In the style of the Shepherd

Around here, the little Akre crew can dig on some Mexican food. As children of the 70's, Neil and I are nostalgically fond of the good ol' American Tex-Mex ground beef taco with crunchy shell, cheddar, onion, tomato, lettuce, etc., you get my drift.  Make no mistake, I still make these kind of tacos every time we have one of those busy weeknights. I.LOVE.TACOS.


But, as we have aged and evolved, we have been fortunate enough to actually experience Mexico and myriad really, good, authentic Mexican restaurants and Mexican people here in the U.S.  As time has gone by, our knowledge (by "our," I mean Americans in general) of true Mexican food has gradually been realized.  True Mexican style tacos are something relatively new to many Americans, as many of our brethren still flock to the standard Tex-Mex "Somebody's San Jose" and order crap like the "Speedy Gonzales" or the ubiquitous "Lunch #3."  

One of my favorites is Tacos al Pastor.  I've always wondered about the "al" part of this name, so I checked into the history of this dish.  From what I've read, this dish was actually introduced to Mexico by Lebanese immigrants.  It was inspired by schwarma, also one of my favorite dishes, so this is all starting to make sense.  If you are unfamiliar with "al Pastor," it is a mixture of marinated pork, onion and pineapple served in a warm corn tortilla and topped with finely diced onion, cilantro and a squeeze of lime.  

So, as you can probably deduce by now, I like making stuff at home.  I recently got a shipment of beautiful boneless, center cut pork chops.  Pastor time!  It is surprisingly easy to make and so worth the small amount of effort.

Guajillos:  I use these for enchilada sauce, my tamales and now for this!

 

Chop up those finishing touches for your tacos

Boneless pork & pineapple in marinade

 

Draining off marinade

 

Cookin' up that goodness!

Taco al Pastor with homemade refried beans

Tacos al Pastor
5 dried Guajillo chiles
1 chipotle pepper 
1 med onion, chopped
1 can pineapple chunks 
1/8 cup vinegar
1 Tbs minced garlic
1/2 tsp cumin
1 lb (roughly) boneless pork, cut into small cubes
1 Tbs canola oil
Corn tortillas
Chopped cilantro
Chopped onion
Wedges of lime

1.  Boil about 1 cup water and soak chiles for about 10 min to soften.  Cool, then remove stems and seeds.

2.   Chop onion, strain pineapple and reserved the juice.

3.   Transfer guajillo peppers, chipotle pepper, half of the chopped onion, 1/2 of pineapple juice (save the rest for another use), vinegar, garlic and cumin in food processor.  Puree until smooth.

4.   Transfer mixture to saucepan and bring to a boil; cook until raw onion taste subsides, about 2 minutes.  If you want it spicier, add some adobe from the can of chipotles. Cool then combine in a ziploc bag with pork, remaining onion & pineapple.  Refrigerate and marinate at least 2 hours, up to 24. 

5.    Drain meat/pineapple mixture & discard marinade.  Heat a bit of oil in skillet.  Add pork and pineapple and cook until dark golden brown and cooked through, about 15 minutes. 

6.   Dry "fry" corn tortillas in skillet to soften.  Add meat, pineapple, finely chopped onion, cilantro and give it a good squeeze of lime.


I served our tacos with homemade refried beans. These are so simple, you'll wonder why we ever bothered buying them in a can.

1. Take a 30 oz. can of pintos and "lightly" drain them.
2. Heat about a Tbs oil and add a couple of garlic cloves.
3. When they are lightly brown, crush them up with a fork.  Or, if you prefer, just use minced garlic.  The point is to flavor the oil. 
4. Add beans, 1 tsp chili powder, 1 tsp cumin, salt to taste.
 5.  Cook about 5 min until beans are heated.  Mash with potato masher until consistency you like.  Squeeze in some lime juice, stir and enjoy! 



 

The Whole Enchilada

Clearly, the holidays are already interfering with my blog schedule.  And I'm not likin' it.  But, I'll do my best to post meaningful (?) information for you, all my friends.  I don't want to disappoint you :-)

Most weeknights, I morph into Sandra Lee and conduct my own episode of "Semi-Homemade" especially now that I have "regular hours." (How does the rest of the world handle this regular hour thing? I'm not good at people tellling me what to do.)  Anyway, I come blasting in the door from work, head straight to the kitchen, get a glass of wine first and foremost!, then start getting food on the table. And, I'll admit, this fast and furious style of meal preparation doesn't often lead to exotic food brimming with Wow-factor.  But, the other night, I did it.  I whipped up the fastest, easiest and tastiest supper.  So, tasty that it surprised Neil.  It was almost like he was expecting to just sort of like it, but he ended up loving it, and once again, thinking that I'm a genius. 

It was Green Chile Chicken Enchiladas.  Now, let me give you a little back story.  Once upon a time, my sister Katherine lived in Colorado.  Out there people make and eat green chile on EVERYTHING. I'm not exaggerating: breakfast burritos, omelets, biscuits, sandwiches, meat, enchiladas and all other forms of Mexican food, EVERYTHING.  Katherine makes a mean pot of the stuff herself.  It's just that good.  Well, my mom really fell in love with it.  As you can imagine, flying across the country with a bunch of ziplocs full of green chile would most likely end in disaster.  (Remind me to tell you sometime about the styrofoam bait bucket full of fresh crab that was in the overhead bin.)

So, mom found Old El Paso green chile enchilada sauce in the Colorado grocery stores.  She brought a bunch back because we'd never seen it here in our stores.  She searched far and wide, but alas, here in the Deep South, no one knew what she was talking about.  Everytime my sister came home, she had to lug a stash of canned green chile for my mom.  Dottie became a chicken enchilada machine.  I kept telling mom to have the grocery store order it.  I don't think she ever did.  So, anyway, the other day I was checking out the myriad of refried beans in the store these days when I looked up and there it was.  Old El Paso green chile enchilada sauce. Now, I'll submit to you that perhaps our stores have been carrying this for quite some time now, but I just haven't looked for it.  I guess I just had it in my mind that canned green chile in South Carolina just wasn't meant to be.  Well, it's here and I bought it with exuberance and headed to the kitchen.

Pre-Bake

Post-Bake

On the Plate

I basically just followed the recipe on the can.  In the past, we've made these rolled up the traditional way but also flat, like in stacks, which works well too.  In a nut-shell, you saute some chicken until done.  I used about a pound of chicken tenders and then shredded them. Then, you mix them with cream cheese (I like the lower fat Neufchatel) and green chiles until it gets melty and mixed together well.  Spoon into flour tortillas, roll and place seam side down in your baking dish.  Pour 2 cans of the sauce over, sprinkle with some cheddar and pop in the oven for about 15 minutes at 350.  Then, present to your husband, or wife, or whomever and they will love it and think you're a genius.  

That's it for this episode of "Semi-Homemade with Elizabeth.  Thanks for joining us.  Stay Classy Columbia."