Crema or Crema?????

In most of our grocery stores in my area Mexican Cremas are available under the Cacique brand. Cacique is an American company, not Mexican. If you read the label you will find most do not even have cream as ingredient. (To be fair, if you look at the labels now days on Creama in stores in Mexico you will find they, too, are non-dairy.

Now if you want to find a real Mexican style dairy sour cream go to WalMart and buy their Good Value Sour Cream. Take it home, open the container and whip the sour cream vigorously and you will find you have a real authentic Mexican Crema - AND at about 1/2 the price, too.

OKRA- don't you just love it???!!!!!

In south Louisiana every household you pass on the old road to New Orleans via New Iberia and Houma has a patch of 7 ft. okra growing and blooming constantly. We grew okra on the farm and I thought it would never stop growing fruit. Pick it every day or it gets big and tough and stringy. It seemed to me when the snow was on the ground there was that yellow bloom saying, "I'm still here". But we loved it. Wish I had my Mom's recipe for cooking it.

COOKIN' STEAK TAMPIQUENA !!!

One rule for cooking steak tamiquena!!!!! COOK IT FAST AND HOT. To me there are two ways to do it. The wet/grill kind and the dry/skillet style. Altho most of these steaks are prepared for grilling, some people do not have a grill or can't used it if they did. A marinade is made and the steak is marinaded for 3-4 hrs. Grill until the meat is only cooked with no pink at all but very well done. The meat is flank steak - about 1/2 inch thick.

I used my marinade for Fajitas (Fajitas are really Steak Tampiquena on tacos with the condiments in the tortillas with the meat).
My Own
Formula

Mojo Marinade
Sour Orange Marinade
Trial-sized

2 Heads Garlic + 1 Tsp. dehydrated Minced Garlic
2 Tsp. Salt
1 Tsp. Medium Grind Black Pepper
24 fluid oz. (3 Cups) Sour Orange Juice
½ Medium Onion, minced + 1 Tsp. Dehy. Rough Cut Onion
1 Tsp. Oregano
2 TBS. Spanish Olive Oil

Mash garlic, salt, and peppercorns into a paste, using a mortar and pestle. Stir in sour orange juice, onion, and oregano. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes or longer. On medium heat bring mixture barely to boil and bottle while hot.

Note: Pork has enough fat that when using this marinade you can omit the olive oil.
Msh

Put appr. 2 lb. Flank Steak in a 1 gallon ziplock and pour in the marinade and refrigerate for 3-4 hrs. Place on HOT grill and cook just until meat is barely brown all the way thru. Even under cook - it will continue to cook some after taken off grill. The minute meat hits the grill it begins to toughen ---- DON'T OVERCOOK.

DRY RUB COOKING

For those who don't want to use the grill in 10 below zero weather can use my dry rub. That way when you cook in a skillet the meat does not "boil" in the liquid marinade.

Texas Chef
Fajita Seasoning
(salt free)

Ingredients: Ground Black Pepper, Granulated Onion, Granulated Garlic, Tenderizer, Ground Cayenne, Citric Acid.

4 oz. Café Grind Black Pepper 3 oz. Granulated Garlic

1/2 oz. Ground Cayenne 1 oz. Granulated Onion

1 oz. Tenderizer * 1-1/2 oz. Citric Acid

Lay the steak out on a cutting board and rub with seasoning, allow to sit until the seasoning begins to draw moisture from the meat. Place in HOT heavy duty cast iron skillet or cast iron grill. Cook as above when using marinade.

Best Steak? Maybe - Right after CFS.

We in Texas are pretty strong about our Chicken Fried Steak, but we are also pretty good consumers of Mexico's Bistek Tampiquena - a delectable dish, especially in the old days before big time operators started restaurants in Mexico.

Picture this scene in the 70s in a Mexican border cuidad: You have just ordered and before the waiter gets out of sight a little boy about 10 years old starts bring out all kinds of condiments in small soup bowls - chopped onion, pickled jalaenos, guacamole, sliced carrots and maybe 4-5 choices the cook had ready (don't forget the charro beans!!) for you when you order Bistek Tampiqueno, the best known dish in Mexico. Now days instead of an extravanganza you get a plate lunch.

By the time the boy has arranged the condiments which now almost surround you, the waiter is there with your steak because is is a "fast and hot" cooked dish to maintain tenderness. Cook it slow and you get tough.

My next post will have my way of cooking Steak Tampiqueno. Coming up soon.

IT'S HARD TO BEAT A GOOD BISCUIT !!!!

I was going to post #4 on the commercial shortening subject - cake mixes but got to thinking about my Mother making biscuits. I can see her now, mixing the dough by hand. But there is more so I'm posting this. Mom had an old, I mean old, cast iron skillet that was lighter weight than the Lodge type. Her grandfather gave it to her as a wedding gift an she used it DAILY. Just ask for something and she reached for that skillet. Anyway, she prepared the skillet for baking biscuits by dropping enough lard to barely cover the bottom then put it in the oven to heat. Meantime, she mixed the dough by hand, going from flour, etc, to crumbling it to coarse cornmeal texture, then kneaded the dough Oh!! so lightly, rolled the dough out to about 1/2" thick and used an old beat up biscuit/donut cutter to cut them. She removed the now just the right temperature skillet with lard and picked up a cut biscuit and "mopped" it on both sides in the melted lard, repeating it until the skillet was full and biscuits touched each other. Amazing how the skillet space and the biscuit dough ran out at the same time. Then she put the skillet full of biscuits in the oven and baked at 375 degrees until all were brown. Now that is a BISCUIT!!!!!!!!!!!!

Decoration Day !!!

DECORATION DAY
Long time ago Decoration Day was on May 30th (every year). I keep it in mind because my Mom and Dad’s wedding was right at Decoration Day, but on May 31 .Decoration Day started in France when French ladies decorated the graves of fallen soldiers with flowers. Just happened that poppies were in bloom at that time of year.It was first started in the US shortly after the Civil War when a guy in Waterloo, IA decided to organize his town and decorate the graves of Union Army Waterloo men who had died in the Civil War. Shortly thereafter Gen. Logan,Who was head of the Grand Army of The Republic contacted all its members and suggested they decorate Union Army graves everywhere.On Decoration Day all our families gathered at the cemetery and the men cleaned the graves and mowed the grass and generally cleaned things up. The women brought flowers or went into the adjoining pastures and picked flowers for the graves. Usually there was a big gathering close to 100 people because most of the people were young and had lots of kids. All the housewives would bring covered dishes and tables would be erected as best as could be under a tree in the corner of the cemetery (or just a blanket spread on the ground). Our cemetery was Union Chapel. It was 5 or soMiles East of Hennessey, Oklahoma and a mile North. My greatgrandfather was a Civil War Vet in that cemetery. Thank you Vets - we're grateful !!!!

Is Making Puff Pastry A Lost Art?

Picture this::: Country boy just arriving at one of the biggest Food Companies in the US directly from the conglomerate's NY Wall St. office working as a Currency Trader. The first place they send me was baker's school which was then located in the experimental kitchen in Sherman, TX. There I was in the company of great experimental chefs like Carter Hodding, emulsion expert, John Mock, experimental chef and master baker, Warren Laruth, the later famous New Orleans chef. Warren was there to learn about emulsions. Warren said once his time with Carter Hodding taught him all the knows about getting flavor and keeping it. My company made Puff Pastry shortening. For centuries puff pastry shortening meant BUTTER - that's it. In the 60s there were still regional bakeries that made puff pastries and Danish. The shortening had to be almost specifically manufactured for puff pastry - right melting point, mouth feel, and malable. We thought we had it so we sent a refrigerated truck of it to Mrs. Baird's Bakery in Abilene, TX for Mrs. Baird's expert puff pastry bakers. They sent me along to spend a day on the line making puff pastry with the big guys. Long conveyors of the simple dough came along and we plopped 5# blocks of shortening at intervals on the dough and the conveyor took it to a machine that folded, rolled, rotated, folded again, rotated again, and rolled again - 3 times. (See: http://www.tgap.com.au/products.html) And out came sheets of puff pastry ready to make all the different items they used it for. Talk about an experience. In the 60s was a period of puff pastry shortening wars Proctor and Gamble and my company were battling it out so John Mock and I travelled the country showing big bakeries how to use our product. Sorry, no picture - yet- soon. I'm glad puff pastry is still alive.

Oldie But Goodie !!!! Baker's Cheese

Once upon a time, everyone who made cheesecake used Baker's Cheese. It is kind of a dry cottage cheese. When I worked at ACCO, I had to go to baker's school for a period and a fellow named, John Mock, was the experimental baker - a master baker from St. Louis. He insisted the company keep Baker's Cheese on hand because he said decent cheesecake REQUIRED Baker's Cheese. You know he was right!!!!! The cheesecake you buy in stores now is made with cream cheese and for cheesecake cream cheese is like lemon flavored toothpaste and turns out a goo-ie, stick cheesecake - more like cheese pie - it is called CHEESE CAKE. Once you have tried a New York cheesecake, or a Chicago cheesecake or even St. Louis cheesecake, you WILL know the big difference. Baker's Cheese is still available in Wisc. and even Amazon has 5 lb. tubs. I don't think there is any premium on price, just lack of demand because cream cheese is so much more available. If you get a chance, try it.