Mexican food and culture, on both sides of the border
I hope you’re enjoying a lovely day with family, friends and lots of good food.
Here are a few Christmas-inspired photos culled from The Mija Chronicles’ archives.
A big ol’ pot of bacalao, at Mercado de Medellín
Ensalada Nochebuena, a mix of beets, oranges, jicama and peanuts
First-ever Christmas tamalada, December 2009.
Sweet corn tamales
Chaya-wrapped tamales, at the Fundación Hérdez in January 2012.
I’d originally planned to write this detailed, year-end blog post full of mouthwatering food photos. But then in December, Eat Mexico started booking lots of tours, and I got a few freelance assignments and didn’t have much time to blog. I really only came up for air a few days ago.
So I wanted to tell you: I’m so, so grateful to each of you for reading. And honored that you keep commenting. (Really — the Tlacolula comments made my entire week.) I’m just really glad that I have this space and that you’re a part of it. I hope you have a fantastic 2011, full of peace and good food.
Here is one mouth-watering photo, just to start the year off right. It’s a tlacoyo and a quesadilla de quelite (edible Mexican greens), from a street food stand off Rio Lerma.
Abrazos from el DF!
Ponche is a warm tropical-fruit punch. As I mentioned in my previous post — thank you for all the wonderful comments! — it’s traditionally imbibed in Mexico during Christmastime. Vendors sell it at night near the sidewalk Christmas markets. It’s also served with buñuelos during the posadas.
No one seems to know exactly how and why Mexican ponche materialized. In general, historians seem to agree that the punch concept originated in India, where English sailors took a liking to it and brought to Europe. The Spaniards (or the French?) must have carried the tradition to Mexico.
Today, the base of Mexican ponche comprises piloncillo, a dark-brown unrefined cane sugar, mixed with water and cinnamon sticks. To that, you can add pretty much any winter fruits you want: apples, oranges, guavas, tejocotes.
The latter two are key. Tejocotes are small, speckled orange fruits with an apple-pear taste, and their soft flesh turns almost creamy while soaking in the ponche.
Guavas lend just the right amount of tang and citrusy perfume. The smell of guavas cooking with cinnamon and sugar is intoxicating. Someday someone’s going to make a million dollars selling it to Williams-Sonoma as an air freshener.
The ponche workhorses: tejocotes (small orange fruits in front), guavas (left), apples and cinnamon
In addition to the fresh fruit, ponche can contain prunes, raisins, tamarind, walnuts. Some folks add hibiscus flowers, which gives the ponche a pretty burgundy color.
Ponche isn’t an exact science. Everything simmers together until the fruit is tender, and the dried fruits become plump, sugar-swollen nuggets. If you are like me, you will hover over the pan and give yourself a ponche facial, letting that sweet, spicy steam envelope your face.
You can’t see the steam in the picture below, but that’s because I was so smitten once the ponche started to cook that I forgot about my camera, and kept fishing raisins and tamarind pieces out of the pot to eat.
Ponche simmering on the stove
Ponche has a lot of ingredients, but it requires minimal chopping. If you have a helper the whole thing can be on the stove within 20 minutes.
If you like — and we do, in our house — a little nip of brandy, rum or tequila, feel free to add it in. Just make sure to serve the cups with a spoon, so everyone can dig into their boozy (or not) fruits.
Recipe below.
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Crayton decided a few days ago that he wanted to make figgy pudding for Christmas this year.
He’d been humming “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” on Wednesday night when he suddenly asked, “What is figgy pudding, anyway?”
We looked it up on the Internet and discovered it was a cake filled with dried, boozy fruits. We found a recipe by Dorie Greenspan and it seemed easy enough: whip up a type of cake batter, add some spices, scrape it into a bundt pan. The cake did need to be steamed, which meant we’d cook it on the stove top in a water bath. But we could do that. I had a new tamale-steamer that could double as a stock pot.
So, on Christmas Eve, I shopped for figgy pudding ingredients while Crayton worked. Found everything quickly except for the dried figs, which took me two hours to find. Eventually scored them at the El Progreso spice shop near Mercado San Juan.
On Christmas Day, Crayton made the whole thing almost entirely by himself. I hovered nearby and washed the dishes, and chopped the apricots. I prayed he wouldn’t burn the house down. Lighting the cake on fire is a key part of figgy pudding presentation, and that’s all he kept talking about: “We’re going to make figgy pudding and light it on fire!”
Mixing the butter and eggs together
Folding together the eggs, sugar and fresh breadcrumbs, which Crayton pulsed in the food processor
Alcohol-soaked figs and raisins, softly burning in a very safe area of our kitchen
The thick batter, ready to be scraped into my cathedral bundt
The finished bundt, ready for steaming
The pudding finished cooking in about two hours. Crayton used a knife to loosen the pudding’s edges, just like the recipe said. (He’d printed out a copy and placed it on the kitchen table, for handy reference.)
When he was done loosening the cake, I started to advise him on how to invert it onto our wire cooling rack.
Before I could say more than two words, though, he simply picked up the pan and tipped it over. Plop. The pudding fell out in one big mass. I winced.
But the cake looked fine. More than fine — it was pretty.
And it tasted fantastic: hearty, moist, and soaked in bits of alcohol-drenched fruit. I liked the apricots the best, but Crayton loved the raisins. “They’re little booze bombs,” he said.
No lie. We had wine with dinner and after one slice of cake for dessert, I felt my head swimming. Crayton asked if I wanted to see Avatar later on that evening, and I shook my head. “I’m drunk,” I said.
But three hours and many glasses of water later, I felt fine. We saw Avatar after all. It was good, if you disregarded the dialogue.
Oh, and Crayton did light the cake on fire, fulfilling his one Christmas wish. The flames only burned for a few seconds before they went out. Next time, I’ll pour the rum while he has the match ready. We’re making figgy pudding an annual Christmas tradition.
Recipe below.
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