Jamie Iredell's Blog, page 14
April 12, 2012
Why I'm in Love with all Things Mexico
I cannot be entirely sure, but it certainly has something to do with where I grew up. And that place was the Central Coast of California, near the town of Castroville, a town so small it's not really a town. Ask Wikipedia; it's a "census-designated place." Since you may or may not have checked out Wikipedia's Castroville, California page, let me assure that this is a town of no more than 7,000 souls, and, during the years I spent there, it was closer to 5,000. Of these 5,000 people, over 90% of the population was Hispanic, and by "Hispanic" I mean Mexican.
While growing up, though try as I did, I did not identify with being Mexican. I was and am in the truest sense of the word, White. But most of my classmates in elementary, middle, and high school, and many of my friends--people with whom I played football and baseball and went to dances and took on dates--were Mexicans. My father had majored in Spanish in college, and so, as was required of the college prep track in which I was enlisted in high school, when it came to studying a foreign language, the natural choice was Spanish. I mean, I grew up in a town named Castroville, founded by Juan Bautista Castro, son of "Simeon Nepomuceno Castro, owner of the Rancho Bolsa Nueva y Moro Cojo Mexican land grant on which the town is located." So, you see, I grew up in a part of the what is today the United States, that at one time was part of Mexico, and before that a colony of Spain, and before that, simply what would become known as the west coast of North American, but was likely called something else entirely by the Calendaric Native American Indian tribe that lived where the town now sits.
It also has something to do with having visited Mexico on numerous occasions, and met, eaten with, and talked to the people who call themselves Mexicans. They are a lovely, humble, hard-working, faithful, purely human people. When with Mexicans, I feel closer to Earth. I don't feel that way around my own kind--Americans. Americans seem to want to own Earth. Mexicans seem to simply acknowledge the fact that they are a part of the planet. I don't know any Mexican government officials, nor any higher-ups in drug cartels, so I couldn't tell you waht the rich and powerful of Mexico think and feel, nor how they act. I can only tell you about the regular people. I suppose these people would be analogous to myself as an American. It's true; I do know some of the educated elite of Mexico. But they, like me, are decidedly middle class. So we're all just regular folk, eeking a way in life. But the folk I love most are Mexican folk.
But I cannot ignore the fact that probably the biggest reason why I love all things Mexican is the food. Mexican food. In its fast varieties of tacos, burros, and sopes--and a ton of variations--and in its slower, sit-down items: moles, pibil, tamales. Mexican food is a revolutionary force. Few Americans can deny the hold that a good taco can have over their appetite. Salsas, fresh tomato and cilantro, chiles. For the bland traditional American palate, the influx of Mexican food is a magic spell, an elixir full of life. I'll never forget the first time I visited New York City, in 2001, just months before 9/11. One of the first things I asked my hosts was how the Mexican food was. In unison they shook their heads (these were two women who had lived for nearly ten years in San Francisco, so I could trust their opinion): "don't bother," they said. They said New York had the worst Mexican food on the planet. So I didn't try it then. But over these intervening eleven years I hear reports of a sea change taking place in New York City. Suddenly Puerto Ricans no longer may be the people cooking the food in "Mexican" restaurants. No offense to the Puerto Ricuenos out there, but come on, the cuisines are infinitely different! But I hear tell there are Mexican folk working Mexican restuarants in America's Metropolis. All this despite legislation hell-bent on stereotyping and racially profiling not only Mexicans, but all Hispanic people in the United States. But the comida will not be stopped.
While growing up, though try as I did, I did not identify with being Mexican. I was and am in the truest sense of the word, White. But most of my classmates in elementary, middle, and high school, and many of my friends--people with whom I played football and baseball and went to dances and took on dates--were Mexicans. My father had majored in Spanish in college, and so, as was required of the college prep track in which I was enlisted in high school, when it came to studying a foreign language, the natural choice was Spanish. I mean, I grew up in a town named Castroville, founded by Juan Bautista Castro, son of "Simeon Nepomuceno Castro, owner of the Rancho Bolsa Nueva y Moro Cojo Mexican land grant on which the town is located." So, you see, I grew up in a part of the what is today the United States, that at one time was part of Mexico, and before that a colony of Spain, and before that, simply what would become known as the west coast of North American, but was likely called something else entirely by the Calendaric Native American Indian tribe that lived where the town now sits.
It also has something to do with having visited Mexico on numerous occasions, and met, eaten with, and talked to the people who call themselves Mexicans. They are a lovely, humble, hard-working, faithful, purely human people. When with Mexicans, I feel closer to Earth. I don't feel that way around my own kind--Americans. Americans seem to want to own Earth. Mexicans seem to simply acknowledge the fact that they are a part of the planet. I don't know any Mexican government officials, nor any higher-ups in drug cartels, so I couldn't tell you waht the rich and powerful of Mexico think and feel, nor how they act. I can only tell you about the regular people. I suppose these people would be analogous to myself as an American. It's true; I do know some of the educated elite of Mexico. But they, like me, are decidedly middle class. So we're all just regular folk, eeking a way in life. But the folk I love most are Mexican folk.
But I cannot ignore the fact that probably the biggest reason why I love all things Mexican is the food. Mexican food. In its fast varieties of tacos, burros, and sopes--and a ton of variations--and in its slower, sit-down items: moles, pibil, tamales. Mexican food is a revolutionary force. Few Americans can deny the hold that a good taco can have over their appetite. Salsas, fresh tomato and cilantro, chiles. For the bland traditional American palate, the influx of Mexican food is a magic spell, an elixir full of life. I'll never forget the first time I visited New York City, in 2001, just months before 9/11. One of the first things I asked my hosts was how the Mexican food was. In unison they shook their heads (these were two women who had lived for nearly ten years in San Francisco, so I could trust their opinion): "don't bother," they said. They said New York had the worst Mexican food on the planet. So I didn't try it then. But over these intervening eleven years I hear reports of a sea change taking place in New York City. Suddenly Puerto Ricans no longer may be the people cooking the food in "Mexican" restaurants. No offense to the Puerto Ricuenos out there, but come on, the cuisines are infinitely different! But I hear tell there are Mexican folk working Mexican restuarants in America's Metropolis. All this despite legislation hell-bent on stereotyping and racially profiling not only Mexicans, but all Hispanic people in the United States. But the comida will not be stopped.
April 9, 2012
The Hardest Thing to Make
are tortillas. I think. Maybe a mole negro is very difficult and complex, and it takes a couple days to make it. But tortillas--hand-made corn tortillas--are the most difficult thing I've ever attempted to master in Mexican cuisine. I can't do it. I suppose if all I did was work on making tortillas for hours a day for a few months or years I would eventually get pretty good at it, but I'm trying to be realistic about my abilities when it comes to Mexican food, and my time when it comes to cooking it. Here's a short video that slow-mo's a woman making tortillas completely by hand:
Since I cannot do that, I cheat and use a tortillas press, which looks like this:
This contraption is composed of two hinged heavy cast iron plates that can be pressed together with the lever that folds over the top plate. Still, tortillas aren't easy to make using this machine.
First you need masa harina, or corn flour. This is not the coarse corn flour one might use for cooking cornbread. Nor is it cornmeal that you might toss over your pizza stone before rolling out your pie dough. This is made for and used almost exclusively for Mexican food: tortillas and sopes and huaraches, or chalupas, etc. All of these latter are the same thing: thicker corn meal patties lightly fried and used as a surface for holding meat, beans, or veggies (or whatever else you plan to eat). They're not tortillas, although their composition is the same. When you make tortillas you need this masa harina, a bit of lard, and some water. You mix the lard and water and masa harina to make a dough. This dough should be thick enough to flatten out and thick enough to hold together. To be honest, I've never figured out any exact ratios because I suck at making tortillas and usually opt for the store-bout Mission brand white corn tortillas instead. However, I will say that the best tortillas I've ever had were those i successfully made myself. That might have something to do with the fact that I was happy I made some half-decent tortillas, or it could be that homemade tortillas really are better than the store-bought kind.
The problem is that this dough is sticky. If you've worked with wheat flour dough and thought it was sticky you haven't worked with anything yet. Masa harina is so fine that, when mixed with water, it sticks to everything: your hands, the spoon, the bowl, the countertop, your wife, your cat. It's a big mess. That's where the lard comes in. Lard makes the dough a little greasy and thus not so sticky. But you can't use too much lard or else you'll get a greasy, almost-deep fried mess when you try to cook your tortillas. You also use extra masa harina to keep the tortilla-ready dough from sticking to your work station or hands or the tortilla press. This is not a science, so it doesn't always work as planned. I get extra masa harina stuck to the press, or to the wax paper that I stick between the press's plates in yet another attempt to keep the masa from sticking and not peeling way. Then I try to press the tortillas. I pull out a ball of dough about the size of a golf ball and place in in the center of the tortilla press's bottom plate. I flip the press closed, give it a shove with the lever, and when I pull it apart: the goddamn masa stick to the fucking press and even if I try to spatula it off of there it tears to pieces. I once spent an hour and half making six decent corn tortillas for my wife and I. That's why I usually say fuck this shit and buy the bag of Mission tortillas, which retails for ~$2.50.
So i've still got a giant ass bag of masa harina sitting around. I use it for sopes, which are amazingly easy to make in comparison, but that'll be, like, another chapter.
Since I cannot do that, I cheat and use a tortillas press, which looks like this:
This contraption is composed of two hinged heavy cast iron plates that can be pressed together with the lever that folds over the top plate. Still, tortillas aren't easy to make using this machine.
First you need masa harina, or corn flour. This is not the coarse corn flour one might use for cooking cornbread. Nor is it cornmeal that you might toss over your pizza stone before rolling out your pie dough. This is made for and used almost exclusively for Mexican food: tortillas and sopes and huaraches, or chalupas, etc. All of these latter are the same thing: thicker corn meal patties lightly fried and used as a surface for holding meat, beans, or veggies (or whatever else you plan to eat). They're not tortillas, although their composition is the same. When you make tortillas you need this masa harina, a bit of lard, and some water. You mix the lard and water and masa harina to make a dough. This dough should be thick enough to flatten out and thick enough to hold together. To be honest, I've never figured out any exact ratios because I suck at making tortillas and usually opt for the store-bout Mission brand white corn tortillas instead. However, I will say that the best tortillas I've ever had were those i successfully made myself. That might have something to do with the fact that I was happy I made some half-decent tortillas, or it could be that homemade tortillas really are better than the store-bought kind.
The problem is that this dough is sticky. If you've worked with wheat flour dough and thought it was sticky you haven't worked with anything yet. Masa harina is so fine that, when mixed with water, it sticks to everything: your hands, the spoon, the bowl, the countertop, your wife, your cat. It's a big mess. That's where the lard comes in. Lard makes the dough a little greasy and thus not so sticky. But you can't use too much lard or else you'll get a greasy, almost-deep fried mess when you try to cook your tortillas. You also use extra masa harina to keep the tortilla-ready dough from sticking to your work station or hands or the tortilla press. This is not a science, so it doesn't always work as planned. I get extra masa harina stuck to the press, or to the wax paper that I stick between the press's plates in yet another attempt to keep the masa from sticking and not peeling way. Then I try to press the tortillas. I pull out a ball of dough about the size of a golf ball and place in in the center of the tortilla press's bottom plate. I flip the press closed, give it a shove with the lever, and when I pull it apart: the goddamn masa stick to the fucking press and even if I try to spatula it off of there it tears to pieces. I once spent an hour and half making six decent corn tortillas for my wife and I. That's why I usually say fuck this shit and buy the bag of Mission tortillas, which retails for ~$2.50.
So i've still got a giant ass bag of masa harina sitting around. I use it for sopes, which are amazingly easy to make in comparison, but that'll be, like, another chapter.
April 5, 2012
I posted this photo to my Facebook page and commented: "Y...
I posted this photo to my Facebook page and commented: "You get really thirsty when you've got this much cocaine." And Facebook censored it within 10 minutes, post completely removed. It was funny and weird.
April 2, 2012
Smoked Salsa Verde and Some Publications I've failed to Mention
So I have this recipe for a salsa verde that I've never had anywhere else, and since I'm so in love with Mexican culture, Mexican people, and Mexican food and am from California, I feel almost confident that I can say I invented this.
I got into smoking stuff about six years ago, and that started primarily because I currently live in the South and I've gone to some barbecue places where I'm absolutely convinced they don't slow smoke their meat, but slow cook it in an oven or a crockpot or something, then smoke it for a little bit to get that smoke flavor, and that's why their meat's never dried out but still falls off the bone. So I wanted to perfect smoking myself and have some true homemade barbecue.
My father-in-law bought me a smoker for my birthday one year. The obvious thing was to make my own chipotles, but I figured: why stop there? Along with my jalapenos, I smoked an Anaheim chile, a poblano chile, a cubanelle chile, and about six good-sized tomatillos. This is what's needed to make a small batch of salsa, like enough for two soup bowls' worth, or some to go with chips, and some for your tacos or whatever you're having for dinner.
I smoked all this for about an hour, turning everything once. By the time they're done, the chiles are withered and brown and their skin peels easily. The tomatillos have likewise taken on a brown tint and are soft, like stewed tomatoes.
It's worth mentioning that I usually end up smoking with mesquite chips because that's what I can buy readily here at Publix in Atlanta. If I were in CA I'd likely smoke with coast live oak (a variety of red oak, that gives that distinct CA barbecue flavor). But the mesquite's good.
Generally, making salsa's pretty easy, because all you need is a blender or a food processor and into that appliance goes all your smoked chiles (after you've peeled their skins) and the tomatillos. Add to this a white onion, three garlic cloves, and half a batch (about a cup and a half) of picked cilantro. Blend. The salsa should be thick and slightly chunky, but you can blend it to your desired consistency. Add salt and lime juice to taste. I usually add a lot of lime and lime zest, and try to limit the salt.
The smoked flavor makes this spicy salsa verde distinct, and some guests to parties or dinners have become addicted to it.
So, I've been writing all this stuff that's been appearing at places like The Nervous Breakdown and Thought Catalog and The Rumpus and I haven't been keeping up with the links to my pubs here on this page. But, if anyone would like to read those things, here are the links now. Maybe one day I'll get around to fixing the links in the list, too.
I got into smoking stuff about six years ago, and that started primarily because I currently live in the South and I've gone to some barbecue places where I'm absolutely convinced they don't slow smoke their meat, but slow cook it in an oven or a crockpot or something, then smoke it for a little bit to get that smoke flavor, and that's why their meat's never dried out but still falls off the bone. So I wanted to perfect smoking myself and have some true homemade barbecue.
My father-in-law bought me a smoker for my birthday one year. The obvious thing was to make my own chipotles, but I figured: why stop there? Along with my jalapenos, I smoked an Anaheim chile, a poblano chile, a cubanelle chile, and about six good-sized tomatillos. This is what's needed to make a small batch of salsa, like enough for two soup bowls' worth, or some to go with chips, and some for your tacos or whatever you're having for dinner.
I smoked all this for about an hour, turning everything once. By the time they're done, the chiles are withered and brown and their skin peels easily. The tomatillos have likewise taken on a brown tint and are soft, like stewed tomatoes.
It's worth mentioning that I usually end up smoking with mesquite chips because that's what I can buy readily here at Publix in Atlanta. If I were in CA I'd likely smoke with coast live oak (a variety of red oak, that gives that distinct CA barbecue flavor). But the mesquite's good.
Generally, making salsa's pretty easy, because all you need is a blender or a food processor and into that appliance goes all your smoked chiles (after you've peeled their skins) and the tomatillos. Add to this a white onion, three garlic cloves, and half a batch (about a cup and a half) of picked cilantro. Blend. The salsa should be thick and slightly chunky, but you can blend it to your desired consistency. Add salt and lime juice to taste. I usually add a lot of lime and lime zest, and try to limit the salt.
The smoked flavor makes this spicy salsa verde distinct, and some guests to parties or dinners have become addicted to it.
So, I've been writing all this stuff that's been appearing at places like The Nervous Breakdown and Thought Catalog and The Rumpus and I haven't been keeping up with the links to my pubs here on this page. But, if anyone would like to read those things, here are the links now. Maybe one day I'll get around to fixing the links in the list, too.
March 14, 2012
The rest of the rest of the mole and xTx's Normally Special Reviewed
Everytime I come back to the blog I realize I haven't finished something. So: the rest of the mole. When I last wrote about this I had talked about tossing raisins and other dried fruits into the onion, garlic, and tomato sautee that's going on in the skillet, or large saucepan or dutch over that you're using to make this mole. So you want to stir that concoction up and let the heat get into the dried fruits. They'll suck up some of the moisture, and the raisins--or whatever else you end up using--will swell a little, the little wrinkles of their skins evening out just slightly. Next you'll add your spices: salt and pepper, cumin, cinnamon, cloves. To be honest, I simply eye how much I'm putting in, as I've gotten used to how much a tablespoon or teaspoon looks like when it's dumped out, but if you're making a mole from 5-6 tomatoes, you'll want to add a 2 teaspoons each of the spices, and add salt and pepper to taste. You can probably get away without adding any salt at all. It would be great if everyone didn't have fucking jobs ad we all had mortars and pestles and raw spices, but I don't have that fucking time so I use the pre-ground jarred stuff. Stir the spices in with everything else that's sauteeing. While this is going on, in another frying pan set on a burner on high heat, you'll want to toast a couple corn tortillas. Toast them just like you would if you're having tacos. They should char up a little on each side. That slight charred flavor is what you're going for. Alternatively, you could toast a slice of bread. I've used both and the result is about the same. The masa from the corn tortilla, or the bread, is used as a thickener and smoother (I just made that word up, but you'll see what I mean), plus you get the flavor from whatever you choose to use. Corn tortillas add just a little sweetness. Once your tortillas have toasted, the raisins have swelled and softened, the sautee is good and liquidy, you chiles should be softened from the boiling water you submerged them in. What you do now is take all of this and scrape it out into a blender or food processor. So, use a rubber spatula and sweep out everything in your sautee pan or dutch oven or whathaveyou into the food processor. In order to fit them, tear up your toasted tortillas and toss them in. And uncover your steeped chiles and toss them in along with the water you used to steep them, water which should be brown and earthy smelling now from the dried chiles. You'll blend--or process--the whole of this to a fine sauce. While it's blending, peel a banana and toss that fucker in there, too. This is when you'll see how that tortilla acts as a smoother and thickener. They should soak up a lot of the excess liquid and blend the rest of the ingredients together nicely so that end result is a very smooth sauce. If you've ever made a romesco sauce the effect is similar. I think the effect is somewhat similar if you've ever made a gravy or a roux, but the flavor profile is different, as you're using cooked bread, or in this case tortilla, as opposed to toasted flour. But that smooth thickness is what you're going for. Once you've achieved that, return the mole to saucepan large enough to hold it. You'll get the mole to boiling, then reduce the heat to let it simmer. You may need to add water to keep the mole saucy enough so do so as needed. But you don't want the mole to be runny. After the mole has simmered for ten minutes or so you'll add the chocolate. Take 2 ounces of unsweetened baking chocolate and cut them up into small chunks. Really, to get the tastiest mole you should use the best Mexican chocolate you can get, but I've used plain old Baker's brand baking chocolate and I've made some pretty darn good moles. Just make sure that the chocolate is unsweetened. Watch out for some chocolate brands--like Ghirardelli--that will put "Baking Chocolate" on their packaging, but what they're selling is a chocolate candy bar that's full of sugar. I once made that mistake when trying to make a "white mole," ad all the time and everything I'd put into the mole was ruined by the sweet white chocolate I added to it at the end. No amount of spice could cover it up, they put so much sugar into that candy chocolate. When you add your chocolate to your simmering mole it should melt quickly. Stir to infuse it all, and let your mole simmer for another ten minutes, adding water if necessary. The end result should be a velvety smooth reddish-brown sauce that is rich (you won't need but a ladlefull to cover a piece of chicken, pork, or beef (or enchiladas or tamales)), and complex in its flavors. Here's the amazing thing: you should literally be able to taste each of the ingredients you've added. You should get a hint of the toasted nutty pepitas, the cinnamon and cloves ad cumin, the chiles, the earthy bitterness of the chocolate, the sweetness of the banana, raisins, ad tortilla. It's pretty much a meal in itself, which is why you won't need much of it with whatever you're serving. But goddamn if it isn't sabroso.
So, the other thing I wanted to talk about was xTx's book,
Normally Special
, which was published by Roxane Gay's micropress, Tiny Hardcore, in 2011. I'd been reading xTx's stories in online literary magazines for over a year and--I gotta be honest with you--I was reticent before my first read of one of those stories. I don't know why, but it bothered me at first that this writer referred to him/herself as xTx. It felt so gimmicky. But after a while I got over that because that's a really stupid reason for not reading someone's stories. The first one I read, I think, was "Vegas Blood Themed Three Day," and I was like, all right, so why was I waiting to read these stories? What I liked about this one was how weird it seemed at first, with these vague, almost surreal details about blood. And then of course being a Nevada kid, I liked the Vegas details. Anyway, I liked it. I liked how this flash rounded up. Then I read this on Thought Catalog. Finally, I read "She Who Subjected the Sun," at Emprise Review, and that's the story that really kind of sealed the "buy the book" deal. That story's about some sort of weird vampiric sadomasochist escort agency or something. I'm not really sure, but I liked it. I've taught that story to creative writing classes. It's atmosphere, everything you want in something so short. I also liked that it wasn't readily realistic. I'm so sick of realism. So I bought the book. In fact I've bought almost all the books from Tiny Hardcore Press. I guess Roxane Gay's taste and mine line up like lines on a highway or something. Before going on I must also admit upfront that I've gotten a little tired of flash fiction. I say this because a lot of Normally Special is flash. In fact 88% of the book is flash. I'm weird when it comes to figuring such things out. A lot of flash when I read it I go, okay, cool, and that's about it. I know it's hypocritical of me to say this having been and continuing to be an off-and-on flash writer myself. Flash fiction just feels exercise-y to me. It's like a writer's working on exercises for conciseness, impact of images, pretty language, etc. Then, of course, some flash rises above this and is fantastic--amazing, even--that a writer could achieve this in such a short space. xTx has some stories like these latter in Normally Special. "Father's Day" is fucked up dark and sad and funny weird. It has everything you want in flash: "Whenever he calls me princess I smell him on me even when I hold the phone at arm's length." I could quote more from this story, but, you know, it's flash and quoting more would kind of ruin your reading experience of it, and you should read it. Other flash I really loved: "The Honking Was Deafening," "Fireflies," "I Love My Dad. My Dad Loves Me," and "There Was No Mother in that House." I liked all of xTx's longer-length fiction. There are five, maybe six, stories that are stories you can live in for a while. My favorites of these were "The Mill Pond"--because I was, am, a fat kid--and "An Unsteady Place," a story in which a beach vacationing family is--in only one of many great details--overrun by advancing sand dunes. Really, I loved the entire book. The flash that was not as powerful for me still worked quite well within the context of the book as a whole, with a number of rhyming or echoing images (like melting witches). The book feels like a piece, an art object in itself, and that is, I think, the hallmark of a good collection. It was weird to have already read this book and have this mental image of who xTx might be before I met her at AWP in Chicago. She was really nice, and didn't look anything like I imagined she might. I don't really know what I expected. But meeting her was a pleasant surprise, just like my choice to read her stories in the first place, and my choice to buy and read this book.
So, the other thing I wanted to talk about was xTx's book,
Normally Special
, which was published by Roxane Gay's micropress, Tiny Hardcore, in 2011. I'd been reading xTx's stories in online literary magazines for over a year and--I gotta be honest with you--I was reticent before my first read of one of those stories. I don't know why, but it bothered me at first that this writer referred to him/herself as xTx. It felt so gimmicky. But after a while I got over that because that's a really stupid reason for not reading someone's stories. The first one I read, I think, was "Vegas Blood Themed Three Day," and I was like, all right, so why was I waiting to read these stories? What I liked about this one was how weird it seemed at first, with these vague, almost surreal details about blood. And then of course being a Nevada kid, I liked the Vegas details. Anyway, I liked it. I liked how this flash rounded up. Then I read this on Thought Catalog. Finally, I read "She Who Subjected the Sun," at Emprise Review, and that's the story that really kind of sealed the "buy the book" deal. That story's about some sort of weird vampiric sadomasochist escort agency or something. I'm not really sure, but I liked it. I've taught that story to creative writing classes. It's atmosphere, everything you want in something so short. I also liked that it wasn't readily realistic. I'm so sick of realism. So I bought the book. In fact I've bought almost all the books from Tiny Hardcore Press. I guess Roxane Gay's taste and mine line up like lines on a highway or something. Before going on I must also admit upfront that I've gotten a little tired of flash fiction. I say this because a lot of Normally Special is flash. In fact 88% of the book is flash. I'm weird when it comes to figuring such things out. A lot of flash when I read it I go, okay, cool, and that's about it. I know it's hypocritical of me to say this having been and continuing to be an off-and-on flash writer myself. Flash fiction just feels exercise-y to me. It's like a writer's working on exercises for conciseness, impact of images, pretty language, etc. Then, of course, some flash rises above this and is fantastic--amazing, even--that a writer could achieve this in such a short space. xTx has some stories like these latter in Normally Special. "Father's Day" is fucked up dark and sad and funny weird. It has everything you want in flash: "Whenever he calls me princess I smell him on me even when I hold the phone at arm's length." I could quote more from this story, but, you know, it's flash and quoting more would kind of ruin your reading experience of it, and you should read it. Other flash I really loved: "The Honking Was Deafening," "Fireflies," "I Love My Dad. My Dad Loves Me," and "There Was No Mother in that House." I liked all of xTx's longer-length fiction. There are five, maybe six, stories that are stories you can live in for a while. My favorites of these were "The Mill Pond"--because I was, am, a fat kid--and "An Unsteady Place," a story in which a beach vacationing family is--in only one of many great details--overrun by advancing sand dunes. Really, I loved the entire book. The flash that was not as powerful for me still worked quite well within the context of the book as a whole, with a number of rhyming or echoing images (like melting witches). The book feels like a piece, an art object in itself, and that is, I think, the hallmark of a good collection. It was weird to have already read this book and have this mental image of who xTx might be before I met her at AWP in Chicago. She was really nice, and didn't look anything like I imagined she might. I don't really know what I expected. But meeting her was a pleasant surprise, just like my choice to read her stories in the first place, and my choice to buy and read this book.
February 21, 2012
I'm serious about this and am not trying to be snarky; I'...
I'm serious about this and am not trying to be snarky; I'm just curious: those of you on Facebook who post things about what a monster Santorum is, and how the GOP is waging war against women, etc., do you have a lot of conservative friends? I'm asking because I don't (at least I don't think I do, I know I have some fiscal conservative, some religious, and some libertarian friends, but I don't think I have many who might agree with most things Mitt, or Rick, or Newt have to say). I feel like you're "preaching to the choir," since I see it and agree so much that I actually ignore the post, or I'm not interested in clicking on it or liking or commenting on it because it would just be all these people agreeing with each other. I wonder who your audience is, or who you might be trying to convince that these Republicans are crazy.
February 11, 2012
the rest of the mole
So, I think I was at the point where I sauteed onion and garlic when last I finished writing about making this mole.
For a chocolate mole typically one uses tomatoes as a base for the sauce, so you want to have five or six vine-ripened tomatoes and put them into a pot of boiling water. You need to have a big enough pot to accommodate all of the tomatoes and to make sure that there's enough water to cover them. Otherwise, the boiling water will spill out when you put the tomatoes into the pot and/or there won't be enough water to cover them and while this is not a disaster really it's a pain in the ass. You're putting the tomatoes into boiling water so that you will not cook them, but so that you can skin them. Tomato skins don't really work in sauces because they won't break up even if you food process them. the skins roll up into strings and are unsightly in a sauce that you'll want to be smooth and uniform in texture. Hot water will make a tomato's skin crack and separate from the tomato's flesh, and then they can be peeled. But, in order to make sure that the tomato you want to use in your sauce doesn't overcook when you're boiling it, you want to get it to the point (i.e., them, since we're talking about multiple tomatoes here) that the skin cracks. Immediately remove the tomato from the boiling water and submerge it in an icewater bath. As you can see this all requires multiple steps. So, when you set your pot of water to boiling, then you peel the stickers (if there are any) off your tomatoes, get a big bowl and fill it with ice. Once your water's boiling and you put in your tomatoes, add water to your ice-filled bowl. Then, finally, after your tomato skins have cracked, and you've submerged them in the icewater bath to stop the cooking process and cool them down, peel the skins and throw them away, and chop up your skinless tomatoes and add them to your simmering onion and garlic.
So by now you've got your pepitas and onion and garlic and tomatoes taken care of. Did I mention the chiles? I think I forgot the fucking chiles. Ah shit. This is another huge prep thing that you can do ahead of time. You're gonna want a few dried chiles, and some fresh ones. You can buy these in most grocery stores because--thank god--Mexicans want to live with us, but if they're not in your grocery store you can probably find a nearby Latino market or something that will have what I'm talking about. You'll want a dried pasilla chile, a dried ancho chile, and two dried chiles de arbol. The heat comes from the chile de arbol, so it kind of depends on how hot you like things, and I like things pretty hot (hence 2 chiles de arbol), but you can kind of adjust the heat as you want and if you want things hotter you can always add fresh jalapeno or serrano peppers. If it's too hot, well, at that point I would say that tough titties, you're kind stuck with it, but you can do some things to try and alleviate the heat like adding tortilla and making sure that you and/or whomever you're dining with has plenty of beer.
But with the chiles, you'll prepare them thus: just rip away the stems with your fingers and break the chiles open. scrape out the seeds and get rid of em. some people think that the seeds are what makes chiles really hot, but that's bullshit. Capsaicin, the chemical compound that makes that hotness, is found in its highest concentration in the pitch around the seeds. It's not in the seeds at all. Anyway, probably when you're boiling the water to skin your tomatoes, you'll want to take up the ripped flesh from your chiles and put them into a bowl. Then ladle enough boiling water into the bowl to cover the chile parts. Cover the bowl with a serving plate to retain the heat and let those chiles sit for a while.
At this point you want to add to your onion-garlic-tomato sautee the pepitas and some raisins. Yes, raisins, In fact, it's not bad if you've got some other dried fruits, like dried pineapple or mango. I usually end up using the dregs trailmix for my mole. It's a good way to use up that stuff that's just sitting around. and, this might sound like a weird ingredient, but I'm not kidding: it makes for an amazingly complex and delicious sauce. If you've had mole before, you know what I'm talking about.
All right. I'll pick up on the rest of this later. I'm not kidding: this is a serious fucking recipe. It's even exhausting to write about.
For a chocolate mole typically one uses tomatoes as a base for the sauce, so you want to have five or six vine-ripened tomatoes and put them into a pot of boiling water. You need to have a big enough pot to accommodate all of the tomatoes and to make sure that there's enough water to cover them. Otherwise, the boiling water will spill out when you put the tomatoes into the pot and/or there won't be enough water to cover them and while this is not a disaster really it's a pain in the ass. You're putting the tomatoes into boiling water so that you will not cook them, but so that you can skin them. Tomato skins don't really work in sauces because they won't break up even if you food process them. the skins roll up into strings and are unsightly in a sauce that you'll want to be smooth and uniform in texture. Hot water will make a tomato's skin crack and separate from the tomato's flesh, and then they can be peeled. But, in order to make sure that the tomato you want to use in your sauce doesn't overcook when you're boiling it, you want to get it to the point (i.e., them, since we're talking about multiple tomatoes here) that the skin cracks. Immediately remove the tomato from the boiling water and submerge it in an icewater bath. As you can see this all requires multiple steps. So, when you set your pot of water to boiling, then you peel the stickers (if there are any) off your tomatoes, get a big bowl and fill it with ice. Once your water's boiling and you put in your tomatoes, add water to your ice-filled bowl. Then, finally, after your tomato skins have cracked, and you've submerged them in the icewater bath to stop the cooking process and cool them down, peel the skins and throw them away, and chop up your skinless tomatoes and add them to your simmering onion and garlic.
So by now you've got your pepitas and onion and garlic and tomatoes taken care of. Did I mention the chiles? I think I forgot the fucking chiles. Ah shit. This is another huge prep thing that you can do ahead of time. You're gonna want a few dried chiles, and some fresh ones. You can buy these in most grocery stores because--thank god--Mexicans want to live with us, but if they're not in your grocery store you can probably find a nearby Latino market or something that will have what I'm talking about. You'll want a dried pasilla chile, a dried ancho chile, and two dried chiles de arbol. The heat comes from the chile de arbol, so it kind of depends on how hot you like things, and I like things pretty hot (hence 2 chiles de arbol), but you can kind of adjust the heat as you want and if you want things hotter you can always add fresh jalapeno or serrano peppers. If it's too hot, well, at that point I would say that tough titties, you're kind stuck with it, but you can do some things to try and alleviate the heat like adding tortilla and making sure that you and/or whomever you're dining with has plenty of beer.
But with the chiles, you'll prepare them thus: just rip away the stems with your fingers and break the chiles open. scrape out the seeds and get rid of em. some people think that the seeds are what makes chiles really hot, but that's bullshit. Capsaicin, the chemical compound that makes that hotness, is found in its highest concentration in the pitch around the seeds. It's not in the seeds at all. Anyway, probably when you're boiling the water to skin your tomatoes, you'll want to take up the ripped flesh from your chiles and put them into a bowl. Then ladle enough boiling water into the bowl to cover the chile parts. Cover the bowl with a serving plate to retain the heat and let those chiles sit for a while.
At this point you want to add to your onion-garlic-tomato sautee the pepitas and some raisins. Yes, raisins, In fact, it's not bad if you've got some other dried fruits, like dried pineapple or mango. I usually end up using the dregs trailmix for my mole. It's a good way to use up that stuff that's just sitting around. and, this might sound like a weird ingredient, but I'm not kidding: it makes for an amazingly complex and delicious sauce. If you've had mole before, you know what I'm talking about.
All right. I'll pick up on the rest of this later. I'm not kidding: this is a serious fucking recipe. It's even exhausting to write about.
February 8, 2012
I don't post here very much anymore and I'm not really su...
I don't post here very much anymore and I'm not really sure why that is but I think it's because, as a general sentiment, blogging is done, over with, passe. Facebook is now everyone's god, and twitter, at least for me, is getting to be even better, because there's no point in writing things that go on for more than 140 characters or whatever. See, already this blog post is stupid.
So perhaps I will threaten as I have always threatened that this will become a place wherein I talk only about food and cooking-related stuff. And I threaten this to no one, really, because I don't think anyone really (I mean really) reads it anyway.
So, here goes: it's winter and almost the end of winter and a favorite wintertime food is mole and I haven't had mole since last summer, a time when one doesn't usually have mole but I got tired of eating fucking coleslaw for the sixth day in a row while at the beach with family because that's what my family does while at the beach in summer: eat coleslaw constantly and I die a little with every meal.
Moles are not only delicious and fun to eat they are especially fun to make because they contain tons of ingredients and many of those ingredients require multiple steps for prep before they even go into the mole. I have made primarily rojo, verde, and chocolate moles. I'm scared to make a mole negro, because to make that you have to carefully burn everything so that it turns black but does not taste scorched. It's tricky. It is where, I think, cooking gets close to baking, or what I think of when I think of good baking, or when I talk to my friend Molly about it (and she is like the best baker I know personally).
So since I've never done that I'll only talk about what it takes to make a chocolate mole which is yums. First, during Halloweentime my wife and I always get pumpkins to put on our deck or to decorate the dining room table or a bookcase or something. We get big ones for carving and little ones too. The little ones are good for eating, and all of them are good for pepitas, or pumpkin seeds. But the bitch of pumpkin seeds is making them edible. You scrape them out of the pumpkin and wash them free of pumpkin guts then set them out to dry or roast them dry in the oven. After all that you shell the fuckers one at a time. I've gotten good at pumpkin-seed-shelling and I can get through one in about 2 or 3 seconds. This means that, in order to get enough pepitas to make a mole for four people this one ingredient takes me ~ 1/2 hour of sustained effort.
Once I've got my shelled pepitas I roast them in a castiron skillet till they brown and pop a little bit. i set them aside so they cool, then I roast some sesame seeds. Sesame seeds are easier because I just buy them in a little plastic jar, and I dump about a tablespoon's worth into the skillet and shake the skillet around so they brown evenly.
Then I chop and onion and about four or five garlic cloves. I chop this all pretty fine, but it doesn't have to be super fine because it's all gonna end up in a food processor at some point anyway. I saute the onions and garlic in olive oil because I guess I'm being health conscious, but if I really want amazing flavor i would saute them in lard or bacon fat. Bacon fat makes pretty much anything taste amazing.
I'm tired of this now and I have to get ready for work, so I'll talk about finishing this mole later. bye.
So perhaps I will threaten as I have always threatened that this will become a place wherein I talk only about food and cooking-related stuff. And I threaten this to no one, really, because I don't think anyone really (I mean really) reads it anyway.
So, here goes: it's winter and almost the end of winter and a favorite wintertime food is mole and I haven't had mole since last summer, a time when one doesn't usually have mole but I got tired of eating fucking coleslaw for the sixth day in a row while at the beach with family because that's what my family does while at the beach in summer: eat coleslaw constantly and I die a little with every meal.
Moles are not only delicious and fun to eat they are especially fun to make because they contain tons of ingredients and many of those ingredients require multiple steps for prep before they even go into the mole. I have made primarily rojo, verde, and chocolate moles. I'm scared to make a mole negro, because to make that you have to carefully burn everything so that it turns black but does not taste scorched. It's tricky. It is where, I think, cooking gets close to baking, or what I think of when I think of good baking, or when I talk to my friend Molly about it (and she is like the best baker I know personally).
So since I've never done that I'll only talk about what it takes to make a chocolate mole which is yums. First, during Halloweentime my wife and I always get pumpkins to put on our deck or to decorate the dining room table or a bookcase or something. We get big ones for carving and little ones too. The little ones are good for eating, and all of them are good for pepitas, or pumpkin seeds. But the bitch of pumpkin seeds is making them edible. You scrape them out of the pumpkin and wash them free of pumpkin guts then set them out to dry or roast them dry in the oven. After all that you shell the fuckers one at a time. I've gotten good at pumpkin-seed-shelling and I can get through one in about 2 or 3 seconds. This means that, in order to get enough pepitas to make a mole for four people this one ingredient takes me ~ 1/2 hour of sustained effort.
Once I've got my shelled pepitas I roast them in a castiron skillet till they brown and pop a little bit. i set them aside so they cool, then I roast some sesame seeds. Sesame seeds are easier because I just buy them in a little plastic jar, and I dump about a tablespoon's worth into the skillet and shake the skillet around so they brown evenly.
Then I chop and onion and about four or five garlic cloves. I chop this all pretty fine, but it doesn't have to be super fine because it's all gonna end up in a food processor at some point anyway. I saute the onions and garlic in olive oil because I guess I'm being health conscious, but if I really want amazing flavor i would saute them in lard or bacon fat. Bacon fat makes pretty much anything taste amazing.
I'm tired of this now and I have to get ready for work, so I'll talk about finishing this mole later. bye.
January 25, 2012
The Chattahoochee Review: I Don't Know What to Think About What People Will ...
The Chattahoochee Review: I Don't Know What to Think About What People Will ...: I wanted to interview Blake Butler for a number of reasons, but in part due to his novel, There Is No Year , released last year from Harper ...
January 17, 2012
Just happen to think of douchebags who say things like, "...
Just happen to think of douchebags who say things like, "It wasn't my fault," when talking about their inordinate actions around women that they deem "asking for it" due to dress, or linguistics, or anything at all. And also thought "what the fuck" and "sometimes killing is okay," all in response to guy who walked into bar and said, "Hello, sweetheart" to bartender, and she was obviously offended but too timid to say so.
