28 Feb 2015
by scolgin
in Recipes, The Pantry
Tags: cheese, chicharrones, Mexican cooking, Mexico, queso cotija, recipes, Saul Garcia construction, tacos
My friend, Saul, who grew up one of nearly a dozen children without electricity or running water on a farm some 45 minutes from the nearest village in Mexico, once brought me back from a visit with his parents a chunk of cheese his mother had made. Of course it was raw, of course it was artisanal — not in the self-congratulatory way of the contemporary foodie, but in the “what other way is there?” way of the peasant farmer.
“Mr. Chicharron, we’re ready for your close up.”
Not only was it a thoughtful and generous gift — it was delicious, with a grassy freshness pairing with a slightly tart complexity reminiscent of bufala mozzarella, a characteristic more often more evident in raw cheeses. More
27 Nov 2014
by scolgin
in Food, Humor
Tags: confit, Evangelical Christians, Ferry Building, humor, Mexico, percebes, Southern cooking, Thanksgiving, Turkey, Vic Zaud
I’m a bit of a non-traditionalist, particularly when it comes to Thanksgiving. I think turkey pretty much sucks, stuffing does nothing for me, I don’t like pumpkin pie and cranberries are weird.
Kind conquerors feeding the savage Indians at the first Thanksgiving
So I faced a dilemma when my in-laws asked me to bring a turkey. I joked with my mother-in-law that I was going to solve the dry-turkey problem by serving mine medium rare. She laughed uneasily. More
04 Nov 2014
by scolgin
in Pork, Recipes, Video
Tags: Dia de los Muertos, holidays, James Joyce, Loteria, Mexican cooking, Mexico, mole, Oaxaca, Pork, The Dead
“His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.” —James Joyce, “The Dead”
As I’ve confessed to in the past, I like holidays — particularly other people’s holidays. Our neighbors to the south, Mexico, for example.
More
19 Sep 2014
by scolgin
in Humor, Video
Tags: breakfast, Don Schneider, eggs, Ferry Building, food, humor, Mexico, San Francisco, Topanga
“Why don’t you do a post about me?” 10-year-old Naomi Schneider said, gazing over my shoulder as I showed her various posts about her father and mother.
“Why would I do a post about you?” I answered.
Naomi
“Because,” she said.
I assured her that she must be somewhere on my blog, and began opening posts about Tuesday sushi nights and Mexico vacations and Sonoma wine barbecues and other Schneider-related topics, and finally found a group shot at the Ferry Building in San Francisco where a teeny, tiny Naomi could be spotted in a corner. More
11 Jul 2014
by scolgin
in Beverages, Recipes
Tags: agua fresca, Attempts in Domesticity, cocktails, margarita, Mexico, Sir Isaac Newton, watermelon
I remember watching a Ken Burns documentary series a few years back about the National Park system. It was called, “America’s Best Idea.”
I was thinking about this on a particularly hot Southern California summer afternoon, the desert winds blowing through the canyon and out to sea. It was stifling, I was thirsty… and then it came to me: My best idea!
Watermelon Aguarita
It began with a half-eaten watermelon sitting on the kitchen counter. I was reminded of a post about watermelon agua fresca on my friend’s Jessica’s blog, Attempts in Domesticity. I pulled up her website, glanced at the instructions, and made myself a nice cold pinkish glass of watermelon agua fresca, which was just as refreshing as the post had suggested. More
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