The Mija Chronicles

Mexican food and culture, on both sides of the border

Lesley Tellez

I will not let the swine flu win, dammit

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As my friend Joy mentions on her blog today, it’s getting harder and harder to ignore the flu and lead a normal life. Yesterday evening, on day five of the panic, I started to get a little depressed. I couldn’t go outside. (For what? I already bought groceries. The gyms and restaurants are closed until May 6.) I didn’t want to read any more news. I sat home by myself until almost midnight, surfing the Internet in a daze — and attempting to work on a completely non-swine-flu related essay — because hubby was off covering a late-night swine flu press conference.

Meanwhile, my mom called to say, “I’m worried about you! Don’t go outside!” and my dad says, “Mija, don’t burn the candle at both ends.” And my response is, I’m not. I’m home. Again.

Today is a new day, and I’m determined to make it a good one. I’m going to the grocery store to buy milk and cereal. I’m going to finish painting, because my lovely husband taped the ceiling at 12:30 a.m. I’m going to pop in my yoga DVD because I need some Zen relaxation, and I’d like to work on my headstand. (And it’d be nice to burn off the package of Oreos and three beers I had last night with Crayton.)

In the meantime: Does anyone want to take a load of bread pudding and some homemade whipped cream off my hands?

A cure for your swine flu worries: Orange bread pudding with gooey raisin sauce

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Orange bread pudding with gooey raisin sauce

With Mexico going to hell in a handbasket — or shall I say a pig-hide canasta — nothing seems more comforting right now than a warm homemade dessert.

I love bread pudding, but it always seems like so much work. And I couldn’t afford another trip to the supermarket with all the flu-hysterical crazies. So yesterday, with three-quarters of a loaf of stale bread and some Clementine oranges, I turned to Elena Zelayeta.

Elena was a blind Mexican immigrant who wrote Elena’s Famous Mexican and Spanish Recipes, a bestselling cookbook that’s now out of print. I found a copy of the first edition, published in 1944, stuffed into a kitchen drawer at my mom’s house. It was my grandmother’s, my mom said. I thumbed through it for a few minutes and fell in love.

Not only is the book full of Mexican basics (chiles en nogada, sopa de fideo, capirotada, etc.), but it was written back when housewives actually spent three hours or more on a single dish, and asked the butcher to do things like “shape their lamb chops.” Her membrillo recipe calls for leaving it out in the sun for two days to prevent mold. How freaking awesome is that?

The dessert section overflows with bread puddings, all of them simple constructions of milk-soaked bread, eggs and sugar. I made the orange version last night and finished the sauce this morning. Tasted a spoonful as it cooled and… mmmmhhhrrrmmm. (Sorry, that was my pleasurable moaning noise.)

With something this good, you gotta bring out the big guns and make homemade whipped cream. And then try not to lick the bowl after.

I swear, this thing really might be able to cure swine flu. Or at least get everyone out from under their porcine cloud.

Recipe after the jump.
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Just when I thought it was getting better…

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Mexico City supermarket

Reforma says people are making crazy runs on the supermarket. The city has closed all gyms, sport clubs, pool halls. Restaurants have been ordered to sell food to-go only. El Universal reports that three more people have died. But WHO? Were they young? Old? Did they wait a long time to go to the hospital? Were they taking medication?

It doesn’t say.

I don’t even know what to think. It’s been a roller-coaster up in here. Went to bed feeling calm, watched The Wire and forgot about the flu. Now I’m thinking, “Do we have enough canned goods?” and wondering how to not go stir-crazy after another day indoors. We don’t even own any board games.

*Photo from Reforma

Remaining calm amid swine flu, earthquakes, and however else God decides to smite Mexico

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Both the pharmacy and the paint store were out of face masks. I thought it’d be best to stay home, even though my dad told me how to make a face mask out of a T-shirt. (That’s okay, dad.)

However, since I’ve been home for four days in a row, I’m dangerously close to going stir crazy. Here’s how I avoided the madness today:

1. CLOSE LAPTOP AND DO NOT READ THE NEWS.

2. Paint the living room wall with one coat of Comex Wasabi Green.
Living room before
Living Room after

3. Make an eggy orange bread pudding. (Which looks more like a cheesy breakfast strata in the photo below, but whatever.) Oranges have Vitamin C. Eggs have protein. That’s good. Die flu, die!

Orange bread pudding

4. Compose this blog item in my head while I’m painting.

5. Try not to pass out from the paint fumes.

So. That gets us to now, 7:49 p.m. Guess I’ll fire up the laptop and watch another episode from the first season of The Wire.

First swine flu and now earthquakes?

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I was IM’ing with a friend a few minutes ago when suddenly the house started swaying. I thought I was getting dizzy. I.e., OH CRAP, I THINK THE SWINE FLU FINALLY HIT ME.

Nope. It was an earthquake. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m getting the hell out of this house.

As a side note, the quake did wake up my street. It’s been deathly quiet all morning, and now people are outside talking.

Update: El Universal says the quake was centered northeast of Guerrero. Still no word on injuries/deaths/material damage. However, I am loving the comments on El Universal’s story. Two faves:

“Ay no manchen. Que sigue?? Mañana van a llover ranas.”
You’ve got to be kidding me. What’s next? Tomorrow it’s going to rain toads.

“Qué sigue?? El Popocatepetlzaso??”
What’s next? Popocatepetl’s gigantic eruption-disaster?

Off to paint now. Much more calm than earlier.

Ignoring the Big Pig in the room

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I’ve been trying to stay optimistic about all this swine flu stuff, but it hasn’t been easy. The media is screaming about how everyone in Mexico City is terrified. People who live here admit to being terrified. Deep down, I’m a little scared too.

It’s weird how all this has evolved. Friday I didn’t care. Saturday I went out, bought paint, took pictures of people in face masks, went to lunch… and then I got a scratchy throat. I curled up under a blanket and gulped an E-Boost, and searched the Internet on whether everyone with swine flu actually dies. Couldn’t find the answer so I asked Crayton, “Am I going to die from the swine flu? I mean, I know we’re all going to die eventually, but am I….?” He sighed. “You’re not going to die from the swine flu.”

Yesterday I felt much better, so I went to the gym. Part of me wondered whether I was signing my death sentence by using a possibly-infected elliptical machine. (Whatever, I’m going back today, pigs be damned.) Now I’m starting to think: Is it really bad that I don’t have a face mask? Soldiers haven’t handed them out in my neighborhood. I figured every pharmacy would be out, too, so I haven’t asked. But without a face mask am I… exposing myself?

The yogic side of me says it’s completely useless to be scared, because that wastes energy and doesn’t accomplish anything. It’s crazy to worry about something you can’t see or smell or hear. More than that, it creates stress, and that lowers the immune system, making way for a big ol’ swine to barge in and lounge on the veiny sofas of your bloodstream.

Today, I am ignoring my fear. I’m going to finish painting my living room, go to the grocery store, write, and make orange bread pudding from an old cookbook of my grandmother’s. I’m not going to get scared that the city seems much quieter today than on a usual Monday, and that I didn’t hear the guy yelling “GAAAS!” this morning (I think that’s what he yells), and that no one is honking their horns.

Maybe I will ask the grocery-store pharmacy for a tapabocas. Just to cover all my bases. But I am NOT going to obsessively read the news. That just makes everything worse.

Are we all going to die from swine flu?

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I was home yesterday surfing the Internet when the swine flu craziness broke. Mexico City was shutting down schools. People needed to avoid large crowds. I got an email from a DF-dwelling friend saying, “There are no more face masks left in the city!” and another from a friend asking me whether I was okay. Actually, I was tired. Stayed out too late the night before. Just wanted to eat a salad with my homemade walnut-miso noodles and go to bed. So I did.

Maybe I’m totally naive here, but I’m not that concerned about this swine flu stuff. We left this morning for the paint store — an errand I’d planned all week, and hell if I was going to let swine flu stop me — and people were out walking their dogs, eating at cafes, taking out their trash. Even my favorite juice guy was on the corner doing his thing:

Juice guy, the day after swine flu hit

It doesn’t seem different from any other weekend, except for the fact that maybe one in 10 people walking around wears a face mask. And the taxi drivers are wearing them on too. But not every taxi driver. No one is running around screaming, “Don’t inhale! Wash your hankies!”

My friend Joy told me she saw a CNN headline that said Mexico City was shut down, but that’s really not true, at least not where I am. However, the hip youngsters of Condesa and Roma were too scared to go out last night, according to a poetic report in El Universal. As the story related: “The streets of these neighborhoods shone emptily, uninspiring, sad, without their traditional charm.”

I figure as long as I wash my hands and get sleep, I’ll be okay. Maybe I’ll pick up an anti-viral juice, too.

The strange world of Mexican doormen

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“Portero” means doorman in Spanish. A lot of middle-class apartment buildings here have one, or they’re supposed to. (Sometimes apartment owners are too busy squabbling amongst themselves to hire anyone.)

We had a portero named Vicente when we first moved in. He had bleached blond hair and a surly expression. Sometimes he wouldn’t show up for work. Or he’d leave for the day and forget to turn off his radio, so we’d come home to find cumbia and merengue blaring in the empty vestibule. The weird thing was, even though he obviously didn’t care about the job, no one wanted to fire him. I’d tell my landlady, “Vicente didn’t show up today,” and she’d sigh and grouse about how they needed to get rid of him.

Finally, a few weeks ago Vicente got canned. And we got a new portero: Pablo.

Pablo shows up to work. He cleans the floors — a portero prerequisite — and he’s usually downstairs at his post. But he’s… odd. He rings my bell for weird reasons. Once he rang to tell me I had a visitor, but it ended up being for another apartment. He rang my buzzer a few minutes later to tell me sorry, he got mixed up.

A few days ago, I’d just gotten out of the shower and — BZZZ! — there he was, standing on the other side of the peephole. I grabbed my robe and answered the door.

“Can I come in?” he said.

I should mention here that Pablo is a short guy, probably just over five feet. He has huge brown eyes and a quizzical expression that always make him look like either a deer in headlights, or like he’s not quite sure what he’s looking at, like maybe you’re an alien with green gunk spewing out of your nose.

I asked him, “Why do you need to come in?” and he gave me the alien-gunk expression.

“I need to clean the glass,” he said.

“What glass?”

“The glass above the entrance to the building.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand, why do you need to come in?” Me still in my robe.

“To clean the glass.”

I finally figured out that he needed to access the glass through my apartment, but I said sorry, I’m in my robe and about to leave anyway. He looked confused and then disappeared.

The next morning, while I was having coffee: BZZZ!

“Did I leave una franela around here somewhere?” He was referring to the striped cleaning cloths that overrun Mexico City.

“Umm…. no….” He gave me the deer-in-headlights look so I rambled on. “Maybe on the terraza? Dejame checar.”

Sure enough, the little cloth lay on our porch. No idea how it got there. I returned it to him and he smiled, and then disappeared again.

If I was a more cynical woman, I might be a little worried. Why in the hell is this guy ringing my buzzer so much? How did a random flannel cloth end up on my porch? What’s wrong with him? Actually, I think he’s just a little slow. He is trying really hard and I’m sure being a portero doesn’t pay very well. Our first portero in Polanco slept in a tiny stucco box on the other side of the front gate, barely containing a twin bed and a TV.

Just to be sure, though, I’m gonna keep an eye on this Pablo guy.

We officially have Internet!

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NBA Basketball via the InternetI know sometimes I go wild with the exclamation points, but this time they’re needed. Came home last night to find hubby watching the Dallas Mavericks’ game on TV. Streamed via the Internet. DUDE! It’s here, it’s here!

He was giddy because he finally got to watch NBA basketball, and I was giddy because this meant no more daily Starbucks trips. So I had another glass of wine, snapped the slightly off-kilter photo above and then posted on my Facebook page: “DUDE WE HAVE INTERNET!”

I think I yelled at the universe too loudly. We woke up this morning without water. It ran out while Crayton was in the shower.

Oh well.

No word on a pipa yet, but I’m sure everything will fix itself somehow. I really don’t care much to be honest. I’ve been googling all day. I’m tired and thirsty and hungry — and I haven’t showered yet (sorry Mom… and Crayton) — but I can’t quit now. There is still more googling to be done. It may even last through dinner time.

Tomorrow I’ll try harder to join the real world.

A trip to Mercado San Juan, and, as I am now calling it, Chicken Row

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Produce at Mercado San Juan

I’ve been dying to go to Mercado San Juan since I flipped open one of my favorite guidebooks, DF De Culto, and saw a diagram of the market’s best stands. A diagram! The writers didn’t diagram any other markets. Or gush about anyone else’s meat, cheeses, imported oils, vinegars, olives, fish….

Actually Mercado San Juan is one of the oldest in Mexico, tracing its roots to prehispanic times. Mexican movie stars have visited the place, although I’m not entirely sure why. (Maybe they liked to nosh on manchego between takes?) And local chefs shop there, too.

My friend Alice and I decided to go last Friday morning. We first grabbed an atole (a sweet, thick rice n’ masa drink) and pan dulce outside the Salto de Agua metro station, because hunger is a bad idea when you’re in a giant warehouse full of food.

Then, on the walk to the mercado, we passed a small city of raw chickens. Butcher shops lined both sides of the street, chicken parts smothering the countertops: Thighs, legs, roasters; deep crimson gizzards; headless chickens, covered in yellow goosepimply skin. Workers snipped chicken parts as fast as they could, so all you could hear was this weird metallic scissoring sound.

That alone was worth the Metro ride, and we hadn’t even made it to the mercado yet. Of course, once we arrived there, I forgot all about the chicken, because the first guy we saw tried to sell us fried grasshoppers and escamoles (ant eggs). Then we walked in further and saw sharks on ice, and ducks, and skinned baby goats. That’s probably about when I fell in love.

Sharks on ice at Mercado San Juan

Fresh duck at Mercado San Juan

Well, that, and when I saw the curly lettuce and leeks stacked practically to the ceiling in the produce section.

Over the next hour or so, I stuffed my bag with asparagus, spring onions, fresh peas, red leaf lettuce, spinach, blackberries, mamey, mangos, proscuitto, freshly grated parmesano-reggiano, smoked provolone, homemade tofu (“Lo hace un chino aqui,” the lady told me), dried mushrooms and cute mini pita breads. (Yes, I’m buying for only two people. I go kinda crazy sometimes.) The proscuitto and parm I bought at La Jersey; the smoked provolone and pita, at La Holandesa. I willfully ignored the French butter and fresh bread. Mmmm. Next time.

What I made with my items:

1. Blackberry-lime coolers (perfect for sipping on the patio)
2. Arroz con leche (the Rick Bayless version) with mango
3. Pasta with peas, asparagus, proscuitto and parmesan
4. Mamey muffins
5. Sliced provolone with salted pita chips

I’d like to go back once a week, but it does require some advance menu-planning. Guess I better hit the cookbooks.