Mexico Cooks!

It's Back! It's Back! The Toritos de Petate Parade in Morelia is With Us Again...

Morelia's 2009 Festival del Torito de Petate starred "El Michoacano" featuring as its theme Morelia's own Fuente Las Tarascas (the Tarascan fountain on Av. Madero).  The huge creations were originally made of petate (the word for this woven palm mat, similar to a Japanese tatami, comes from the Náhuatl), but today they can be made of almost anything.


Here's a photo of me with a petate that I had made about a year ago.  The petate can be used as a simple floor covering in a home, or as a sleeping mat, or in smaller sizes as a mat for kneeling on the ground or on a floor while one uses the metate for grinding.  Its symbolism is profound--the petate is considered to be the place where dreams are born, where sleep and wakefulness meet, where life and death are connected.

Morelia's annual Festival del Torito de Petate (literally, festival of the little bull made of woven reeds) will once again have a presence here in the city.  For the last two years of the pandemic, there has been no parade--but this year, it's happening again!  These "little bulls" are hardly little, and are hardly made of woven reeds.  Some measure as high as five meters (more than 15 feet) and weigh in at more than 110 kilos (nearly 250 pounds).  Built today by group members from Morelia's working-class neighborhoods, the danza del torito de petate stems from dances that date back as far as 1586, just a bit more than 50 years after the Spanish arrival in the land that today is Mexico.

The towering Torito Azteca incorporates inventive components of pre-hispanic design.  You can see the little bull's red eyes, white nostrils and red tongue near the bottom center of the photograph.

This intricate guacamaya (macaw) measures at least five meters tall.  A strong young man carries the heavy torito on his shoulders and performs a several-minute-long dance.  Cheering crowds and a tumultuous local band urge him and his costumed companions to ever faster spins.

Children absolutely love the Festival del Torito de Petate.  The little boy on the left is wearing a horse costume held up by suspenders.  He's whipping his steed in more and more frenzied circles.  The taller boy in the center has a bull costume mounted on his shoulders; Mexico Cooks! could only capture a shot of the bull's tail as the boy whirled to the music.

Sixty neighborhoods participated in one of the last pre-pandemic editions of Morelia's Festival del Torito de Petate.  Mexico Cooks! watched the line of elaborately colorful creatures as it formed alongside Plaza Valladolid; the giant toritos were accompanied by crowds of whoop-it-up well-wishers, cheerleaders, and frenetic dancers.

Mexico Cooks! asked this young man why his face was painted half orange, half black.  "It matches our torito," he explained.

"I represent the devil, but you know it's not for real.  It's just for the toritos dance." 

Little ones perched high up on Dad's shoulders for a great view.


The parade of the toritos de petate and its fans and attendees is the best possible excuse for people-watching.  Everyone is watching you, of course, and vice versa!  

Every age celebrates when the toritos come out.  The toy this woman is holding is also a torito de petate.  Strolling vendors set up all over the parade route to hawk these little toritos to the crowd of thousands.

Let's all go next year!  I'll let you know when the dates are announced. 

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Good Friday Procession of Silence, Morelia, Michoacán :: Viernes Santo Procesión del Silencio

Due to the restrictions of COVID-19 in 2020 and 2021, the procession was shown in a different format via virtual transmission.  Like many virtual events during the pandemic, a virtual platform was not the same as being face to face with the enormity of the Crucifixion.  Viernes Santo (Good Friday) fell on April 15, 2022. For the first time in two years, the actual Procesión del Silencio (Procession of Silence) took place live on Avenida Madero, Morelia's main street.  

Hooded 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 broke the silence along the route.

Nuestra Señora de Dolores (Our Lady of Sorrows).  Hooded members of various Catholic confraternities (religious organizations founded in Europe in the 15th Century) carry these life-size statues on their wooden platforms approximately three kilometers through Morelia's Centro Histórico.

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

El Señor del Pilar (the Lord of the Column) depicts Jesus, bound to a column, and whipped by Roman soldiers after his conviction.

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 four 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 stood along the entire route of Morelia's Procesión del Silencio.

Penitents from one of Morelia's confraternities carry their crosses the length of the procession.  Many march barefoot through the city streets.  The procession will celebrate its forty-first anniversary this year.  

Robed and hooded members of another Catholic confraternity carry a small image of the crucified Christ.  As a sign of penitence, tall pointed hoods called capirotes cover the faces of those who march.

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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Fresh Blackberries Grown in Michoacán :: Rica Zarzamora Producto de Michoacán

Here's another wonderful dessert for a Lenten Friday: American-style blackberry cobbler, made with super-delicious blackberries grown in Michoacán, Mexico.  When you're shopping, look at a 'clamshell' of blackberries.  Most blackberries that you buy today in the USA and Canada are exported from fields almost in Mexico Cooks!' back yard!

Blackberries are one of the staples of the Mexico Cooks! kitchen.  In season nearly year-round, Mexico's blackberries are primarily grown in the state of Michoacán.  This bowlful of delicious blackberries is being crushed with Splenda® and a pinch of salt to add to breakfast yoghurt. 

In 1994, the commercially cultivated blackberry first arrived in the area around Los Reyes, Michoacán.  High in the mountains, Los Reyes offered a perfect climate for the Brazos variety of erect blackberries.  The original commercial growers planted only three hectáreas (about 6 acres) of berries.  

Developed at Texas A&M University and introduced in 1959, 'Brazos' has been the Texas standard for years and is still a great variety. The berries are large and the plants produce heavily.  In Michoacán, this variety starts ripening early in May.  The berries are a little acid and are better for cooking and canning than fresh eating. This variety has more thorny plants and larger seeded fruit than many of the improved varieties.  In fact, the blackberries offered in Mexico's markets are huge, about an inch long by half an inch in diameter--as big as the ball of my thumb.


Brazos blackberries 'on the hoof'.

Since those 1994 beginnings, local growers have learned a tremendous amount about the cultivation of blackberries.  Today, the fruit fields cover more than 4,500 hectáreas in the area of Los Reyes, Tocumbo, and Peribán--almost all in the west-central highlands of Michoacán.  The 2009 production reached a weight of 30,000 tons of blackberries--tons!  Ninety percent of those were exported to the United States, the primary foreign market.  The rest went to Europe and Japan.  This quantity of blackberries represents 95% of those grown in Michoacán and 90% of those grown anywhere in Mexico.  This rinconcito (tiny corner) of Mexico produces more blackberries than anywhere else in the world.


Shortly before Christmas, Mexico Cooks! was unable to find unsweetened, unflavored yoghurt in our neighborhood shops--and there was a liter of blackberries in the refrigerator that needed to be eaten immediately.  They had been destined for breakfast, but one morning se me prendió el foco (the light bulb went on in my brain) and I thought: COBBLER!  In the bowl is the entire liter of berries, mixed with sugar, the juice and some grated zest of a limón (key lime), and a bit of cornstarch.

Blackberry cobbler, as you might have guessed, is not in the Mexican food repertoire.  However, when all of the ingredients are grown or made in Mexico, maybe it should be.  In the photo are salt, baking powder, an egg, two limones, standard-grade sugar, milk, and freshly rendered pork lard.  During Lent, I make the topping with butter.

Pre-heat the oven to 425ºF and butter a glass baking dish.

Scoop the blackberry mixture into the pan and gently even it out.

Measure the shortening (you can use solid vegetable shortening or butter if you prefer not to use lard).  I always use the displacement method to measure solid shortening: for this 1/4 cup of lard, I started with 1 3/4 cups of cold water in this clear measuring cup.  I added lard until the water rose to the two-cup level, then emptied out the water.  Bingo, 1/4 cup of lard and no mess.

The flour mixture that will become the dough for topping the cobbler.  You see the lard on top of the flour mixture, ready to be worked into it.

The flour mixture should look like this when you finish working the lard into it.

Break an egg into the milk and beat with a fork till blended.

The cobbler, topped with raw dough and ready for the oven.  Sprinkle the raw dough with sugar to give it a finished look after baking.  The cornstarch that I mixed with the raw blackberries and sugar thickens the juices as the cobbler bakes.

Bake the cobbler for about half an hour, or until the dough is light golden brown.  Your house will smell heavenly!

Here's the entire recipe:

Blackberry Cobbler
Ingredients
4-6 cups fresh blackberries
3/4 cup sugar, divided use
1 Tbsp lemon juice
zest of 1/2 lemon
1 Tbsp cornstarch

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/4 cup shortening--I usually use lard, but for Lent I use butter
4 Tbsp butter
1 whole egg
1/2 cup milk

Preparation
Preheat your oven to 425ºF.

Butter the glass baking dish.  Mix blackberries, 1/2 cup sugar, cornstarch, lemon juice, and lemon zest in a large mixing bowl.  Reserve.

In a separate bowl, mix the flour, salt, baking powder, and 1 or 2 Tbsp sugar.  Add the shortening and butter and work them into the flour with your fingers, until the mixture looks like coarse corn meal. 

Measure 1/2 cup milk into a large measuring cup; break the egg into the milk.  Beat with a fork until well blended.  Pour the milk/egg mixture into the flour/shortening mixture and stir until smooth.  The dough should not be sticky; if you need to add more flour, start with just an additional tablespoon.  When the dough is smooth but still quite damp, it's ready.

Pour the blackberry mixture into the glass baking dish and gently even out the berries with your fingers.  Put large spoonfuls of dough all over the berries, leaving some small spaces on top for the juice to bubble through.  Flatten the dough a little--use your fingers, and don't worry about how it looks.  Sprinkle the top of the dough with a tablespoon or two of sugar.

Bake until golden brown, about 30 minutes.  A serving of your cobbler, topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, will look like this--truly a thing of beauty.

The finished product: blackberry cobbler, hot out of the oven and topped with rich real-cream vanilla ice cream.  The red in the background is a countertop trastero (dish shelf), meant to be used for storing small kitchen items.  Mine is filled with miniature kitchen-related local artesanías (crafts).

What could be better on a chilly winter evening--a taste of Mexican blackberries, from a recipe straight out of your grandmother's kitchen! 

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Chile Poblano Strips with Onion, Corn Kernels, and Cream, A Classic of the Mexican Kitchen :: Rajas de Chile Poblano

Delicious and eaten at any time of the year, rajas de chile poblano con crema, cebolla, y elote (strips of poblano chile with cream, onion, and young tender corn) is the perfect dish for a Lenten Friday!

The mild-to-not-so-mild chile poblano is one of the most commonly used fresh chiles in Mexico's kitchen.  A very large, fleshy chile, it can measure as much as seven or eight inches long.  The stem end is much wider than the point, and the color ranges from dark green to almost black-green. Shopping tip: if you buy chiles poblano that are flat on all sides, they will roast more quickly than if they are deeply creased in spots.  The flat sides will evenly touch the roasting surface.

The chile poblano is commonly used for preparing main dishes such as chiles rellenos, including the seasonal and festive chiles en nogada.  It is also used for making rajas de chile poblano con crema (strips of chile poblano with cream), a marvelously flavorful vegetable side dish.  All photos by Mexico Cooks! unless otherwise noted.


Chiles poblano roasted with skin removed, showing the interior of the opened chile (left) and the exterior (right).  These are two of the four chiles I used to prepare this dish. To prepare chiles poblanos for use in any recipe, wash and roast them.  Don't try to use them with the peel on; the peels will be as tough as trying to chew through plastic.  Mexico Cooks! uses a cast iron comal (griddle) placed over a high flame to roast as many as four to six chiles at a time.  Other cooks prefer to roast these chiles one or two at a time over an open flame, or on a broiler pan in a slightly open oven. No matter which roasting method you use, the roasted chiles should look like the ones in the above photo.

Once the chiles are roasted, put them in a plastic bag, twist it shut, and allow the chiles to 'sweat' for 10 to 15 minutes.  You'll easily be able to remove the blackened peels.  It's best not to rinse them--or rinse them only a little--as rinsing removes a good bit of the delicious chile poblano flavor.  


The slit-open chiles with the seeds still inside.  At the foreground of the photo, you can see that I removed the stem with the bulk of the seeds.  Simply cut around the stem and pull it and the seeds out of the chile.


Two of the chiles still on the cutting board, with one of my 60+-year-old Sabatier carbon steel knives.  


All four chiles, seeded and cut into rajas (strips about 3" long and less than 1/2" wide).


Half of a large white onion, thinly sliced and ready to sauté. The ingredients include half a white onion, sliced very thin, and about half a cup of fresh (or canned) white or yellow corn kernels.


Sauté the onions in oil first, until they are soft and translucent.  Then add the rajas and continue to sauté until they are soft, but still have a bit of crispness.


Add the corn and continue to sauté briefly.


Add Mexican crema de mesa (table cream, not sour cream) if you can find it.  Crema Aguascalientes is the one I prefer to use.  If Mexican table cream isn't available, use sour cream instead. 


Salt to taste and let the cream and vegetables simmer briefly. The cream will become a thick sauce for the vegetables.  The chile poblano is generally quite mild and flavorful, but once in a while you will come across one that is surprisingly spicy.  There's no way to tell by looking at them whether they are mild or hot, and either way they're delicious and not overly 'hot'.

The recipe as you see it written here, using four large chiles, will serve 3 to 4 people as a side dish.  It's excellent served hot or at room temperature.  I've never met anyone who doesn't love rajas de chile poblano served this way!

Provecho! (Good eating!)

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More Marvelous Meatless Meals for Lent!

Atole de grano, a Michoacán specialty made of tender young corn and wild, licorice-scented anisillo, is a perfect cena (supper) for Lenten Fridays.


Tortitas de papa (potato croquettes, left) and frijoles negros (black beans, right) from the state of Chiapas in far-southern Mexico are ideal for a Lenten meal.

Roman Catholic Mexicans observe la Cuaresma (Lent), the 40-day (excluding Sundays) penitential season that precedes Easter, with special prayers, vigils, and with extraordinary meatless meals cooked only on Ash Wednesday and during all Lenten Fridays.  Many Mexican dishes--seafood, vegetable, and egg--are normally prepared without meat, but some other meatless dishes are particular to Lent. Known as comida cuaresmeña, many of these delicious Lenten foods are little-known outside Mexico and some other parts of Latin America.

Many observant Catholics believe that the personal reflection and meditation demanded by Lenten practices are more fruitful if the individual refrains from heavy food indulgence and makes a promise to abstain from other common habits such as eating candy, smoking cigarettes, and drinking alcohol.  

Lent began this year on February 18, Ash Wednesday.  Shortly before, certain food specialties began to appear in local markets. Vendors are currently offering very large dried shrimp for caldos (broths) and tortitas (croquettes), perfect heads of cauliflower for tortitas de coliflor (cauliflower croquettes), seasonal romeritos, and thick, dried slices of bolillo (small loaves of white bread) for capirotada (a kind of bread pudding). 

This common Lenten preparation is romeritos en mole.  Romeritos, a slightly acidic green vegetable, is in season at this time of year.  Although it looks a little like rosemary, it has the texture of a succulent and its taste is relatively sour, more like verdolagas (purslane).


Beautiful fresh romeritos at a market in Morelia, Michoacán.

You'll usually see tortitas de camarón (dried shrimp croquettes) paired for a Friday comida (midday meal) with romeritos en mole, although they are sometimes bathed in a caldillo de jitomate (tomato broth) and served with grilled and sliced nopalitos (cactus paddles).


During Lent, the price of fish and seafood in Mexico goes through the roof due to the huge seasonal demand for meatless meals.  These beautiful huachinango (red snapper) come from Mexico's Pacific coast.


Caldo de habas secas (dry fava bean soup), delicious and thick even though meatless, warms you up from the inside as if your days are still frigid at the beginning of Lent.  Easter Sunday marks the end of Lent; this year, Easter falls on Sunday, April 17.


Uchepos (fresh corn tamales) and other ingredients used to make chiles rellenos de uchepos, a meat-free dish typically from Michoacán.  Split open roasted, seeded, and peeled chiles poblanos.  Then remove the green (not dried) corn husks from the uchepos and break them into medium-size pieces to stuff the chiles.


The completed chiles poblanos rellenos de uchepos.  These are often bathed in a creamy white sauce just prior to serving.  

Chef Martín Rafael Mendizabal of La Trucha Alegre in Zitacuaro, Michoacán, prepared trucha deshuesada con agridulce de guayaba (boned trout with guava sweet and sour sauce) for the V Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán held in Morelia in December 2008.  The dish would be ideal for an elegant Lenten dinner.


Caldo de fideos--angel hair pasta cooked in a thin tomato broth.  This delicious soup is a wonderful first course to a Lenten comida.


Classic chiles rellenos can be stuffed with shrimp, cheese, tuna fish, mashed potatoes, or anything meatless that sounds good to you.  Served with black beans and a thin caldillo (tomato broth), these are simple to prepare and truly delicious.

Last week's Mexico Cooks! was all about capirotada--a classic dessert here in Mexico during Lent.  Look back at Mexico Cooks! for March 12, 2022 and prepare this dessert for your family and friends.  Everyone will be delighted.

Try very hard not to eat the entire cazuela of capirotada at one sitting!

A positive thought for this Lenten season--and God knows we need a positive thought right now: give up discouragement, be an optimist.

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Capirotada :: Traditional Dessert for Lent in Mexico

Pouring miel de piloncillo (spiced raw brown sugar syrup) over the second layer of capirotada.  The cazuela (clay dish) measures about 14" in diameter at the top.

Capirotada is the iconic Mexican dessert during Lent.  It has its origins as long ago as the fourth century, in Rome.  The history of the Roman dish is similar, but the dish itself is completely different from the capirotada we know in Mexico today.  The list of Roman ingredients included bread soaked in vinegar and water, layers of chicken livers, capers, cucumber, and cheese.  Only two of the ingredients that the Romans used 1600 years ago are the same as the ones we use today: slices of bread, and cheese--and even the cheese is optional today.  


The cofradía Siervo de la Nación (association members of the Nation's Servant) makes the silent, many blocks long pilgrimage over Morelia's main street on Viernes Santo (Good Friday).  The groups of the cofradías all walk in similar costume; each cloak may be a different color, but their sole purpose is to give anonymity to each individual in the group as they walk the length of this profoundly spiritual and humble procession.

Even the name capirotada has an unusual origin.  It's derived from the word "capirote", the tall pointed hat that is part of the cloak used by the cofradías (religious individuals who form a church-associated group with pious ends) as they walk the Procesión del Silencio on Good Friday evening.  The Procesión del Silencio takes place in cities and towns all over Mexico and in Spain.


The primary ingredients for capirotada.  Clockwise from nine o'clock: toasted peanuts, 2 large cones of piloncillo, Mexican stick cinnamon, raisins, fresh orange peel, whole allspice, anise seeds, cloves--and in the center, finely diced acitrón.


Here's the queso fresco I bought for the capirotada.  It's a milder flavor than the queso Cotija. This small cheese weighed about 120 grams and was just the right amount to crumble over the layers of bread.

The recipe came with the Spanish to Nueva España (what is today's Mexico) and has changed over the course of 500 years until it has become the dessert that we know today.  Since long ago, the recipe contains:
--densely textured white bread, thoroughly dried and hard.
--optional stale tortillas to line the bottom of the cazuela or other dish you use 
--freshly rendered pork lard
--vegetable oil
--cones of piloncillo (Mexican raw brown sugar)
--fresh orange peel
--fragrant cloves
--Mexican cinnamon stick
--allspice
--anise seeds
--shelled and skinned peanuts, toasted
--filleted almonds, toasted (optional)
--acitrón, a kind of crystallized cactus (optional)
--about a teaspoon of sea salt or table salt
--raisins
--queso Cotija or queso fresco (Cotija or fresh farmer's cheese (optional)

I purchased this already dried and buttered bread, ready for making capirotada, in a market in Michoacán, where I live.  Numerous vendors offer the slices by the kilo (2.2 pounds) or by the bag.  I bought a bag of about 10 very wide slices, which I sawed in half with a serrated knife so that I could fit them into a medium-size clay cazuela.  

The recipe is simplicity itself.  If you are using fresh bread, you'll need to slice it into 1/2" slices and let it dry for up to four nights, turning it every little while, until it is very hard on both sides.  Then you smear both sides of the dried slices with butter and fry the slices in a liberal amount of freshly rendered pork lard mixed with vegetable oil.  In many cities and towns of Mexico, one can buy pre-sliced, pre-buttered, pre-fried bread to use for capirotada.  I did, its photo is just above.


Canela (Mexican cinnamon) sticks can be as much as a yard long.  They're much softer and flakier and flavorful than the sort of short, hard, unbreakable cinnamon sticks sold packaged in most of the United States.  One can buy Mexican cinnamon sticks at a Latin grocery store; look for one near your home.  In the photo, you see raisins to the right of the cinnamon.


Here's a steamy shot of the miel de piloncillo as it simmers in a stainless steel pot.  You can see the orange peel, the raisins, and the cinnamon stick.


I used two of the large cones of piloncillo (on the left).  With this amount of piloncillo, the sweetness of the syrup was perfect.  Piloncillo is available in a Mexican market near your home--and you might even find it packaged in your favorite supermarket, in the Mexican canned and dried food aisle.

Once the bread is prepared, make the miel de piloncillo.  I used two large cones of piloncillo and a liter of water to start the process.    Put the piloncillo, the water, about 10-12 inches (broken into two pieces) of a Mexican cinnamon stick, 2 or 3 fragrant cloves, the fresh orange peel, about 1.5 teaspoons of anise seed, and 2 or 3 whole allspice into a medium-size pot.  Bring the pot to a boil and then lower the heat until the water is just simmering.  Allow it to simmer until the piloncillo is completely dissolved; this might take as much as 10 minutes.  You can allow the syrup to reduce just a little bit; you'll need the full amount of thin syrup to pour onto the layers of the capirotada.  Turn off the fire and set the pot aside.

Next, liberally grease your cazuela or baking dish with freshly rendered pork lard.  You can see in the photo that 'liberal' is what you want: don't stint.  Smear the lard, on the bottom of the dish and right up the sides!  Pork lard adds flavor to the capirotada that you can't get with any other fat.  TIP: the lard you want is available by weight at a Mexican market and maybe at your supermarket.  But DO NOT buy that cold brick of white hydrolyzed lard that's sold in your supermarket's meat or dairy case.  It has no flavor and excuse me, is basically disgusting.


Now you will put a single layer of bread into the cazuela and top it with the amount of peanuts, raisins, acitrón and crumbled cheese that you like.  I used about 50-60 grams of each per layer--maybe a few more peanuts.  Once the first layer was assembled, I poured about a cup of the miel de piloncillo over it, soaking it well.  The quantity of bread I bought made three layers; three fit very nicely into my cazuela.  On each layer of bread, I scattered approximately the same amount of the ingredients I'd put on the first layer, and poured about the same amount of miel de piloncillo over each successive layer.  The kitchen smelled fantastic!  


The finished product!  Once the capirotada was completely assembled, I put it into a pre-heated 180ºC (350ºF) oven for about 10-15 minutes.  The oven is optional; your capirotada will be just as delicious if you don't bake it at all.

Not only is capirotada a traditional Lenten dessert, it also has a strongly spiritual essence.  The Spanish are said to have used it as a teaching tool to give the indigenous population of Nueva España an understanding of the death and resurrection of Christ.  

--the bread alludes to the Body of Christ
--the miel de piloncillo represents His blood
--the cinnamon stick looks like the wood of the cross where He was crucified
--the clavos (cloves) have the same shape and the same Spanish-language name as the nails in His hands
--the white cheese reminds us of the sheet that remained in the tomb when He arose from the dead

Although capirotada is richly delicious, and its history is also rich, today's reality is that home-made capirotada is not prepared as often as it was in years gone by.  Yes, you can buy it already prepared in many towns in Mexico, and it's important to support the women who prepare it.  Nevertheless, little by little the tradition is being lost.  It's important that each of us do her/his part to make and eat something this significant and delicious--and with a five hundred year history on our Lenten tables.  When one prepares it, it brings back so many memories of our childhood, our families, and our friends.  It preserves the long tradition.  Truly, it's well worth the time to prepare this simple recipe.  During this Lenten season, let's commit ourselves to making capirotada and sharing it with those dearest to us.  

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Mexico's New Year's Customs Explained :: New Underwear, Old Suitcases, and MORE

In Mexico and some other Latin American countries, women wear yellow underwear on New Year's Eve to bring good luck and wealth in the year to come.  Red underwear (this vendor has a lot, in every style, for sale on her tables) indicates a New Year's wish for an exciting love interest!  Just remember that the underwear has to be NEW.

Superstition or not, many people here in Mexico continue to keep the customs of ritos del Año Nuevo (New Year's rituals).  Some rituals include foods, others prescribe certain clothing, and still others warrant attention for religious interest.

As the clock strikes midnight, it's common to eat twelve grapes--one at each ding, one at each dong of the bell.  While eating the grapes, you make a personal wish for each grape you consume, welcoming the new year that's beginning.  Mexico Cooks! finds that it's helpful to write down the twelve wishes so as not to forget one or choke in the rush to swallow the grapes before the clock finishes striking the New Year's earliest hour!  Even the most elegant restaurants promise that along with your multi-course late-night New Year's Eve meal, they will provide the grapes and champagne.

Eating a tablespoonful of cooked lentils on New Year's Eve is said to bring prosperity and fortune.  You can also give raw lentils--just a handful, with the same wish for abundance, to family and friends.


Mexico Cooks! has often received a New Year's detallito (a little gift) of a tiny bottle like this, about 3" tall, filled with layers of different kinds of seeds and grains.  This gift represents the giver's wish for your New Year: abundance.


Sweep all the rooms of your house, your front steps, and the street in front of your house to remove all traces of the old year.  Some people put 12 golden coins outside--to be swept into the house after the house is swept clean.  The coins are to invite money and other abundance to come into the home.  Photo courtesy Jeff Trotter.


Give someone a wee woolly toy sheep as a New Year's gift--it too is a symbol of abundance!  Why?  In Mexico, a slang word for "money" is lana--wool, in English.  And what's a sheep covered with?  Lana--for an abundance of money in the New Year.  Photo courtesy Etsy.

On a small piece of paper, write down the undesirable habits and customs you'd like to let go of in the New Year that's just starting.  Burn the paper, then follow through with the changes!

Choose three stones that symbolize health, love, and money.  Put them in a place where you will see them every day.

Light candles: blue for peace, yellow for abundance, red for love, green for health, white for spirituality, and orange for intelligence.

Spill clean water on the sidewalk in front of your house as the clock rings in the New Year.  Your house will be purified and all tears will be washed away.

To have money for your needs all year, have some bills in your hand or in your pocket to welcome the arrival of the New Year.  Some people fold up the money and put it in their shoes!

Take your suitcase for a walk.  Legend is that the farther you walk with your suitcase, the farther you'll travel during the new year.  Several New Year's Eves ago, Mexico Cooks! and a few friends celebrated by walking our suitcases around the block.  We all traveled far and wide during the new year that followed.

Mexico Cooks! wishes all of you a muy Próspero Año Nuevo--and especially wishes that your red underwear brings you (or keeps you) the love of family, friends, and that special someone.

We'll see you right here in 2022!  May your New Year be infinitely better than old 2021!

Remember Me As You Pass By :: Noche de Muertos, Michoacán, 2013

Mexico Cooks!' full body bone scan, 2009.

Remember me as you pass by,
As you are now, so once was I.
As I am now, so you will be,
Prepare for death and follow me.
                   ...from a tombstone

What is death?  We know its first symptoms: the heart stops pumping, breath and brain activity stop. We know death's look and feel: a still, cold body from which the spirit has fled.  The orphan and widow know death's sorrow, the priest knows the liturgy of the departed and the prayers to assuage the pain of those left to mourn. But in most English-speaking countries, death and the living are not friends.  We the living look away from our mortality, we talk of the terminally ill in terms of 'if anything happens', not 'when she dies'.  We hang the crepe, we cover the mirrors, we say the beads, and some of us fling ourselves sobbing upon the carefully disguised casket as it is lowered into the Astroturf-lined grave.

Octavio Paz, Mexico City's Nobel Laureate poet and essayist who died in 1998, is famously quoted as saying, "In New York, Paris, and London, the word death is never mentioned, because it burns the lips."


Tzintzuntzan, Michoacán panteón (cemetery), Mexico Cooks! photo.  These fellows were singing to la Descarnada (the fleshless woman) on November 2, 2009.

In Mexico, on the contrary, every day is a dance with death.  Death is a woman who has a numerous affectionate and humorous nicknames: la Huesuda (the bony woman), la Seria (the serious woman), la Novia Fiel (the faithful bride), la Igualadora (the equalizer), la Dientona (the toothy woman), la Pelona (the bald woman), la Patrona (the boss lady), and a hundred more.  She's always here, just around the next corner or right over there, behind that pillar.  She waits with patience, until later today or until twelve o'clock next Thursday, or sometime next year--but when it's time, she's right there to dance away with you at her side.


November 2013 altar to La Santa Muerte (Holy Death), Sta. Ana Chapirito (near Pátzcuaro), Michoacán. Devotees of this deathly apparition say that her cult has existed since before the Spanish arrived in Mexico.

In Mexico, death is also in the midst of life.  We see our dead, alive as you and me, each November, when we wait at our cemeteries for those who have gone before to come home, if only for a night. That, in a nutshell, is Noche de Muertos: the Night of the Dead.


In the lower center portion of this photograph, you can see the panteón municipal (town cemetery) in Quiroga, Michoacán.  Late in the afternoon of November 1, 2013, most townspeople had not yet gone to the cemetery with candles and flowers for their loved ones' graves. Click on any photograph for a larger view.

Over the course of the last 30-plus years, Mexico Cooks! has been to countless Noche de Muertos events, but none as mystical, as spiritual, or as profoundly magical as in 2013.  Invited to accompany a very small group on a private tour in Michoacán, I looked forward to spending three days enjoying the company of old and new friends. I did all that, plus I came away with an extraordinarily privileged view of life and death.


A magnificent Purépecha ofrenda (in this case, a home altar) in the village of Santa Fe de la Laguna, Michoacán. This detailed and lovely ofrenda was created to the memory of the family's maiden aunt, who died at 74. Because she had never married, even at her advanced age she was considered to be an angelito (little angel)--like an innocent child--and her spirit was called back home to the family on November 1, the day of the angelitos.  Be sure to click on the photo to see the details of the altar. Fruits, breads, incense, salt, flowers, colors, and candles have particular symbolism and are necessary parts of the ofrenda.


Detail of the ofrenda casera (home altar) shown above. Several local people told Mexico Cooks! that the fruit piled on the altar tasted different from fruit from the same source that had not been used for the ofrenda. "Compramos por ejemplo plátanos y pusimos unos en el altar y otros en la cocina para comer. Ya para el día siguiente, los del altar pierden su sabor, no saben a nada," they said.  ('We bought bananas, for example, and we put some on the altar and the rest in the kitchen to eat.  The next day, the ones in the kitchen were fine, but the ones from the altar had no taste at all.')


Preparing a family member's ofrenda (altar) in the camposanto in the village of Arócutin, Michoacán. The camposanto--literally, holy ground--is a cemetery contained within the walls of a churchyard.  The candles used in this area of Michoacán are hand made in Ihuatzio and Santa Fé de la Laguna.

Come with me along the unlit road that skirts the Lago de Pátzcuaro: Lake Pátzcuaro.  It's chilly and the roadside weeds are damp with earlier rain, but for the moment the sky has cleared and filled with stars.  Up the hill on the right and down the slope leading left toward the lake are tiny villages, dark but for the glow of tall candles lit one by one in the cemeteries.  Tonight is November 1, the night silent souls wend their way home from Mictlán, the land beyond life.

At the grave: candlelight to illuminate the soul's way, cempazúchitl (deeply orange marigolds) for their distinctive fragrance required to open the path back home, smoldering copal (frankincense) to cleanse the earth and air of any remnants of evil, covered baskets of the deceased's favorite foods.  And a low painted chair, where the living can rest through the night. This tumba (grave) refused to be photographed head-on. From an oblique angle, the tumba allowed its likeness to be made.


Waiting through the night.  

"Oh grave, where is thy victory?  Oh death, where is thy sting?"

Noche de Muertos is not a costume party, although you may see it portrayed as such in the press.  It is not a drunken brawl, although certain towns appear to welcome that sort of blast-of-banda-music reventón (big blow-out).  It is not a tourist event, though strangers are certainly welcomed to these cemeteries. Noche de Muertos is a celebration of the spirit's life over the body's death, a festival of remembrance, a solemn passover.  Many years ago, in an interview published in the New York Times, Mexico Cooks! said, "Noche de Muertos is about mutual nostalgia.  The living remember the dead, and the dead remember the taste of home."


One by one, grave by grave, golden cempazúchitles give shape to rock-bound tombs and long candles give light to what was a dark and lonely place, transforming the cemetery into a glowing garden.  How could a soul resist this setting in its honor?  


"Our hearts remember..." we promise the dead.  Church bells toll slowly throughout the night, calling souls home with their distinctive clamor (death knell).  Come...come home.  Come...come home.


Watching.  Prayers.  No me olvido de ti, mi viejo amado. (I haven't forgotten you, my dear old man.)

Next year, come with me.

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Long Live Independence in Mexico :: Qué Viva La Independencia Mexicana!

Padre Miguel Hidalgo, whose 1810 cry for freedom from Spain set in motion the fight for what is now Mexico's independence.  His original estandarte (banner) bearing a likeness of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe (Our Lady of Guadalupe) is part of Mexico's historic patrimony.

Mexico's struggle for freedom from Spanish colonization began in earnest sometime between midnight and dawn on September 16, 1810, when Father Miguel Hidalgo stood up with the estandarte to shout out the Grito de Dolores (Cry of Dolores--"Dolores" being the name of the town known today as Dolores Hidalgo, Guanajuato.  The grito precedes the parades of school children and military battalions, politicians proclaiming speeches, and general festivity.  In normal times--prior to COVID-19--Mexico has always celebrated its Fiestas Patrias (Patriotic Holidays) on September 16, with enormous energy.  Last year (2020) and this year will be much more subdued.

Flag sellers' carts blossom all over Mexico for a month or so prior to Independence Day.  I usually go take a look at what the latest souvenir is, and if I need to replace the little Mexican flag on my desk, this is the time to do that.


The little Mexican flag on my desk.  I think it will last another year, if the cats don't try to chew on it!  This wee flag measures about six inches long and three inches high.

Hundreds of books have been written about Mexico's break from Spain, millions of words have been dedicated to exploring the lives of the daring men and women who knew, a bare 200 years ago, that the time had come for freedom.  You can read some of the history on the Internet.  Another excellent source for Mexican history is The Life and Times of Mexico, by Earl Shorris.  You'll find that highly readable book available on the left-hand side of this page.  Just click on the book cover to order it from Amazon. 

This bandera monumental (monumentally-sized Mexican national flag) waves over one of the highest points in the city of Morelia.  In 1999, former Mexican president Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León initiated the program of oversize flags made to fly over some of Mexico's historic cities.  These enormous flags generally measure more than 14 meters high by 25 meters long and fly from 50-meter-high flagpoles.

The balcony of Mexico City's Palacio del Gobierno (government office building).  On the night of September 15, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador will stand on the balcony to give the annual grito (shout) that is said to replicate Padre Hidalgo's rallying cry for independence.  In every Mexican town, no matter its size, the elected official will also give the grito during that night.


The Palacio de Gobierno in Morelia, Michoacán, all dressed up on September 15, 2020, ready for the Grito.  In the center of the facade is the balcony from which the Grito is proclaimed by the governor.


Mexico City's metropolitan cathedral and the zócalo (main square) with its bandera monumental, perfect for Independence Day festivities.  The 2021 verbena patria (patriotic festivity) in the nation's capital promises to be low key, in keeping with protection from COVID-19.

In Morelia, considered to be the cradle of independence--it was in this city, then called Vallodolid, that the pro-independence conspiracy was developed in 1809--the budget is supposed to be 28.5 million pesos (a bit over two million United States dollars).  Many Michoacanos are thrilled with the Fiestas Patrias party plans, while many others are outraged at this huge expenditure that comes at a time when Mexico is suffering not only an economic but a political and psychological crisis.

A tiny kiosko (bandstand) in a small-town plaza in the state of Jalisco, decorated for its Fiestas Patrias.

Today, Mexico is as it has always been: a country of profound contrasts.  Life parties with death in 2021 just as much as it did in 1810.  The road behind us and before us is littered with confetti and spent shell casings.  Our continuing task is to find la ruta a la independencia (the path to independence).

José Guadalupe Posada (1851-1913), La Calavería. I suspect these esqueletitos (little skeletons) are celebrating their independence!

Viva México!  Qué viva!

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Rosalba Morales Bartolo :: The Newest Maestra Cocinera Tradicional (Master Traditional Cook) in Michoacán

On March 8, 2021 (International Women's Day), several women in Michoacán received the designation "maestra cocinera tradicional" (master of traditional cooking), named as such by members of a committee well-familiar with each of their achievements in the cocina tradicional de Michoacán (Michoacán's traditional cooking).  The criteria for naming each of them as maestra cocinera were arduous and included participation in health and safety issues for diners, in community efforts, in the development and promotion of their own small restaurants, and in the promotion to the public--both in Mexico and internationally--of Michoacán's cuisines.  Seven new maestra cocineras were named: Calletana Nambo, Paula Campoverde, Concepción López, Blanca Delia Villagómez, Carmen Vidales, Norma Alicia Urbina, and Rosalba Morales Bartolo.  What happy news!  Each of these women deserves enormous accolades for her trajectory as one of the greatest cooks in the state.


All seven of the new maestras cocineras are featured in this photomontage provided last Monday by the government of Michoacán.


Rosalba Morales Bartolo with her brand new document naming her a maestra cocinera de Michoacán.

Rosalba, born and raised in San Jerónimo Purenchécuaro, Michoacán, grew up cooking alongside her mother in their indigenous Purépecha kitchen. Purépecha women are well known for their regional cuisine and extraordinary cooking abilities. Rosalba, who learned recipes and techniques from her grandmother and her mother, beginning in her childhood, has become one of the most exemplary cooks living in Mexico. In the photo, Rosalba oversees a restaurant dining room during a 2015 homage dinner she prepared for Diana Kennedy and many attendees. All photos copyright Mexico Cooks! unless otherwise noted.


San Jerónimo Purenchécuaro--Purenchécuaro translates to 'place of visitors'--nestles at the shore of the Lago de Pátzcuaro, in central Michoacán.  Eighty per cent of the town's approximately 2,000 inhabitants are indigenous Purépecha and a large number continue to speak their native language and teach it to their children.  The town continues its millennia-old social customs, some of which are incorporated now into Roman Catholic religious practices.  Mexico Cooks! took the photo from a scenic overlook in San Jerónimo; you can see the town, including the parish church tower, one tiny portion of Lake Pátzcuaro, and the tiers of Michoacán's mountains stretching out beyond the other shore. 


Lake Pátzcuaro fishermen, in an old postcard.  Today, the butterfly nets typical of the lake region have been largely replaced by other styles of hand-woven nets. Fishing continues to generate income as well as family sustenance for the towns around and close to the lake. Photo courtesy Mexico en Fotos.


Charales, freshly caught and cleaned.  Rosalba's father was a fisherman, working on Lake Pátzcuaro.  From him, she learned how to fish with a net. She learned how to prepare tiny charales (genus Chirostoma) her grandmother's old-fashioned way.  Once the fish are caught, she scales them (yes, these tiny fish, one by one), then eviscerates and washes them.  The heads are typically left on the charales.  Next, Rosalba spreads them out in the sun to dry on petates (mats made of palm fronds).  Once the fish are dried, she uses them for a variety of different dishes: fried for a filling in tacos or gorditas, simmered in a richly flavored broth, crushed into a salsa, or cooked in a guisado (a type of main dish that can also be used as a taco filling).


Petate (mats made of palm fronds), rolled up to be transported on a bicycle.  The petate, of pre-Hispanic origin, has multiple uses, including use as bedding, as a drying floor, and as a burial shroud. Image courtesy Pinterest.


At home in her kitchen, Rosalba shows off a plateful of her famous charales.  Restaurants and individuals in cities and towns all over Mexico order kilos of Rosy's charales to be shipped to them.  I confess that I always thought I hated them: strongly fishy, thickly breaded, greasy, and often overly picante (spicy), charales were for years the very last item on my list of things I wanted to eat.  One day a few years ago, Rosalba stood in front of me with a lightly fried, delicately golden brown charal held out between her fingers.  "You haven't tried mine, Cristina," she insisted, as she poked it into my mouth. There was no way to say no. What a surprise, it was absolutely delicious!  Now I crave them--but only Rosalba's.


Your family's food preparation probably begins with a trip to a well-stocked supermarket.  Once your ingredients are at home, you simply turn on a modern stove, either electric or gas. Rosalba's food preparation begins with a trip into the woods near her home, where she gathers branches to be used as fuel in her wood stove.  In addition, she grows much of her food in her large back garden: she tends and harvests tomatoes, chiles, squash, cilantro, avocado, and various fruits, among other delicious items that end up on her table.

Recently, Rosalba has been featured on several Mexican television programs, including this one called "Cocineros Mexicanos" (Mexican Cooks). Take a few minutes to watch how she cleans the charales, prepares a simple soup and salsa, and delights Nico (the program's host) with her simplicity, directness, honesty, and skill as a cocinera.

Rosy's route to her present renown hasn't been fast and it hasn't been easy.  Her life has had numerous ups and downs, its path twisting from her birthplace in San Jerónimo to the United States and back again.  In 1984, she graduated from primary school in San Jerónimo and left the next day to work as a cook in a private home in Guadalajara.  Her employer asked her to prepare food that was completely unfamiliar to her--fish cooked in white wine!  She remembers, "That day marked my life and was incredibly special, because it confirmed and reconfirmed the love, my deep feeling for cooking, as I experimented with different flavors."


In 2013, Rosalba won honorable mention in Raíces, Platillos que Cuentan Una Historia (Roots, Dishes Which Tell a Story) at the annual Encuentro de Cocineras Tradicionales de Michoacán (Meeting of Michoacán's Traditional Cooks).  Her first entry, in 2010, won her a first prize.

Twice Rosalba entered the United States, each time laboring in Mexican restaurants and sending money back to her native San Jerónimo Purenchécuaro.  Over the course of 25 years, she was able to construct her own home, where she lives today and has made her "Cocina Tradicional Rosy" well known to Mexicans and foreigners who are intent on dining well in Michoacán. 


Everybody's favorite chile in much of Michoacán: chile manzano, known in Michoacán as chile perón. Approximately 1.5"-2" in diameter, the perón is only chile in the world with black seeds.  It ranks between 30,000 and 50,000 'heat' units on the Scoville scale--about the same heat level as the chile de árbol.   "While I was living in the United States, I really missed caldo de trucha (trout soup) with chile perón," Rosalba reminisced.


Rosalba at Morelia en Boca 2015, with chef Aquiles Chávez of La Fishería Restaurant in Houston and Restaurante Sotero in Pachuca, Hidalgo, Mexico.  Morelia en Boca, an annual international high-end food and wine festival, featured a conference given by cocinera tradicional Rosalba together with chef Aquiles, demonstrating the preparation of Rosy's tiny charales and chef Aquiles' enormous pejelagarto (freshwater gar), native to the waters in chef Aquiles' home state, Tabasco. Their conference was so knowledgeable, so well-presented, and so funny that the huge and enthusiastic audience gave them a standing, cheering ovation at its end.


Chef Aquiles roasted the pejelagarto over a charcoal fire; this photo shows only the head and a small portion of the giant fish's body.  To roast the fish, chef Aquiles inserted a broomstick into the gaping tooth-filled mouth; the broomstick stopped at the fish's tail.  With the end of the broomstick that protruded from the mouth, chef Aquiles was able to turn the fish as it roasted.

Rosalba serves a taco de charales to chef Joaquín Bonilla, director of the Colegio Culinario de Morelia (Morelia's Culinary School).  Not only has Rosy prepared and served her extraordinary dishes all over Mexico, but she has traveled to a number of foreign destinations as well.  In 2016, she thrilled Chicago, Illinois, for several weeks with her food. She was one of the star presenters at a major food festival in Toronto, Canada.  Later that year she participated in the Slow Food International Terra Madre event in Turin, Italy, and she has excelled at a major food event in Madrid, Spain.  The current year has brought more much-deserved recognition throughout Mexico.


Rosalba's caldo de pata de pollo.  She prepared this rich chicken broth using just chicken feet as the base.  She added fresh vegetables just prior to serving.


Rosy's delicious guisado (a casserole or stewed dish) made with nopales (cactus paddles) and calabacitas (a squash similar to zucchini).


One of Rosalba's many talents is the ability to create utterly wonderful food from whatever is seasonably available.  Salsa de zarzamora (blackberry sauce) is a molcajete-ground spicy, sweet, and savory concoction of roasted chile perón, roasted ripe tomatoes, and native Michoacán blackberries.  A pinch of salt, a moment's grinding in the volcanic stone mortar, and it's ready for the table.  I would cheerfully have eaten it with a spoon, it was so heavenly.


Mexico Cooks! with Rosalba.  It's a privilege to share close friendship with her.

Please contact me if you'd like to visit Rosalba and enjoy a meal in her kitchen.  I'd be delighted to take you to meet my dear friend and talk with you about the food and its preparation.

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