January in Mexico, or Mexico in January

Since not everyone can afford a vacation in Mexico, we will bring Mexico here, and make our January cooking class about some Mexican or Mexican inspired disches.

Breakfast

I started out trying some purple corn flour for breakfast, as an alternative to my usual steel cut oats:

Mama Tere Purple Corn Flour

There is a simple breakfast recipe on the back. You soak 1/2 cup of it in water overnight, bring it to a boil, constantly stirring and then start adding fruit, and maybe some sweetener (I used 1 tpsp of date sugar). I had apple, cinnamon, blueberries, some strawberries and a piece of Jackfruit.
Simple and it works. I think oats remains my favorite, but it is an interesting alternative. Sometimes I am just in the mood to deviate from the routine.

Tortillas

Next on the list is tortillas. Who knew there was more to it than the Guerrero, or Old El Paso and others at the supermarket... Some people still make these fresh at home... and the difference is that the supermarket brands are full of preservatives, but if you make them fresh, that's quite a different story!

Masa

The story begins with Masa, which is the corn flour that is made from corn kernels soaked overnight in typically calcium hydroxide, which softens and makes it more nutritious. From that you can make the dough for tortillas - you merely need to rinse it and grind it up and then mane the masa dough. You can roll it into balls and flatten them with a frying pan or a tortilla press and then all you need to do is to cook them in a frying pan or on a griddle.

Here is a good article on the whole process, from a website called Mexican Please. It is worth reading, also regarding his experience with store bought tortilla flower (masa harina).

This month, our cooking class will be Mexican inspired dishes. We will not be making our own Tortillas, but hopefully we will manage to have home cooked tortillas thanks to two fresh tortilla makers in the area, La Milpa in Yonkers, or
Tortilleria Nixtamal in Queens.

For our cooking class, we will prepare some Mexican style dishes, to be enjoyed with real tortillas!

Oh, and look what comes up on Nutrition studies if you look for some Mexican dishes:
https://nutritionstudies.org/mexican-plant-based-cooking-101-chefs-guide-for-delicious-authentic-flavor/