We just finished eating a short time ago and the meal was both very satisfying and very tasty. Normita’s chicken soup had its normal effect of settling our stomachs and relaxing us. Something very needed this week. It is so effective it should be sold in every pharmacy…
Normita's World Famous Chicken Soup - A cure for all ailments
The tacos and accompanying sauce were also very satisfying and we both left the table well fed and in a better mood. What more do you want from a good meal? Now it’s back to work and we both hope to be very productive tonight!
The corn tortillas pre-heating on the comal
Normita preparing the chicken tacos
The tacos cooking on the comal
The plated tacos, one with a bit of homemade salsa and heavy cream inside
Lucito
Today Normita will be doing the cooking duties. I feel a bit off-the-weather and I had a craving for her incredible super-duper chicken soup. It is a simple soup to make and soups are really her specialty. I call her “Normita la Sopera” (Normita the soup maker) all the time…
The recipe for this great soup was published HERE years ago. Have a look at it if you want a great tasting soup that is easy to prepare. We thawed two nice and large chicken thighs an drumsticks and she will use that for the soup with plenty of noodles.
For the main course she will shred the meat and then make some “taquitos dorados de pollo” (golden chicken tacos) with it. Normally those tacos are made with soft corn tortillas rolled with the chicken inside and then deep fried. We prefer cooking them without fat directly on a “comal” the traditional griddle used in all kind of Mexican cooking. Our stove even has one built-in that covers the middle 2 burners of the 6 burner stove top. You simply roll some shredded chicken meat in the soft tortillas and then place them on the very hot “comal” and turn them until they are evenly golden and crisp. She will serve the tacos with some homemade salsa and them with some heavy cream.
I’m starting to salivate just writing about this… I guess that the strange noises I am hearing right now are from my stomach that is growling from hunger… I’m really looking forward to the meal…
Lucito
Today’s day is only marginally going better than yesterday’s, but I prepared a decent meal anyways. I was not sure what the fish I thawed yesterday was, as I have the bad habit of putting stuff in zipper bags and then freezing them and trying to rely on my memory to know what it is. It does not work and I really need to make an effort to start systematically labeling things with content and freeze date as opposed to only occasionally do it.
It turned out to be one of the last pieces of local “dorado” (mahi-mahi) from the over 1 meter fish we bought some months ago. At the same time we also bought a few large “huachinango” (red snapper). We are now down to our last few packs, so we need to plan another trip to the central fish market. The two pieces in the pack were from the tail tip of the filet and not well cut to cook as a whole.
Yesterday I had though of baking them in a tomato sauce, but today I was pressed for time and I wanted something quicker to prepare and something that gives a satisfying crunch when eating, as everybody knows that crunchy food is fun food. I decided to cut the pieces in small chunks, then bread them quickly with some savory breading.
I prepared a quick bound breading with first some flour mixed with garlic salt, herbes de Provence, citric chile powder and white pepper to lightly flour the pieces. I them passed them through a wash with eggs mixed with a bit of sesame oil, salsa “Maggi”, and heavy cream. Then I completed the bound breading with some hand-crushed Corn Flakes.
Dorado breaded in Corn Flakes
I pan-fried the fish in a few tablespoons of soy oil and it yielded incredibly crunchy pieces of fish with a moist juicy interior. I served it with the leftover sweet potato purée from 2 days ago. It turned out to be an very quick and easy meal to prepare that was very satisfying and very tasty.
The plated Dorado ready to serve
Lucito
Today was a hectic and bad day for us in the office as a lot of things happened that put a lot of projects behind schedule or canceled completely. It was “One of those days” as they say… To make things even funnier I had taken out of the freezer some nice fish to prepare for lunch today and by the time I should have started cooking the fish was still mostly frozen. I guess we will have that tomorrow.
In any case due to our moods we were not very hungry anyways, so we decided around 6pm to finally have lunch and we just made a few plain grilled cheese sandwiched. The easy kind with simply two slices of bread and a slice of cheese in between. Very boring and half an hour later I am starting to get hungry again, but it will have to do for now. We will see later if we decide to eat something in the evening.
Tomorrow will be another day, and hopefully a better one…
Lucito
As mentioned earlier I decided to prepare some thinly sliced pork chops that we bought on sale last weekend. We also bought half a small pineapple and I was planning to use that too. Here is a look at those very thin chops. Thinly sliced meat is very popular here in Mexico.
Here are those thinly sliced pork chops we ate
I ended up removing the flesh from the pineapple husk and chopping it roughly. I mixed it with some quartered mushrooms, tomato ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, balsamic glaze, cumin, salt and pepper. I oven-baked the chops in the pineapple mix on a bed made with pieces of pineapple husk. Here is a picture of the dish as it came out of the oven.
The dish coming out of the oven
The dish turned out fantastic and I will post the recipe in the coming weeks. I prepared some sweet potatoes purée to go with it as it had been ages that we had some. All in all a great meal! Now I need to go take a nap…
Here is the plated dish ready to eat
Lucito
I am about to go to the kitchen to prepare the meal and I am starving. I have been working in the office preparing various proposals since early this morning and I have yet to take a 5 minute break, so I feel understandably lightheaded.
When I got up I thawed some of those thinly sliced pork chops we bought on sale last weekend. I plan to bake them with some fresh pineapple we bought at the same time. I am not sure exactly yet how I will do that, and I will let whatever inspiration that hits me when I actually start cooking take over.
If it turns out well I will post the results later this week. Wish me luck…
Lucito
¡Para nuestros lectores en el área de la Ciudad de México! Además del curso de "Introducción al vino" anunciado AQUÍ en nuestro sitio principal, también tendremos otro curso en el área de Naucalpan, al norte de la ciudad, este sábado 17 de abril. Aún tenemos algunos espacios así que contáctame directamente si estás interesado.
Lucito
For our readers in the Mexico City area! Besides the Introduction to wine course advertised on our main site HERE we are also having another course in the Naucalpan area in the north of the city this Saturday April 17th. We still have a few places remaining so contact me directly if you are interested.
Lucito
We have been doing house chores since around 7am today and it is now 4pm. We do not have time or the inclination to do anything in the kitchen so it wil be the leftover pizza from Saturday, at least the few slices that the Boyz did not steal from us. We'll see about preparing something interesting tomorrow.
Lucito
As mentioned in yesterday's Daily Express, I prepared some ribs with an oriental-influenced marinade. They turned out incredibly good so I will post the recipe later this week as they are worth sharing. Here is a picture to wet you appetite.
Lucito