Homemade Onion-Herb White Bread

En español

This bread was a hit at a recent dinner party.  You don't find too many homemade savory breads here in  Mexico, so when you show up at a dinner with one of these loaves, folks will think you're a cooking god... and you are, aren't you?

My favorite part about this bread (aside from the rave reviews that were lavished upon me all night) is that it only cost me $30 pesos, or less than $3 dollars, to make FOUR loaves.

I made two loaves in bread pans and I braided the other two loaves Challah-style.  The braided loaves were beautiful, and the bread pan loaves have made some delicious sandwiches.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups soy or cows milk (I used soy)
• 5 TB sugar
• 2 TB salt
• 4 1/2 tsp bread yeast
• 2 cups water
• 12-13 cups white flour
• 5 TB melted butter or margerine, or olive oil
• 1/2 onion, minced
• 1 tsp dried basil
• 2 tsp crushed rosemary

PREPARATION

1. Combine milk, sugar, salt, and water in a pan and heat on the stove until lukewarm (it should feel warm, not hot, on your wrist).  Remove from heat and dissolve yeast in the mixture.  Set aside.
2. In a very large bowl (you might even want to use a Dutch oven if you don't have a very large bowl), combine half of the flour and all of the dried herbs.  Add the liquid-yeast mixture from step 1.  Mix until smooth, then add the melted butter or oil and the minced onion. Mix until smooth, then add the remaining flour.
3. Knead the dough for ten minutes, adding more flour if the dough is too sticky.  As you knead, your dough should be silky soft, elastic, and not sticky at all.  It should be easy to knead the dough, although you will certainly break a sweat as you knead, because the dough will weigh about five pounds!  To avoid making a huge mess on my table, I always knead my dough directly in my bowl or Dutch oven.  
4. Oil your bowl or Dutch oven, and place your dough ball inside.  Flip the dough ball over so that the whole ball gets covered in oil.  The oil will make sure the dough doesn't dry out as it rises.
5. Cover the bowl containing the dough with a towel and place in a warm, draft-free place.  If it's a cold or rainy day, you might need to fire up your oven for just a few minutes, then turn it off and put your dough inside to rise where it's nice and warm.  Let the dough rise until doubled in size, about 1 1/2 hours.
6. When the dough has doubled in size, punch it down and divide it into four equal peices (I cut mine into quarters with a knife).  Shape each peice into a loaf and place either in a greased bread pan or on a greased cookie sheet.  Cover the loaves again with a towell and let them rise until double in size, about one hour.
7. While the loaves are rising, pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees F.  
8. When the loaves have risen, place them in the oven and bake for 45 minutes, or until the loaves begin to get a golden color and they sound hollow when you knock on them.
9. Let the loaves cool for about ten minutes, then remove them from the pans and/or baking sheets and set them on a rack to cool.  IMPORTANT! You need to let them cool completely (about an hour) before you cut them.  This is very tricky if you don't live alone!

Makes 4 1-lb. loaves.

Vegan Espresso Shortbread Cookies With Irish Whiskey Glaze

I found this recipe in the Orlando Sentinel.  It was adapted by the Sentinel from a recipe by cooking teacher Janine MacLachlan.  She says about the recipe: "I've deconstructed the classic Irish coffee by using ground coffee or espresso and Irish whiskey in a shortbread cookie."

This cookie recipe is amazing, easy, and completely delicious.  The cookies are crunchy, and the ground coffee gives them a little extra crunch (that's why you want to use ground coffee and not instant coffee powder).  The sweet whiskey glaze makes them anything but your boring old shortbread cookie.

You can whip up a batch in a flash.  The most difficult and time-consuming part is waiting for the cookies to cool so that you can glaze them.

It's easy to make this recipe vegan.  Just replace the butter with margarine.  Make sure you choose a brand that doesn't have trans fats, though, because this cookie is like a whiskey-flavored heart attack.  Look for a tub margarine; they're less likely to contain hydrogenated oils, which is where the trans fats are hiding.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 sticks (225 g) butter or margarine at room temperature
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 cups flour
• 1 TB ground espresso or coffee (not instant!)

       Glaze

• 1/4 cup sugar, divided
• 1/4 cup whiskey or bourbon
• 2 TB butter or margarine

PREPARATION

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.  Stir together butter, sugar, and salt in a bowl.  Mix in about half the flour; stir in the ground coffee.  Stir in the remaining flour; combine thoroughly.  Using damp fingers, press into two buttered 8-inch round cake pans.
2. Bake in the center of the oven until golden brown, 30-35 minutes.  Remove from the oven; immediately cut each pan into 8 wedges but leave in the pan.  Cool completely.
3. For the glaze, pour sugar and 2 tablespoons of the whiskey into a small saucepan.  Heat to a boil over high heat; boil rapidly, 1 minute.  Remove from heat; whisk in butter.  Whisk in remaining 2 tablespoons of the whiskey.  Let set to thicken slightly.  If it's not thickening fast enough, stick the pot in the fridge.  When thickened slightly, spoon over shortbread, using the back of the spoon to cover evenly.  When glaze is set, remove cookies from pan.

Vegan Shoo Fly Cake

This recipe is from the Vegetarian Resource Group's Vegan Handbook, an old but classic book full of delicious recipes, including homemade gluten and vegan baked goods, like this cake.

I'm Pennsylvania Dutch, and I can attest that this cake really does taste like Shoo Fly Pie.  Since it omits the crust, it takes less than ten minutes to put together.  Fast and delicious.

The key ingredient here is molasses.  It's tough to find in Mexican grocery stores, but they sell it very cheap in cane sugar refineries (ingenios azucareros).  So if you live in Veracruz, Chiapas, Oaxaca, or any other sugar-producing state, this cake is for you.  Since I've never seen anyone cook with molasses in Mexico, Vegan Shoo Fly Cake will impress all of your friends.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour (in a pinch you can use white flour)
• 3/4 cup brown sugar, azucar mascabado, or other granulated sweetener
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/3 cup soft margarine (or butter for non-vegan version)
• 1 cup hot water
• 1/2 cup molasses

PREPARATION

1. Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a medium bowl.
2. Cut in margarine until mixture resembles a fine crumb.  If you don't have a french pastry cutter, cut the margarine into several pieces, toss the pieces into the dry ingredients, and start mixing the margarine into the dry ingredients with your hands until it resembles a fine crumb.
3. Set aside 1/3 cup of the crumb mixture.
4. Add molasses and hot water to the crumb mixture that's in the bowl (not the part you set aside), and stir until just mixed.
5. Pour batter into a greased 9-inch round cake pan or a greased 8-inch cast iron pan.
6. Top with the reserved crumb mixture.
7. Bake at 350 degrees fahrenheit for 25-30 min.  When it's done, the cake should have risen to double its original size, and the middle should be just slightly lower than the edges.  A toothpick inserted in the center won't come out clean, but the crumbs that stick to it should be moist but done. 

Oaxacan Cinnamon-Almond Brownies

Rich chocolate brownies with a distinctly Oaxacan taste... what could be better?

Oaxacan chocolate is pure cocoa ground with almonds and cinnamon.  It is pre-sweetened and almost always turned into hot chocolate.  But I've been testing chocolate recipes with Oaxacan chocolate, and with delicious results.  So delicious, in fact, that you'll notice that the picture only features two tiny brownies and a pile of Oaxacan chocolate.  That's because they were gobbled up before I could grab the camera.

This recipe is loosely based on a Hershey's brownie recipe.

INGREDIENTS:

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• 1-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 cup Oaxacan Hot Fudge Sauce, at room temperature
• 1 cup chopped Oaxacan chocolate
• 1 cup coarsely chopped almonds

PREPARATION:

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease 13x9x2-inch baking pan. 
2. Beat butter, sugar and vanilla in large bowl. Add eggs; beat well. Add fudge sauce and stir. 
3. Stir together flour and baking soda; add to butter mixture. Stir in chocolate chips and almonds. Pour batter into prepared pan. 
4. Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until brownies begin to pull away from sides of pan. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Cut into squares. 

Makes about 24 bars.

Oaxacan Hot Fudge Sauce

Fondue it, put it on banana sundaes, this is your all-natural Oaxacan fudge sauce.  I love Oaxacan chocolate.  It is minimally processed (my mother-in-law grinds her own cacao beans for her homemade chocolate).  And the chocolate-cinnamon-almond combination is sinfully delicious.

This recipe also calls for mezcal, which is a hard liquor made from agave.  Mezcal is native to Oaxaca.  The crema de mezcal is its liqueur version. 

INGREDIENTS:

• 8 ounces (227 grams) Oaxacan chocolate, cut into small pieces
• 3/4 cup (180 ml) heavy whipping cream
• 2 tablespoons (28 grams) unsalted butter
• 4 tablespoons coffee- or mocha-flavored crema de mezcal (use Kaluhua if you can't find mezcal)

PREPARATION:

1. Put chopped chocolate in a clay pot or metal bowl (something that won't melt or shatter when you fill it with very hot liquid).
2. Heat heavy whipping cream and butter until it just begins to simmer.
3. Remove heavy whipping cream and butter from heat and add mezcal or Kaluhua.
4. Immediately pour the hot liquid over the chocolate pieces.  Let sit 5 minutes.
5. Stir with a whisk until smooth.
6. Serve hot.

To store leftovers, transfer to a glass jar and store in refrigerator.  To reheat, remove lid from jar and heat in microwave for 1 minute.  Stir, then microwave at 20-second intervals (stirring at every interval) until the fudge sauce reaches the desired temperature.  Alternatively, remove the lid from the jar and place the jar in a pot with enough water to half-immerse it.  Heat until chocolate melts (give it a stir every now and then once it starts to melt to make it melt faster).  

Banana Bread with Oaxacan Chocolate Chips

Mexicans often ask me what dishes are "traditional gringo food."  I'm always hard-pressed to come up with a gringo main dish, because one of the beauties of the United States is its culinary diversity.  So many dishes that we grew up with are borrowed from other countries and cultures.  However, one thing that is uniquely "gringo" is our desserts.  When I think of the US, I think of the pies, cakes, and sweet quick breads my grandmother used to make.

I snagged this banana bread recipe from The Joy of Baking, but I added a Mexican twist: my mother-in-law's Oaxacan chocolate.  Oaxacan choclate is less refined than the chocolate you find in grocery stores.  It's grittier, and it generally has almonds and cinnamon ground up with the chocolate.  It comes pre-sweetened, and Oaxacans drink it with water or milk as a hot chocolate.  It's delicious.   It's wonderful in this recipe because the cinnamon and almond flavors compliment the banana beautifully.

You can find Mexican chocolate in Mexican grocery stores.  They generally sell the Abuelita brand.  Amazon.com has some from Ibarra that is an excellent price.  It's not the same as my mother-in-law's chocolate (she grinds the sugar, cocoa, almonds, and cinnamon herself), but it'll do.  Oaxacan chocolate generally comes in tablets.  You'll have to coarsely chop them in this recipe.

If worse comes to worse, use regular old chocolate chips (which, ironically, are difficult to find in Mexico).

I've used both regular bananas and "macho" bananas (the bigger, starchier ones that are similar to plantains) in this recipe.  The end result is the same, but it's more difficult to mash the macho bananas.

This recipe makes two loafs of banana bread.  You can easily half the recipe, but it's just as easy to make two loaves as it is to make one.  And this bread freezes great.  Just wrap it up well in tin foil or wax paper and stick it in a thick freezer bag to protect from freezer burn.  When you're ready to eat it, put it in the fridge to thaw a day or two ahead of time.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups coarsely chopped Oaxacan chocolate
  OR
  1 cup coarsely chopped Oaxacan chocolate and 1 cup chopped pecans or walnuts
• 3 1/2 cups flour
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 4 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 cup (two sticks) butter, melted
• 6 large bananas, mashed
• 2 tsp vanilla

PREPARATION

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit
2. Grease and flour two 9 x 5 x 3 inch (23 x 13 x 8 cm) loaf pans.
3. Combine all of the dry ingredients except chocolate and nuts, if using.
4. In a separate bowl, combine all wet ingredients.
5. Fold wet ingredients into dry ingredients.  Stir as little as possible so your bread doesn't come out tough.  
6. Add chocolate and nuts, if using.
7. Divide the batter evenly between the two greased loaf pans.
8. Bake 350 degrees Fahrenheit for an 1 - 1 1/2 hours, until a toothpick or wooden chopstick comes out almost clean.
9. Let the bread cool in the loaf pans.  Once cool, run a spatula or butter knife between the bread and the walls of the pan to loosen the bread.  Turn the loaf pans upside down to remove the bread.

Scrambled Eggs al la Mexicana (Mexican-Style)

This is a simple recipe for scrambled eggs.  I make it several times a week because of all of the Mexican breakfasts, it is by far the easiest and quickest.  That's right, I make it several times a week--here in Mexico we eat eggs for breakfast nearly every day.  And if we don't eat them for breakfast, we eat them as part of another meal.

I added a mild option, replacing chile with green bell pepper.  It's sacrilegious, but I know that not everyone likes chile.

Mexicans generally prepare their eggs (and all other food) in vegetable oil.  I don't like vegetable oil because it is generally at least half soybean oil (and who knows what else), which is very high in saturated fat.  Saturated fat is one of the worst fats: your body turns it into cholesterol.  While diet's role in a person's cholesterol levels is still being debated, one thing's for sure: saturated fat is not your friend.  For that reason, vegetable oil is not your friend, either.

When I'm cooking, I prioritize two things: health and flavor.  Vegetable oil is neither healthy nor flavorful, so I never use it and you won't find it in my kitchen.  Olive oil, which I use in this recipe to fry the vegetable ingredients, is relatively low in saturated fat and contains some "good fats."  It is also very flavorful and makes a wonderful combination with the vegetables.  However, I've found that frying eggs in olive oil has less-than-desirable results.  Butter, however, is by far the best fat to fry your eggs.  It's not healthy, but it sure is flavorful!

Another thing you won't find in my kitchen is non-stick cookware.  That stuff causes cancer.  For frying eggs, I use a heavy-duty stainless steel frying pan.  You need to use more oil with a stainless steel pan than you would with a non-stick one, but I do think it's worth it.  If you are using a non-stick pan, feel free to reduce the oil.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1-2 tablespoons butter
• 2 plum or roma tomatoes, diced
• 1 chile, chopped (jalepeño for milder eggs, serano if you want a very spicy breakfast) OR 1/4 cup chopped green bell pepper
• 1/4 cup diced white onion
• 5 eggs
• salt to taste

PREPARATION

1. Heat the olive oil in an 8-inch frying pan over medium heat.  Don't let the oil smoke; that means you're burning it.
2. Add tomatoes, chile, and onion.  Fry until onion is translucent.  Add a little more olive oil if the tomatoes start to stick during frying.
3. Add butter.  Use less if a decent amount of olive oil remains from frying the vegetables; use more butter if the vegetables have soaked up a lot of the oil.  The goal here is that your eggs don't stick.
4. Add eggs.  You can either crack them right in the pan or you can crack them in a separate bowl and beat them and then add them.  Obviously, cracking them straight into the pan is much easier.
5. Scramble the eggs and add salt to taste before they're cooked through.
6. Serve with warm corn tortillas and Basic Beans, Mexican Style.

Serves 2.