Monday, 5 December 2011

Tomato Salsa with Quesadillas and Spinach and Mushroom


From Truly Mexican, Roberto Santibañez, John Wiley & Sons, 2011.

I am very fond of Mexican food. I occasionally try to cook it but never quite seem to be able to achieve anything near the real taste. So this book, I hope, will be able to help me master something nearer to proper Mexican cuisine.

The book concentrates on the sauces and condiments giving instructions on how to achieve the best results with these. So the book is arranged into sections according to these elements: salsas, guacamoles, adobos, moles and pipianes. In each section the reader goes through a series of instructions on making the sauce or condiment. The section then ends with some recipes for using these elements in particular dishes. The author hopes that once a person has achieved success with the sauce or condiment they will be able to construct their own recipes.



The instructions are very clear and easy to follow. I began with a salsa, a pico de gallo (fresh tomato salsa). This was the easiest salsa to make. All of the ingredients were mixed together, it was seasoned and served.

This was a salsa with a great tang to it and one I think I would go back to whenever I am preparing a salsa dip for other occasions.



The recipe ends with suggestions for what to serve it with. These were generally not vegetarian so I settled on having it with quesadillas, the instructions for which were in a later section of the book. Again these were simple to make, though once again I should mention the difficulty in Sydney of obtaining corn tortillas.



As a side I made sautéed spinach and mushrooms, again from the end section of the book.



This turned out to be a very satisfying meal (salsa, quesadillas and spinach with mushrooms) with lots of flavour and spicy bite that I like.

I’ll be back into this book again soon, I think.

Taste: ✔✔✔✔
Ease of cooking: ✔✔✔✔

No comments:

Post a Comment