Mexican night, with a little helpful inspiration

I was leafing through the September 2015 issue of Food and Wine and came across an article about Mexican chef Enrique Olivera.  I realized that Shells and I hadn't done a Mexican dinner in a while, so for this meal we broke out the masa and drew inspiration from the article for a different take on some old favorites!

For the first course I put Shells to work with the rolling pin and a plan to make 8 inch corn tortillas.  It was easier said than done and I quickly had to lend my hands to helping flatten out the corn.

While she was rolling I sautéed a batch of mushrooms (I used shiitake for this), shredded some Oaxaca cheese and made a Pico de Gallo. Mushroom quesadillas are something we used to eat on Friday's for lunch in Leon.  While there was a recipe in the article, I kept mine simple with just mushrooms and garlic.

I cooked the tortillas on a cast iron skillet and once I had crisped the first side I added the cheese & mushroom mix, carefully folding the tortilla over to make the quesadilla.

 For the main course I tried a variation on one of my favorite Mexican dishes, Carnitas!  For this version Olivera used pork belly instead of the traditional pork shoulder.  I knew that the extra fat in the pork belly would make this a much different dish!  The full recipe can be found here.

The highlights were a slow braising of the pork belly in an oil and shortening mix (I only used the olive oil) with onion, garlic and morita chiles.  Typically I have braised in a water mix, so I was curious to see how it came out!

After the braising, the pork was cooked in a hot skillet to get the crispy skin and then sliced for tacos.  I served it with lime wedges, Queso Fresco and fresh corn tortillas ... and some ice cold Pacifico, of course!

While this didn't replace traditional pork shoulder carnitas for me, it was a very good incarnation ... try it and enjoy!

Fancy Mexican Food ... just the thing for one day home in two weeks!

Knowing that I'd be coming home for basically just long enough to shove the contents of my suitcase into the washing machine and then repack ... I wanted something fun for Saturday night dinner.  I also needed to bribe Shells on the laundry aspect since I hadn't been home to cook for two weeks.

I had just eaten some tasty Mexican food in Houston and it had made me want to experiment with a couple of things.  Shells wasn't going to argue, even though I refused to share the menu ahead of time.

For the first course I made a style of "Taco Shop" guacamole which is a mix of tomatillos and avocados with jalapenos, lime juice and cilantro.  I served it with a quesadilla for dipping, but I kept the bowl of guacamole full for each of us all night.

For the next tasting component I served blistered shishito peppers with corse sea salt.  These peppers are a great tasting, mild pepper (I've heard 1 in 10 is hit, but I think it's less than that).

For this next course sauteed a U-10 sea scallop that had been sliced into three even slices.  In between the first two slices I served a thin slice of avocado, in between the second and third was a slice of Cotija cheese that had been lightly grilled.  A splash of "Taco Shop" guac finished off the plate.

For this course I used some extra scallops I had from the prior course and some shrimp that I would be using for the next course to make a quesadilla filling.  I used Oaxaca melting quesadilla cheese as the filler and plated with some thin tomatillo and jalapeno slices.

For the shrimp course (and second to last course in the dinner) I made a slow cooked poblano cream sauce that I served over sauteed shrimp and then topped with queso fresco.

Poblano Cream Sauce
3 poblano peppers
1 cup cream
1/4 cup whole milk
1 Tbsp Oaxaca cheese

Roast the Poblano peppers at 375F until soft and the edges are well browned.  Chop the poblanos into thin strips that are about 1/4" in width and 3/4" in length.  Add them to the cream and whole milk and cook in a heavy pan on the lowest temperature setting.  Allow the mixture to cook for at least 30 minutes (preferably more), whisking occasionally to help it thicken.  Immediately before serving add the cheese and whisk well to mix.

The final course was a take on a dish I have made many times, arrachera.  For this rendition I used a USDA Prime New York strip and marinated it for a short 3 hours in the black pepper and Jugo Magi mix before grilling it.  I cooked it to a nice rare and served it sliced, family style, on a single platter.  Hope this dish brings you some inspiration to try something fun and enjoy!