stems and the seeds.  The guajillo is not spicy at all, but adds wonderful flavor and color to pozole broth.

Simmer the chiles while the pork meats cook.  The chiles need to cook for an hour or slightly more.  When the chiles are soft, put them in a blender and purée them with some of their cooking liquid until they are very, very smooth.

Doña Martha eases the nixtamal into the pot.

When the meats are tender, remove the head, the espinazo, and the other meats from the pot and reserve.  Add the prepared corn kernels and the puréed chiles to the pot and continue to simmer over low heat for another hour.

While we wait for the meats to cook, here's a list of the parts of the pig that people really like in their pozole:
--Oreja, slices of ear 
--Cachete, slices of cheek
--Trompo, slices of snout 
--Lengua, slices of tongue
--Ojo, the eyeballs 

You can have your pozole with maciza (just the meaty pork butt or spine) or surtido (a selection of all the meats on this list plus some maciza).

This is not a fish.  My favorite butcher removed an eye from a pig head and laid it on a piece of maciza (raw pork shoulder).  He's a big jokester, and you know me--I'm a little weird.

While the pot of nixtamal-ized corn simmers, slice the meat off the head--the cheeks are particularly delicious!--and slice the rest of the meats into serving-size pieces.  Reserve the eyeballs for your guest of honor.

The finished product!  Serve with a pile of crunchy- tostadas on the side.

Just before serving, put a big ladle-full or more of corn kernels and broth into individual large pozole bowls.  Add several slices of meat to each bowl, on top of the corn kernels.  At table, each eater adds his or her own condiments according to taste.  I like mine with crumbled orégano, a soup spoon of minced onion, a big squeeze of limón, a fistful of sliced radishes, some sea salt, a lot of shredded cabbage, a couple of slices of avocado, and a spoonful or two of salsa roja--in other words, a little of everything!

Espérate, te falta carne!  Ahora sí, provecho!  (Wait, you need more meat!  Okay, now, enjoy!)

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Good Friday Silent Procession of Penitence :: Procesión del Silencio, Morelia, Michoacán

Nuestra Señora de Dolores (Our Lady of Sorrows) leads the procession.  Hooded members of various Catholic cofradías (confraternities, or religious organizations founded in Europe) carry life-size statues on their wooden platforms approximately three kilometers through Morelia's Centro Histórico.

Nuestra Señora de Dolores (detail).

Drummers marked the beat of Morelia's penitential Procesión del Silencio, Good Friday's silent procession commemorating both the crucifixion of Christ and his Mother's grief.  Only the drumbeat breaks the silence along the route.

Jesus during la Oración en el Huerto (praying in the Garden of Gethsemane), just prior to his arrest on Holy Thursday night.  Boy Scouts (like the young man in red at the bottom right of the photo) hold the protective rope all along the route of the procession.

Hundreds of cofradía members marched in the still of this Good Friday night.  Foreigners, particularly those from the United States, are often shocked by the hoods, which seem to them to be tragic cultural reminders of the Ku Klux Klan.  In Mexico, there is no association between the two.  The procession is penitential and the hoods are a guarantee of anonymity and humility for the cofradía members.  They believe that humility and works of charity are best practiced anonymously.

 
Semana Santa (Holy Week) cofradías originated in 9th century Europe as pious organizations and arrived in Mexico with the earliest Spanish settlers. The figures in the 2017 photo above are from Seville, Spain, and are made of white chocolate.  Photo courtesy Jane Bachner King.

Roman soldiers.

The majority of Morelia's Procesión del Silencio takes place after dark, by candlelight.  

The Legion of Christ carry their banner and their lamps.  The Procesión del Silencio lasts about five hours.  During that time, all of Morelia's Centro Histórico is closed to vehicular traffic.

Jesus carries the cross a cuestas (on his back) to Calvary.  More than 50,000 spectators stand along the entire route of Morelia's Procesión del Silencio.

Candle holders are made of many materials, from crystal to styrofoam to metal.


Penitents from one of Morelia's confraternities carry their crosses the length of the procession.  Many march barefoot through the city streets.  This year, the procession celebrated more than 40 years' existence.

Robed and hooded members of another Catholic confraternity carry this image, the Cristo del Entierro (Christ of the Burial), nailed to the cross prior to his elevation.  Hoods cover the faces of those who march as a sign of penitence.

Clothed in gold and black, these marching penitents carry huge metal torches.

Six men of all ages carry Cristo Muerto (the dead Christ), while six others follow as relief when the burden of the image, the platform, the lights, and the flowers becomes too heavy.  The man at the far right of the photo carries one of two saw horses used to support the platform during occasional pauses in the procession.

At the end of the Procesión del Silencio, la Virgen de la Soledad (Our Lady of Solitude) follows the body of her crucified Son.  The platform bearing her image holds burning candles, a purple and gold velvet canopy, and banks of fresh flowers.

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Delicious Mexican Pork in Some of Its Infinite Varieties!

This young butcher at a local market is packing longaniza (a type of spicy Mexican pork sausage) into its casings.

Mexico is one of the largest producers and consumers of pork in the world, second only to China.  In spite of the 'swine flu' crisis several years ago, Mexico continues to eat pork at a record-breaking pace and, every year, to export millions of tons of pork to other countries.  (FIRA) 

From the growers' farms to a rastro (slaughterhouse) is a speedy ride along one of Mexico's super-highways.  A truck like this one, loaded with pigs, is an everyday sight throughout Mexico.  Photo courtesy ROTOV.

Mexico is not nearly as squeamish as the United States in seeing where its carne de cerdo (pork meat) comes from.  In fact, a stroll through just about any city market or tianguis (street market) will give ample evidence that meat--including pork meat--comes from an animal, not from a sterile, platic-wrapped styrofoam meat tray at a supermarket.  


Every part of the pig is used in Mexico's kitchens.  The head is ordinarily used to make pozole, a rich stew of pork meat, reconstituted dried corn, spices, and condiments.  

No pork existed in Mexico until after the Spanish conquest; in fact, no domestic animals other than the xoloitzcuintle dog were used for food.  The sources of animal protein were fish, frogs, and other water creatures, wild Muscovy-type ducks, the javalí (wild boar), about 200 varieties of edible insects, doves and the turkey, all native to what is now Mexico.  


Mexico has been cooking head-to-tail since long before that notion came into international vogue.  Pig tails are used here for roasting--look for recipes for rabo de cerdo asado (roast pig tail).  In addition, when a butcher is preparing pork carnitas, tails, ears, snouts, tongues, and indeed, everything but the squeal goes into the cazo (enormous cooking cauldron used to boil carnitas in lard).


A carnitas taco from Quiroga, Michoacán.  

No matter that just below these jolly mariachi pigs at Mexico City's Mercado de Jamaica, their counterparts lie ready for the butcher's knife.  These fellows play on!


Chicharrón (fried pig skin) is prepared fresh every day by butchers whose specialty is pork.  Nothing goes to waste. In fact, a large percentage of the pig skins used to make chicharrónes are imported to Mexico from the United States, where the market for pig skin is relatively small.

Just about any Mexican butcher worth his apron can custom-cut whatever portion of the pig you need for meal preparation.  In case you're not 100% familiar with the names of Mexican cuts, here are two pork cut charts, first in English and then in Spanish for comparison.


Pork cuts chart in English.  Click to enlarge the image for better viewing.


Pork cuts chart in Spanish.  Even in Spanish, many cuts have different names depending on which country names them.  Again, click to enlarge the image for a better view.


These suckling pigs were butchered at 6 weeks to 3 months old.  Known in Mexico as lechón, roast suckling pig is a delicacy by any name.  Many restaurants in Mexico specialize in its preparation.

One of the most common and popular (and really delicious) kinds of street tacos is tacos al pastor (shepherd style tacos).  This preparation comes from Mexico City.  Marinate thinly sliced pork meat in a sauce made of chiles guajillo, vinegar, and tomato. Next, layer the slices on a vertical spit so that they form the shape of a spinning top.  At the top of the meat, place a pineapple without skin.  Light the fire in the grate behind the spit and allow a portion of the meat to cook until slightly caramelized on the edges and tender within.  Slice into very thin pieces, using them to fill a tortilla warmed on the flattop.  With your sharp knife, flick a small section of the pineapple into the taco.  Add the salsa you prefer, some minced onion and cilantro, and ahhhhh...the taste of Mexico!


Manitas de cerdo: pickled pigs' feet.  The well-scrubbed feet are cooked in salted water, then added to vegetables cooked in a pickling solution of vinegar, chile, vegetables, and herbs.  In Mexico, manitas de cerdo can be eaten as either a botana (snack) or a main dish.

One of my personal favorite pork dishes: carnitas from Michoacán!  These carnitas in particular are the best I've ever eaten: large hunks of pork are boiled in lard until crispy on the outside, succulent and juicy on the inside.  Chopped roughly and served with various salsas, they're the best tacos I know.  Find them at Carnitas Aeropuerto, in Zamora, Michoacán.


Adobo huasteco, another deliciously spicy pork dish.  It's been a while since this last appeared on our table--and it's high time we prepared it again.  Click on the link for the recipe.


Last but not least, here's a rosy bouquet of pig heads for sale at the Mercado de Jamaica in Mexico City.

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Pan Dulce in Mexico :: Take Two, They're Small

Steaming hot café con leche (espresso coffee mixed with a generous portion of hot milk), served with a basket of Mexico's pan dulce (sweet bread).

When my mother, may she rest in peace, first visited me here in Mexico, one of her dearest wishes was to visit a Mexican bakery. For more than 40 years, Mother baked every crumb of bread that she and anyone visiting her consumed: white, rye, whole wheat, pumpernickel, sourdough, French baguette, and esoteric ethnic loaves that she just had to try. Mother wanted to see how bread was made in Mexico.  At my suggestion, she even brought her baking apron for her stay here, hoping to push her floury hands deep into some yeasty dough.

In those years, there was a tiny and excellent bakery just a block from my house.  In a room to the side of his house, through a semi-secret door at the back of his garage, don Pedro turned out hundreds of pieces of pan dulce every day. Shortly after Mom's arrival, I took her to meet don Pedro, the master baker, and his helpers. 

Don Pedro spoke no English and my mother spoke no Spanish, but I interpreted between them and they discovered that they were soul mates.  For two hours, don Pedro and my mother swapped bread stories—conversation about oven temperatures, yeast, flour densities, and tales of experiments, successes and failures. The day before Mother was to leave for home, she asked to go back to the bakery to say goodbye to don Pedro. They both wept because she was leaving and insisted that pictures be taken before they exchanged farewell hugs. Such is the bond of bread.  Don Pedro and my mother have both passed away, and I hope they've had a chance to hug one another again in the más allá (the great beyond).

Bread fresh from the oven: the evocative aroma brings back timeworn memories of Mom's kitchen, filled with the yeasty perfume of twice-raised, golden-crusted hot bread. Here in Mexico, that redolent scent wafts through the air from bakeries scattered like hidden treasures through many neighborhoods. At certain hours of the early morning and mid-afternoon, local ovens disgorge mountains of pan dulce destined for tiny corner mom-n-pop stores or for sale hot from the ovens to individuals who know just when to arrive.

For a few pesos, an early breakfast of this hot, slightly sweet bread served with milk, juice, hot chocolate, or coffee gets Mexico up and off to work or school.  For a few pesos more, the same sort of late supper rocks Mexico to sleep.

In the history of the world, bread has its own record and development. The making of wheat bread has evolved with the progress of world civilization. Particularly in gastronomic Mexico, bread has deep roots in the evolution of the República. The Spanish brought the flavors and recipes of all Europe with them to the New World. The 1860s era of Emperor Maximilian and his French wife, Charlotte, imposed a giddy 19th Century French influence—with puff pastries, whipped cream fillings, and sticky glazes—on the already extensive assortment of Mexican breads.

If you've never visited a Mexican bakery—a bakery where the breads are baked right on the premises, not brought in from a central bakery—you have a real treat in store. One of my favorite bakeries is owned by the Rojas family in Ajijic, Jalisco. When the bolillos (crusty, dense, white rolls) come out of the oven in the early mornings and again when the roles (cinnamon rolls—they're addictive) are ready at about 12:30 PM, you'll find lines of locals waiting to carry home a bag of hot, fresh goodies.


The Rojas brothers, long-time bakers at Panadería Rojas in Ajijic, Jalisco.  Photo courtesy Semanario Laguna.

At the Rojas bakery, the bakers will help you select the breads you want--if you don't know the bread by name, you just point and tell them how many. There are no bakers' shelves at Rojas, and the selection of items is usually small. Most of the breads are delivered to shops and stores shortly after they're taken from the ovens.

Larger Mexican bakeries can be a little intimidating when you first push that front door open and enter a warm, fragrant world of unfamiliar sights and intoxicating yeasty, sugary smells.

One of my favorite bakery excursions was to Panadería Pan Bueno, located at Avenida Vallarta #5295 in Guadalajara. The owner, Sr. Roberto Cárdenas González, graciously allowed me to take photographs with the assistance of his employee, Edith Hernández González.

When you go inside Pan Bueno, take a minute to look around first to orient yourself. Right there by the door are the big metal trays and the tongs you need to gather up the breads you want to buy. With tray and tongs in hand, let's take a tour of the racks of pan dulce.

Very lightly sweetened biscochos are similar to biscuits.


Tasty sugar-swirled conchas are ubiquitous throughout Mexico.

During the Mexican Revolution, soldiers from every region of Mexico came to know the foods of states far from their homes. When they returned to their own areas after the fighting, they took the recipes and flavors of other regions home with them. The south of Mexico incorporated northern bread recipes into its repertoire, the west took from the east, the north from the south.

Today, most panaderías (bakeries) in Mexico prepare similar assortments of pan dulce, along with a sampling of their own regional specialties.

Puerquitos (little pigs, on the right) taste very much like gingerbread.

It's been said that Mexico, of all the countries in the world, has the broadest and most delicious selection of breads. As a result of the mixture of cultures and regional flavors, today in Mexico you will find more than 2000 varieties of breads, and all will tempt your palate.

Pan dulce is just one variety, but there are hundreds upon hundreds of different sub-varieties. The great mosaic of Mexican bread making, inventiveness, and creativity is such that every variety of pan dulce has a name, usually associated with its appearance. That's why you'll see names of animals, objects, and even people gracing the breads on bakery shelves. Puerquitos (little pigs), moños o corbatas (bowties or neckties), ojo de buey (ox eye), canastas (baskets), conchas (seashells), cuernos (horns), chinos (Chinese), polvorones (shortbread), hojaldres (puff paste), empanadas (turnovers), and espejos (mirrors): all are names of specific and very different sweet breads. My current favorite name for a pan dulce is niño envuelto (it means wrapped-up baby and it looks for all the world like a slice of jellyroll).

Niño envuelto on the left, besos on the right.


The loaded shelves at the Panadería El Resobado, in Coatepec, Veracruz.  On this trip, my companions and I bought quite a bit of pan dulce and even though it had been highly recommended to us, we decided we really didn't care for it.  The bread is baked in wood-fired ovens and tasted extremely heavily--and unpleasantly--of wood smoke.  What a disappointment!

Mexican Wedding Cookies (Polvorones de Nuez).  Photo courtesy Storethisnotthat.

Here's a familiar and delicious recipe for a traditional Mexican sweet bread.

Polvorones de Nuez 

Mexican Wedding Cookies

Preheat oven to 275 degrees.

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups (3/4 pound) butter (room temperature)
3/4 pound powdered sugar
1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup finely chopped almonds or pecans
3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

Procedure
Beat the butter until it is light and fluffy. Then beat in 2 tablespoons of the powdered sugar, the egg yolk, vanilla, and your choice of nuts. Gradually add the flour, beating after each addition to blend thoroughly. Pinch off pieces of dough the size of large walnuts and roll between your palms into round balls. Place the dough balls 1 1/2 inches apart on un-greased baking sheets. Flatten each ball very slightly.

Bake in a 275 degree oven until very lightly browned (about 45 minutes). Allow to cool on the baking sheets until lukewarm.

Sift half the remaining powdered sugar onto a large sheet of waxed paper. Roll each cookie gently but firmly in the sugar. Place cookies on wire racks over wax paper. Allow the cookies to cool completely and again dust generously with more powdered sugar.

If you make these cookies ahead of need, store them in airtight containers, layered between sheets of waxed paper, for up to three days.

Makes approximately three dozen cookies.

As Edith and I made the rounds of the bakery, I asked her if she knew the origin of any of the names for pan dulce. With a charming smile, she admitted that they were just traditional inventos—made-up titles. When I asked her if she ever got tired of eating these sweet breads, she shook her head emphatically. "Oh no, señora, we always love the pan."  Here, Edith is holding a huge rosca de reyes, the bread eaten on January 6, the Feast of the Three Kings.

You will always love the pan as well. And now, if you'll excuse me, a slice of niño envuelto is calling to me from my kitchen. How could I have resisted buying a pan dulce or two as I made the bakery tour? All right, it was four—but who's counting?    

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