Doing Justice to Huevos Rancheros

My abuelita Clementina, after whom I was named, was a very dignified woman with a clear sense of propriety. So strong was her abhorrence of anything remotely vulgar, that the word huevo (egg) never escaped her lips lest it drew chuckles from the male population. Blanquillo ("little white one") was her euphemism of choice. And if you are wondering why the male population would chuckle at something as innocuous as an egg. . . well, go ask your abuelo, because, you won't hear it from me.

Perhaps my abuelita Clementina would have been glad that I am writing about Huevos Rancheros, because if there is any Mexican dish that has suffered on its trip northward, this is most certainly it. It goes without saying that most restaurant style Huevos Rancheros are nothing more than a gussied-up version of nachos with rubbery overly cooked eggs attached. If you can feel my righteous indignation oozing off this post, then you are absolutely right. It is as bad as taking a fresh-faced rancherita—a sweet country girl—and making her up to look like a payasa—a painted clown.
Huevos Rancheros conjures up the image of rustic freshness—a cooked salsa made from cooked or, in this case, oven roasted vine ripened tomatoes, chiles, garlic and onions, bright with the taste of their own natural sweetness counterbalanced with a slight undertone of charred smokiness. It means eggs so fresh that they are still warm from lying beneath the little butts of the hens that laid them. And corn tortillas fried up not too soggy or too crisp, but just right. In short, the way Huevos Rancheros were meant to be: a beguiling combination of heat-sweet-tanginess, a rich creaminess together with crunchability, perfect whether you are eating them para el almuerzo—for a late breakfast, or if you are frying some up for dinner, especially if you want to eat something hearty but fast and simple to make.
As for this classic Mexican dish, wouldn't you say it is time to take it back, rescuing it from the disgusting nacho mess it has become, and cooking some Huevos Rancheros your dignified abuelita would be proud of?

You can bet your blanquillos that I would.

Huevos Rancheros With Roasted Tomato Salsa

Or, How to Fry An Egg (For Those Who Don't Know How)

Using a molcajete to crush the ingredients makes the most authentic and best salsa. Nothing can duplicate its flavor or texture--period. Also, I respectfully disagree with Cook's Magazine, from which I very loosely adapted the salsa recipe: If you want keep the rustic charm of this salsa, do not core the tomatoes or remove the seeds as some European trained cooks are apt to do. My Mexican mother never did this and neither should you. As for the jalapeño or serrano chiles, use as much or as little as you can bear.

Ingredients:

Roasted Tomato Salsa (recipe to follow)
eggs
corn tortillas
any vegetable oil
butter (optional)

Roasted Tomato Salsa Recipe:

Ingredients:

6 to 8 ripe medium to large tomatoes, cut in half
about a 1/3 of an onion
2 fresh serrano or jalapeño chiles, whole or seeded, depending how hot you want the salsa
1 fresh serano or jalapeno, finely minced
2 or 3 cloves garlic in their skins.
oregano to taste
ground cumin to taste
salt and pepper to taste

Making the Salsa:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.

Line a rimmed cookie sheet with aluminum foil and give it a light brushing of vegetable oil. Put the onion, garlic cloves, the chiles, and the tomatoes, cut side down on the cookie sheet. Place the cookie sheet on the lower rack of your oven and roast for about one-half hour, or until you see that the tomatoes are "melted" and cooking in their own juices. The tops should be brown, but not burned to the ground. Remove them from the oven at once. Peel the garlic.

MOLCAJETE METHOD: (Don't have a molcajete? Go to Mi Tiendita—My Little Kitchen Store and buy yourself one!)

Take the onion, chiles and garlic, and crush them to a pulp. If your molcajete is small, scrape off the onion-chile mixture and set itaside. Next crush all of the tomatoes. There should be no large pieces of tomato peel. Scrape off the crushed tomatoes and mix with the onion-chile mixture until well blended.

FOOD PROCESSOR METHOD: Pulse the onion, chiles and garlic into small chunks. Set aside. Do the same for the tomatoes. Do not over process. Mix the tomatoes and onion-chile mixture together.

Add the fresh minced chile to the salsa. Whether you want to seed the chile before you mince it is up to you.

Next: add salt, pepper, oregano and ground cumin to taste. If the salsa is not acidy enough for you, you can add a little squirt of lime juice.
Refrigerate the salsa overnight until the next morning. Reheat and keep warm until ready to serve. If the salsa is a little too thick, just add a little water.

FRYING THE TORTILLAS & EGGS FOR HUEVOS RANCHEROS:
Heat a skillet over a medium flame for about a minute. Add vegetable oil to a depth of ¼ inch and wait until you see the oil start to shimmer. Drop a teeny piece of corn tortilla into the skillet. If it sizzles, then it is ready to fry.

Fry two tortillas on one side for 30 seconds. Flip them on the other side and fry them until they are nice and toasty on the bottom. Remove them and lay them on paper towels to absorb excess oil. (You can also oven fry the tortillas if you want, but it is not my favorite method for Huevos Rancheros.) Lower the heat to medium low. Add some butter to the skillet if you want. When the butter starts to foam, break 2 eggs into the skillet. Try to baste a little of the oil over the eggs if you can. You can salt the eggs at this point if you wish.Cover the skillet with a lid and lower the heat to low. The lid will reflect the heat back to the top of the eggs. After a minute or two, remove the lid. The egg whites should be opaque and firm to your liking; the yokes should look nice and shiny. If they are not, then put the lid back on the skillet until the eggs are done to your taste. Remove the skillet from the heat. Shake the eggs until they start to slide around. Then, tilt the pan and slide the eggs onto a plate over the layered corn tortillas. If you prefer, you can turn your eggs. Just make sure the spatula is supporting the yolk(s) before flipping it over. Turn off the heat, wait some seconds, and then slide the eggs off the pan.
Spoon some of the warm tomato salsa evenly over the eggs. Serve with some hearty refried beans that are topped off with a bit of stinky Mexican style cheese like that stinky-feet but utterly delicious Zacatecas-style cheese or maybe some mild Queso Fresco. Serves one.

Chili as Strong as Tarantula Venom

How do you measure success? It is by your state-of-the-art kitchen, the Manolo Blahnik sandals in your closet, or by the new BMW parked in your driveway? Now be honest.

Because if you do, then I feel like, totally sorry for you. Really I do.

Don't get me wrong, you can be justifiably proud of your achievements, but does success or happiness in life depend on amassing wealth? Now that the global economy is near the brink of collapse, perhaps we should turn to Wall Street bankers for their thoughts on the subject.

Oftentimes, whenever I see a picture of an ultra-expensive kitchen with the latest gadgets and appliances, I wonder if people ever cook in such a place—or, is it just for show? And if they do cook, does the food even taste good? Do they make chili salsa the way my mother did, or prepare a big plate of enchiladas? Because let's face it, cooking can be a messy business, and I don't think that a gleaming white kitchen can even survive the explosion of color and smell of chili salsa. I can't count how many times I did not properly fit the lid when I turned on the blender and ended up having to clean chili salsa off the ceiling. Oh well, clumsy me.

Now that we are living in uncertain economic times, how can you make a simple delicious meal without breaking the bank? Like our ancestors before us, you make beans, rice, tortillas and this chili salsa which costs almost nothing to make. Add a green salad and you're set. No only will it fill your stomach, it will comfort you in ways that Coq Au Vin never will.

Before some us lived in McMansions or possessed (now rapidly dwindling) nest eggs we lived in small houses in poor neighborhoods. How can we forget the tiny kitchen, the pokey stove, those mismatched plates? The coughing and choking when the fumes of toasted chilies filled the entire house? The smell of our mother's cooking while everybody gathered round and talked and joked while watching Soul Train on Saturday afternoons? The music of Los Bukis coming from a neighbor's window? Almost nobody we knew had much money, even in good times, and frankly we didn't mind it at all. If you create the same atmosphere of amor in your family, then you are a very successful person, indeed.

And it doesn't cost a thing.

Chili Salsa as Strong as Tarantula Venom (But Better Tasting)

Fact: Who knew that our delicate taste buds do not even register chili's searing heat? Curiously, that burning sensation occurs when chilies and tarantula venom target a specific pain receptor. In fact, some chilies are as strong as tarantula venom. Such a lovely thought, no?

Once you learn to toast dried chiles, you are only a hop, skip and a jump away from making enchilada sauce from scratch (bye, bye cans!). This is just a basic recipe, but the variations on this theme are endless.

Warning: on a heat scale from 1 (mild) to 6 (very hot), this salsa is a 4 or a 5.

What you need:
A large griddle or comalA wooden spatula
A blender
A medium sized bowl

Ingredients:
30 dried Chile de Árbol chilies (stems removed) See photo above.
2 dried New Mexico chiles
1 or 2 cloves garlic in their skins
2 medium sized juicy tomatoes
Salt to taste
1 tablespoon of vegetable cooking oil (optional)
Salt to taste

Directions:
First of all, open the windows and turn on the fan over your stove!
Remove the stems from each dried chili. Slit open the large New Mexico chiles and remove the seeds if you want. (No need to do that with the smaller de arbol chiles). Take the griddle or comal and preheat over a medium heat for a minute or two. Add cooking oil (optional) and wait a minute more. Put the dried chilis, garlic and tomatoes on the hot comal and toast chiles for some minutes until you see their color change (see photo below). Do not burn! (Burning them only makes them bitter, in which case you must throw them out and start all over again.) Remove chilies from comal and put them inside the blender. Remove the tomatoes from the comal when they are toasted on all sides and their skins have burst.
Cut up tomatoes and place them with the chilis and garlic in the blender. Blend at full speed for some minutes until the chili salsa is smooth. If the salsa is too thick, add a bit of water and blend some more. Pour into bowl. At this point, you can pour the chile salsa through a wire mesh strainer to create a smooth bodied salsa, but you do not have too. Add salt to taste.
This salsa is perfect on almost anything: with carne asada, over chicken, fish. I think I will have them with my eggs tomorrow morning.

The Jewel Colored Salsa

If Green were a flavor it would taste like this peridot colored salsa, which glistens with jewel-like beauty. You will never forget how you felt the first time you tried it, as its flavors simultaneously filled your mouth with cool—tangy—fresh—spicy deliciousness. Perhaps you had it in an Albondigas soup on a cold winter's night, or with tender pork carnitas wrapped up in a soft burrito, but no matter, because this salsa will not only touch your palate, but your soul—your Mexican soul—which is the possession of Mexican food lovers everywhere. One that embraces joy and despair with equal ardor. A soul that wants the melodies to be happy but the lyrics sad.

Like love, this salsa will break your heart in a million little tomatillo and Serrano chile and cilantro pieces—but it is a sweet heartbreak, one from which you will not want to recover. Viva tomatillo salsa love.

The Jewel Colored Salsa

(Green Tomatillo Salsa)

Tomatillo salsa is an essential of Mexican cuisine. Put it in tacos, burritos, in soups, in your guacamole, on your fried eggs in the morning, with your beans. The list goes on and on.

Making Tomatillo Salsa is the easiest thing in the world. You can make as little or as much as you want. Just follow the instructions.

What you need:

A small, medium, or large pot, depending on how much you want to make.

A sharp chopping knife

A blender, molcajete, or a hand-held blender

Ingredients:

Tomatillos without the husks, halved. About 5 to 6 for a small amount; 7 to 10 for a medium amount; 11 or more for a large amount

Fresh garlic cloves—1 or 2 for small amount, 2—4 for medium amount, 4 or more for a large amount.

1 to 4 very finely minced chiles serranos

Fresh diced green onion to taste (I like a lot).

Fresh chopped cilantro to taste (again, I like a lot of it).

Put tomatillos and garlic in a pot. Add a bit of water until it reaches just up to ½ way up the tomatillos (see picture). Bring to a boil. Then, reduce to a simmer with the lid covered. Keep checking tomatillos until they are a fully cooked and soft. Do not drain out the water. Place tomatillos and water in the blender, or molcajete, or use a hand-held blender to purée the ingredients. Now add finely minced serrano chiles. You can add a little or a lot so it can be hot or mild, depending on your taste. Add salt to taste. Pour the salsa in a bowl. Let cool and refrigerate until completely chilled. Add diced green onion and cilantro. Keep a little minced serrano chile on the side for those who want their salsa hot. Now, revel in the tangy, fresh spicy deliciousness.

Variation: Add chunks of fresh avocado to the salsa. Or, add the salsa to chunks of fresh avocado. Either way, your taste buds will tell you gracias.

My Little Pig-Headed Molcajete Salsa Garden

This is my little pig-headed molcajete for making salsa fresca—common enough in Mexico, but a novelty here in the United States. Made from basalt volcanic rock and used since ancient times by the Aztecs and the Mayas, it is an indispensable tool in the Mexican kitchen.

Whenever I have had certain guests over for dinner and I bring el molcajete to the table, they look at me with a mixture of surprise and a little bit of nervousness. Once, a young little guest asked me, “Do we have to eat the rock?”

“Of course, I always eat it with my salsa,” I replied with the look of utmost seriousness. Then I winked at his little panic-stricken face. Everybody laughed, but I knew that they were worrying that they would have to eat rocks, too.

Only after taking a taste did they see that this salsa rocks, like totally.

What this molcajete and its tejolote crushing tool do is to produce is the most luscious no-cook salsa fresca ever, especially if you are using the sweetest, juiciest tomatoes you can find. No blender can duplicate the taste and texture of a molcajete-made salsa. The ingredients are crushed, not cut, and the flavor, though subtle, carries over the taste of the stone (which must have some health benefits) and of salsas and spices past.

Up until a few years ago, every spring I scoured nurseries hunting for the best plants and seeds to start a salsa garden. I bought soil and tomato cages and dug in the dirt, sometimes all day, planting tomatoes and green onions, serrano and jalapeño chiles and cilantro. Later, when summer’s harvest arrived, I’d put on my straw gardening hat to go out and pick the best ones for my salsa. What a delight to feel those tomatoes, red and warm to the touch, each looking like giant ruby gemstones.

Anyone who grew up in the city or who spends most of the day working indoors or sitting behind a desk should go out of doors and plant a salsa garden of his or her own, even if only in containers. Then will they experience a sensory delight which up until now they have never had or have forgotten: the rich sensation of feeling dark soil on your hands with the sun on your back, watching beautiful things that you planted yourself, grow.

You will be proud to share the fruits of your labor with your family and friends. Almost everyone will be grateful to receive this uncommonly delicious gift. And, even if your salsa garden project is a dismal failure, it was not a total waste of time. You will have found a new respect for our antepasados—forebearers, who knew how to coach the soil into producing food to feed their families—despite adversity, The Mexican Revolution, and poverty. Perhaps it will change your life’s perspective in ways you never imagined--that living in the world of ideas and solely through one’s brain is not the only way to experience life. All because you planted a little garden to make salsa fresca in a humble molcajete.

Little Pig-Headed Molcajete No-Cook Salsa Fresca

What you need:

A mocajete with tejolote crushing tool (available online, at Mexican markets, or go to Mexico and buy one). Make sure to cure the molcajete by rinsing with water, letting it dry, and grinding in some raw rice.

Sharp knife

If you do not have a molcajete:

A sharp knife for chopping and mincing

A potato masher

A large bowl

Ingredients:

2 sweet, juicy tomatoes—home grown is ideal, but a pint of miniature tomatoes such as cherry or grape tomatoes are perfect, too.

1 large garlic clove

1 serrano chile-coarsely chopped, but finely minced if you do not have a molcajete. Strip off seeds and veins if you don’t want it too hot.

1 or 2 stalks of green onion including tops, finely diced.

Coarsely chopped cilantro to taste (optional, you can omit it, but why?)

Squirt of fresh lime juice

Salt to taste

Chopped avocado (optional)

Coarsely chop tomatoes and serrano chile. Put them in molcajete with garlic and start crushing with grinding tool until well blended. Add green onions, cilantro and avocado. Add squirt of lime and salt to taste.

Without molcajete: Coarsely chop tomatoes. Use potato masher and crush with minced serrano chile until well blended. Add green onions, cilantro, and avocado. Add squirt of lime and salt to taste.