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I see some common themes in NM cooking.... meat-tomato-chili pepper-onion........
sometimes garlic........
oregano and cumin........
earthy stuff......
Tomato seems to mainly be a garnish in New Mexican food. Not sure why since tomatoes grow decently here.
To many hispanos and other native New Mexicans, cumin is considered a foreign ingredient at best and a travesty at worst. It shows up in a lot of New Mexican recipes online, though and I have detected it at a couple of popular 'authentic' New Mexican restaurants as well. Hmm...
I put cumin in with avocado and limes. Mexican ingredients which showed up about a generation or two ago and have insinuated themselves into the local palate. But there are a few restaurants where they are absent, much less abuelita's kitchen.
Also..... best forum name I've ever seen........ seriously........
I sometimes play Pantera and much of the time play heavy metal when cooking..........
I always cook with music......... and most of the time with a drink.......... it is heaven to me....
doing the dishes still sucks though...
Ha funny story...Back in the 90s, my company PanTerra would get their copy work done at the same copy place as the group, Pantera. I picked up one job that they had gotten mixed up. They gave me a big box of fliers for their concert that weekend. I did keep one and put it on our refrigerator in the break room. We would even got phone calls for them.
Tomato seems to mainly be a garnish in New Mexican food. Not sure why since tomatoes grow decently here.
To many hispanos and other native New Mexicans, cumin is considered a foreign ingredient at best and a travesty at worst. It shows up in a lot of New Mexican recipes online, though and I have detected it at a couple of popular 'authentic' New Mexican restaurants as well. Hmm...
I put cumin in with avocado and limes. Mexican ingredients which showed up about a generation or two ago and have insinuated themselves into the local palate. But there are a few restaurants where they are absent, much less abuelita's kitchen.
Absolutely right: lime and avocado are all relatively recent additions to the NM kitchen, and weren't part of truly "traditional" New Mexican food. They've all been around a long time, though, and I believe a recipe for guacamole shows up in at least a few of the earliest published NM cookbooks from the 1920s and 30s. As for cumin, comino seeds have been part of New Mexico spice racks for centuries but for whatever reason a *lot* of traditional northern New Mexico cooks leave it out of their chile. I'm not sure why - maybe it was hard to come by?
Another common modern ingredient that could go on this list is Poncho's beloved black bean, which was originally grown in Central America and only really started showing up in New Mexican dishes sometime in the 1980s. The traditional NM beans have always been the pinto - served whole in the north and refried in the south - and to a lesser extent the bolita, a drought-tolerant native cultivar in northern NM and Colorado that's been grown by Hispano farmers for centuries but never really made it as a commercial crop. Pintos are and were widely grown in NM, however, and for a few decades before World War II we were the pinto capital of the nation.
Anasazi beans are the best, though I have no problem with pintos or black beans either.
Tomatoes are in most salsas. Limes and avocado might be new to food in SF/ALB but they have a long history in Mexican food anywhere to the south. Thousands of years long. Maybe you guys are seeing a change in palates up there due to all the more recent immigrants? Some of whom must be restaurant owners.
FWIW - Check out 505 Southwest company if you live in places deprived of real hatch Green Chille. this morning we had an omelet made with eggs, cheese, scallion and some Hatch Green Chille.
Anasazi beans are the best, though I have no problem with pintos or black beans either.
Tomatoes are in most salsas. Limes and avocado might be new to food in SF/ALB but they have a long history in Mexican food anywhere to the south. Thousands of years long. Maybe you guys are seeing a change in palates up there due to all the more recent immigrants? Some of whom must be restaurant owners.
As I said before, limes and avocados aren't part of traditional NM cuisine but have been around for quite a while. I think the change happened once guacamole became a restaurant staple in California and Texas. People soon expected to see it here as well. I imagine avocados and limes would have been hard to find 50 years ago, but guacamole has been a staple of NM restaurant menus as long as I can remember - I'm in my early 40s.
As I said before, limes and avocados aren't part of traditional NM cuisine but have been around for quite a while. I think the change happened once guacamole became a restaurant staple in California and Texas. People soon expected to see it here as well. I imagine avocados and limes would have been hard to find 50 years ago, but guacamole has been a staple of NM restaurant menus as long as I can remember - I'm in my early 40s.
Didn't mean to argue with you, relatively recent is a subjective term and I assumed you meant more recent than you indicate here. Lo siento.
Didn't mean to argue with you, relatively recent is a subjective term and I assumed you meant more recent than you indicate here. Lo siento.
No worries. Like I said originally, I think guacamole shows up in at least one of the New Mexican cookbooks published in the 30s and 40s. So it's been on the scene to some extent for a good while, even if it's not "traditional" NM food.
FWIW - Check out 505 Southwest company if you live in places deprived of real hatch Green Chille. this morning we had an omelet made with eggs, cheese, scallion and some Hatch Green Chille.
That's the good stuff.
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