I'm a big fan of Mexican food. Oddly, I sort of avoided fish tacos for the longest time. They just sounded ... not right somehow. Then, The Hubby tried this recipe and I was bowled over.
I always liked Mexican food, but it tended to be more Americanized, with the few exceptions of when we went to authentic type restaurants.
My wife ate Mexican food like there's no tomorrow growing up. So she helped expand my horizons beyond tacos and burritos. I too thought fish tacos sounded weird. But she originally is from the west coast where I think it's a lot more popular.
I guess the thing is that I was expecting your standard Old El Paso tacos with fish instead of ground beef. When in reality, the sauces and seasonings are totally different. I'm 'hooked' at this point, if you'll excuse the bad pun.
For what it's worth, this is the book we've been using for ideas lately.
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Mod-Mex/Scott-Linquist/e/9780740768651/?itm=1
It has nice, authentic looking recipes with ingredients you can usually find.
Yeah, I think you're right about the west coast influence. I grew up in the Pacific NorthWest, but also lived in California. Obviously, there's a lot of Mexican food and influenced food in Cali, but it also seemed to have trickled up to Oregon by the time I came along, both fast food and more "authentic" fare. I have to admit, there's a part of me that still likes the "Americanized Mexican food" sometimes (by that I mean burritos, tacos, chimichangas but
not chain fast Mexican food.), but the Authentic stuff will get me every time. I had a great Mexican-American Spanish teacher in High School. He and his wife would have the "honor students" over for dinner occasionally and
man the stuff they served us!!! I can still taste "Mrs. G's" mole and hot green salsa.
But I digress ....
Thanks for the link to the cookbook. I think I'm gonna have to pick that up!
^They've really come along in recent years. DiGiorno's and other ones like that are a far improvement over those Elio's carboard pizzas with waxy cheese from my youth.
This is going to sound lame, but I've gotten so spoiled over the years. I make pizza sauce and freeze it in single serving sizes. I like to make pizza dough when I have time (whole wheat, usually), but you can also buy it in the bakery section of most stores. And, seriously, with the store bought crust and your own sauce, a package of "pizza mix" cheese from the dairy section and a few choice ingredients, you can have a really good pizza in about the same time it takes to cook a frozen store-bought one, and it is 10 times better. This time of year, I make them on the grill, and it works like a charm. Give it a try sometime, I bet you'll be hooked.
My wife is out of town for work for a few days. We had picked out chili as one of the dinners we would make this week when we went grocery shopping.
Since she is not here though, I can make 5-alarm, devil's breath, melt your tongue kind of chili.
I like to use a variety of fresh peppers, and some chipotles in adobo sauce in lieu of dried chili powder. Then when I serve it sprinkle some grated pepperjack cheese on it.
Usually I have to make it kind of bland to suit the mrs. and dump some hot sauce in it to fire mine up, so this is good.
Now
that sounds like my kinda chili. I love making chili, and it's perfect for this time of year. Nothin' like football and chili. I usually have to tone mine down, though, for most people.
You sound like a man after my own heart.
Oh, and I should mention, one of the key ingredients in The Hubby's fish tacos is a condiment made with sour cream and chipotles in adobo sauce (among other things), as well as a cilantro lime marinade. Love the chipotles in adobo, but they'll blow the top of your head off if you're not careful.
Just the way I like it.
LOL! And I just realized, this is a
SmothieX multi-quote fest.
Oh, and finally, I did make the aforementioned merlot pot roast and horseradish mashed potatoes Wednesday night. Made stirfry last night, and it was wicked good, if I do say so myself.
The Hubby's turn to cook tonight. We'll see if it's worth reporting on.
