Good Bacon

I’m sorry for you shoppers who can’t get to the farmers market at Ferry Plaza, but I have to make sure those who come know about Prather Ranch’s new bacon. For weird legal reasons beyond my comprehension, it needs to be branded as Range Brothers, but it’s all part of Doug Stonebreaker’s Prather Ranch Meat Co.

The bacon is beyond delicious and I recommend cooking a couple of rashers and save the fat, at least a tablespoon or so. Then fry onions and garlic in it, add some soaked beans and water and cook until done. Chop up the bacon and toss over the beans right before serving. Hey! Some chopped sage might be nice, too.

They also have two sausages, including a whiskey sausage, that are very good as well.

Good Food in Mexico City

The first time I was in Mexico City, I wasn’t in love with the food I found in restaurants. To be fair, I had just come from Oaxaca where I don’t think I put anything less than stellar in my mouth. The best thing I ate in Mexico City was some kind of fried masa treat with cheese and chiles that I had right on the street outside of a Metro station. I still dream about it. But there were lots of uninspired meals and I realize now it was mostly because I didn’t know where to go.
I wish I’d had a copy of Nicholas Gilman’s Good Food in Mexico City back then. I’ve know Nick from the online food boards for years so when I knew I was going to be in Mexico City this last January, I made it point to meet him in person.

Nick took me to

El Tizoncito, which is one of the many places written up in his book. The afternoon went by in flash but I do remember some outstanding salsas and charro beans.
What I like best about Nick’s book is that it’s opinionated and yet very straight forward. I used it for the entire trip and it didn’t once let me down. I’ve shown it to friends who know Mexico City well and they can’t wait to pick it apart and show me places he’s missed but then they find he’s covered them. I have to assume my friends feel very protective and territorial about Mexico City, or I have some nasty friends. Either way, Good Food in Mexico City passes with flying colors.

Ouch!: DeArbol Chile Salsa

This was in the Rancho Gordo newsletter, in case you missed it:
We are coming to the end of our DeArbol chile crop. These were grown near
Stockton and dried in the sun there. DeArbols are hot and nutty-flavored.
Often you see them in a salsa with tomatillos. In parts of Jalisco,
theyr’e
known as Colo de Rato, or Tail of the Rat.
I collect Mexican cookbooks and one of my favorites is Cocinar en
Jalisco
by Juan Pablo Rosell and Elba Castro. I made this salsa and brought it
into the warehouse. 100 grams is a lot of chiles so I when cleaning them,
I left the seeds in because it was easier. Do you want to see a grown
man cry? Feed him this sauce with all the seeds. It’s almost unbearable,
and yet it’s very tasty. I eventually thinned it out with more mild
vinegar
because it was just too much. Of course you really want to wear gloves
and clean the chiles of all the seeds, stems and veins.

Salsa
de Chile de Arbol

100 grams dry Arbol chiles
1 tablespoon of sesame seeds, toasted
1 tablespoon white vinegar
2 cloves
1 clove garlic
1 teaspoon Mexican organo
salt

Mix well
in a blender. This with a little more vinegar or water of needed.

Seafood whatever ya call it

When I cook, I tend to like to do everything the hard way. Just because. Joan, our Operations Manager, likes to be cook in a more practical manner and has no problems with easy shortcuts like Knorr soup mixes and canned clams. Having been the lucky recipient of many of her dishes, I may be coming around to her way of thinking.

This is her world-famous Seafood Whatever Ya Call It. She made enough thinking we could nibble on it all week here at the warehouse but it’s gone. There’s nary a crumb left!

2 cans diced clams and their juice
1 yellow onion, diced
2 leeks, sliced lengthwise and thinly sliced
3-4 stalks celery, thinly sliced
1 pound Cellini beans, rinsed and sorted
1 teaspoon Mexican Oregano
1/2 teaspoon Summer Savory

Water to cover

Place clams and their juice, onion, leeks, celery and beans in crock
pot.  Add spices.  Add water to cover.  Cook on high for 5 to 6 hours
until beans are "done."

On stovetop:

2 russet potatoes, cut in 1/4 inch cubes
1 package frozen artichoke hearts, defrosted
1 package frozen chopped spinach, defrosted
1 pound mixed seafood (shrimp, calamari, scallops)

In large pot on stove top place potatoes and just enough water to
cover.  Bring to boil, reduce to simmer and cook until tender.  Add
artichoke hearts, spinach and seafood and heat to boiling.  Combine
with the bean mixture from the crock pot and heat through.

For topping:

5 or 6 large slices of sourdough bread, left out to harden
1/2 cup (1 cube) butter
crushed garlic
1/3 cup Reggiano

In food processor process sourdough to form bread crumbs.  Melt butter and garlic.  Toss with bread crumbs and Reggiano.

Place approximately half of the seafood/bean mixture in a 13×9 baking
dish or large casserole.  Top with bread crumbs.  Place in 375 degree
oven for approximately 30 minutes.  Serve it up.  Should serve 4 to 6.

Freeze the other half of the seafood/bean mixture for another time.

Beans Cooked in the Indian Manner

My online friend Arnab has a great site called Another Subcontinent: South Asian Society and Culture.  It’s worth checking out if you’re even vaguely interested in Indian culture. In addition to the articles, fiction and music, there are forums where you can ask questions or just read.
Arnab, after an initial period of doubt about Rancho Gordo beans, has been come somewhat of a fan, I’m happy to say. In fact I’m happy to gloat, if necessary!

We’ve sold out of garbanzos for the season and it looks like we might be done with mayacobas as well, but I wanted to pass on his emails to me about cooking them. I think any mild bean, like the Cellini or Flagelolet, would make a fine substitute.

From Arnab:

okay, this is a little rough, but bear with me:

—
North Indian style Chhole (chickpeas)

Ingredients:

1 packet Rancho Gordo Garbanzo Beans
4-5 cloves
a few pods green cardamom
1 medium onion, chopped fine.
3/4 tablespoon each of ginger and garlic paste, crushed in a mortar/pestle, or whizzed in a food processor
1.5
tspns of the following, ground together in a coffee grinder: 1/2 tspn
turmeric, 1/2 tspn cumin seeds, 1/2 tspn coriander seeds, 1/3 tspn
mustard seeds, 1/4 tspn fenugreek seeds*
1/2 tspn amchur (mango powder)
1/2 tspn red chilli powder. (you might call it cayenne, right?)
1 pinch sugar

For Garnish:

1/2 Lime
chopped onion to taste
a little chopped cilantro
1 hot thai green chilli (or chile, if you will), minced

Preparation:

Soak, and cook the Garbanzo beans till just al dente, as per your method of choice.

While
the beans are cooking, heat some oil in a small saucepan, and add the
cloves and cardamom pods. saute for 1-2 minutes. Add the chopped onion
and saute for another 3-4 minutes, stirring all the while. As the edges
of the chopped onion begin to brown, add the ginger-garlic pastes.
Saute another 1-2 minutes, turn the heat down to medium, and add all
the powdered spices. Saute 3-4 minutes, stirring all the while. Add the
pinch of sugar, stir a little more, and pour the contents of the pan
into the pot with the cooked garbanzo beans. Mash some of the beans
against the side of the pot, and cook everything together for another
5-7 minutes over medium-low heat to incorporate flavours. Add salt.
Pour into a serving dish, squeeze the lime juice all over, top with the
chopped onions and cilantro and minced chilli. Serve with tortillas
(preferable) or steamed rice.

Options:

Add a pinch of garam masala and stir 1 minute before taking everything off heat.
You
could also add a chopped tomato after you’ve sauteed the spices. If you
do, make sure it cooks down and the oil separates before you add the
slurry to the beans.
If you have access to good tamarind, soak some
pulp in hot water, strain and simmer with sugar to make a thick’ish,
tangy sweet tamarind chutney, and lace the cooked beans with it.

*If
you don’t keep all the ingredients for the powdered spice mix around,
you can substitute a curry powder of your choice (ideally, from an
Indian store with high turnover). If you have access to a good Indian
store, look to see if they carry packaged spice blends for "Channa
Masala". If so, you could substitute that as well.

I then asked him about the mayacobas and he replied:

are you asking for a recipe for the mayacobas or if they can be cooked
the same way? as it happens, i did more or less cook them the same way,
except that with the mayacobas i used about 1.5 cups of chopped tomato
(added after the powdered spices had been fried). left out the mango
powder. the spice mix may have been a little different. i think i used
more red chilli powder and less coriander seeds. there’s no hard and
fast rules to the blend–basically you want to remember that fenugreek
seeds are very bitter, that coriander can overpower, and that the
mustard’s only there for a little bite.

you may recoil in
horror, but when i first started cooking, my mother’s advice about
cooking dried beans was to cook them much the same way i would cook red
meat. and that’s more or less what i do. with the garbanzos i make them
more tangy (with the mango powder) to gratify taste memory. of course,
you wouldn’t garnish most meat curries with loads of chopped onion or
squeeze limes over them.

Quality Has It’s Own Problems: Beans Cook Too Fast for the Ham Hocks

I love being the clearing house for all things bean-oriented!
I received this message from a fellow member of one of the big food boards:

Anyway, after finishing the GMStallards, today I soaked and began a
soup with my Yelloweyes. I glanced at a recipe, but basically winged
it. Two stalks celery, one large carrot, one onion, two cloves garlic
and a jalapeno, finely chopped, plus some crushed red pepper flakes —
all sauteed in olive oil.

Added two ham hocks and the beans,
plus a good bit more water (I like brothy soups). I boiled then
simmered maybe two hours in a covered La Creuset, then turned it off
when I left for work around 5:30 p.m. I’m going to have my wife turn it
back on low about an hour before I get off.

When I left, the
beans were pretty tender (I salted then), but the only thing I’m
disappointed by is that the hocks were still tough. If they haven’t
broken down tonight I’m going to pull them and re-use them for more
gelatin in a batch of your black beans later in the week.

I also wish I had a source for hocks of less unknown origin. Cleaner hocks, as it were.

Is it possible the beans are so much fresher than the hocks? To the point that they’d take so much longer to cook? Being from California, the ham hock thing wasn’t really done much. We always had Rosirita refrieds that my father would "doctor up", as he called it. The times I’ve cooked with a smoked ham hock, I got it from my friends at The Fatted Calf. Any advice on the ham hocks that might be older than last season’s beans?

Quality Has It’s Own Problems: Beans Cook Too Fast for the Ham Hocks

I love being the clearing house for all things bean-oriented!
I received this message from a fellow member of one of the big food boards:

Anyway, after finishing the GMStallards, today I soaked and began a
soup with my Yelloweyes. I glanced at a recipe, but basically winged
it. Two stalks celery, one large carrot, one onion, two cloves garlic
and a jalapeno, finely chopped, plus some crushed red pepper flakes —
all sauteed in olive oil.

Added two ham hocks and the beans,
plus a good bit more water (I like brothy soups). I boiled then
simmered maybe two hours in a covered La Creuset, then turned it off
when I left for work around 5:30 p.m. I’m going to have my wife turn it
back on low about an hour before I get off.

When I left, the
beans were pretty tender (I salted then), but the only thing I’m
disappointed by is that the hocks were still tough. If they haven’t
broken down tonight I’m going to pull them and re-use them for more
gelatin in a batch of your black beans later in the week.

I also wish I had a source for hocks of less unknown origin. Cleaner hocks, as it were.

Is it possible the beans are so much fresher than the hocks? To the point that they’d take so much longer to cook? Being from California, the ham hock thing wasn’t really done much. We always had Rosirita refrieds that my father would "doctor up", as he called it. The times I’ve cooked with a smoked ham hock, I got it from my friends at The Fatted Calf. Any advice on the ham hocks that might be older than last season’s beans?

A Podcast and Another Version of Chicken Posole

Sherry Page has been a longtime customer and now she produced Napa Valley Wine Radio with Goosecross Cellars. Recently she interviewed me and now the podcast is available. I like it for many reasons but mostly because I sound thin in the interview!

Sherry is really enthusiastic about Rancho Gordo and came up with this great sounding version of posole.

Chicken Posole Soup 
2 cups posole
Water to cover
8 cups chicken stock

1 leek, top removed, washed and chopped

1/3 cup sundried tomatoes

1 large green poblano pepper, roasted, peeled, seeded and
chopped

½ cup fresh English peas, (shelled)

1 cup roasted chicken, roughly chopped

Sea salt and pepper

2 corn tortillas, cut into strips

4 T olive oil

1 avocado, peeled, pitted and sliced

1 lime, cut into quarters (optional)

Cilantro, chopped (optional)

 

Soak the posole in a large pot for about 6 hours.  Pour off
the water.

Pour the chicken stock over the posole, add the chopped leek
and the sundried tomatoes and simmer on low heat for about two and a half
hours.

Add the chopped roasted pepper and simmer for about a half
hour longer. 

Add the English peas and the roasted chicken.  Bring back to
a simmer and cook for about 5-10 minutes.  Add salt and pepper, to taste.  Turn
off the heat and let the flavors set for about 10 minutes longer. 

Fry the tortilla strips in olive oil until they are crisp.
Remove them from the oil and blot with a paper towel. 

Ladle the soup into bowls.  Place a couple of slices of
avocado on the top of each.  Squeeze a little lime juice over the top of the
soup.  Garnish with the cilantro and fried tortilla strips. 

Serves 4.

Clay Pots With Lead

My recent trips to Mexico have been spent in part searching for great bean pots to import. I see many styles I like but it often comes down to the usage of lead. Some of the workshops have no problem using a non-lead glaze but others think I’m insane for asking.

I was quite erroneously told once that it’s only the vibrant colors, especially the green, that have lead. I can tell you now from experience there’s not much rhyme or reason. On this last trip I was told over and over that the alternative was animal and I wasn’t sure what they were talking about until I lay in bed at my hotel, replaying the days events, and realizing they were saying enamel.

Rick Bayless, in Rick Bayless’s Mexican Kitchen writes:

Yes, and most Mexican earthenware pots have lead glazes. You’ll have to make up your own mind, but let me tell you the essentials: It takes time and acid to leach lead from glazes. So stay away from very acidic food, don’t store foods in them or simply boil vinegar-water in them until all has evaporated to a lead-filled residue, then scrub the residue out (this affects the color). Other than that, I encourage you to enjoy your cazeula from time to time- they have been a traditional and integral part of the Mexican kitchen for centuries.

What do you think? Have you tried the vinegar trick? How acidic is acidic? If I make a standard chile sauce and squeeze lime or pour vinegar in, is that acid enough to leach out the lead into my sauce? I tend to want to believe him, but I’m the guy who has been incredibly lucky eating street food from Puebla to Bombay.

Grow Some Zapatista Corn

The organization Schools for Chiapas is offering local, heirloom corn from Chiapas to home gardeners. You get 60 seeds of either white or yellow corn for $6.50 and the profits benefit a good cause.  It’s not to late for anyone stateside to start planning a corn row or two and 60 kernels to get started is perfect. Unless you have a huge lot of land, just pick one so they don’t cross and be sure to save some of the yield to sow again next year.

I’ll be doing it here in Napa and will have full reports and lots of cooking ideas come harvest in the fall.

Thanks to P.I.N.A. of Napa,  for the the link to Schools for Chiapas.