Shredded Beef Salad (Salpicon de res)
Salpicon is not exactly a precise term. Depending on the context, it can refer to different kinds of hash or salad. In the Ciudad Juárez-El Paso border area where I began my catering career, it meant a colorful salad of shredded beef with other sliced or diced...
Zarela Savory “Cornbread” (Torta de elote)
Zarela Savory “Cornbread” (Torta de elote) At the Instituto Familiar y Social, I learned a zucchini dish with a consistency something like a moist, cakey bread, called torta de calabacitas. Over the years I’ve found it a good basis for departures like this version...
Marinated Pork Strips (Cecina enchilada)
In Spanish and Mexican cooking, cecina can refer to many jerky-like or salt-cured meats. In Oaxaca it usually means long, thin pork strips almost like ribbons of meat, allowed to air-dry for a few hours before being pan-broiled. Sometimes cecina is seasoned just with...
Grill-Smoked Meat (Carne de chango)
Carne de chango or carne de mono literally means “monkey meat.” Some say that at one time this famous smoked specialty of the Catemaco area was made from local monkeys. That’s as may be –- the only monkeys now left in the region are a colony of Asian macaques imported...Los Tuxtlas-Style Chile-Lime Sauce (Chile pastor)
Los Tuxtlas-Style Chile-Lime Sauce (Chile pastor) Sauces don’t get much simpler than this marriage of four or five flavors that accompanies many dishes in the Tuxtlas area. It is great with picadas or pellizcadas, but I also like it with fish and meat dishes. Chile...
The many lives of Zarela Martínez
Culinary legend Zarela Martínez introduced finely tuned, highly researched regional Mexican cuisine to a national stage, and has continued to blaze trails for more than three decades.