Jetsetter Award Goes to Belmond de Casa Sierra Nevada

Jetsetter, the world's go-to brand for travelers with discerning taste, announced its first annual Hotel Food Awards, which pay respect to the best restaurants, minibars, room service menus and turndown traditions at hotels worldwide.

The Jetsetter Hotel Food Awards celebrates hotels and resorts that make food an essential and integral part of their guest experience.

And the Awards Go To...In San Miguel

Favorite place to brush up on your cooking skills: The Belmond de Casa Sierra Nevada, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Sazon is the cooking school acquired by the 16th century Belmond de Casa Sierra Nevada in 2006. Coursework spans regional recipes and seasonal sopes. Instructors include local chefs as well as Michelin-starred toques from international restaurants and Belmond hotels.

Fresh Bites: Tomatillos add fresh zip to anything Mexican

Small, green tomato-like fruits in husks offer a bright citrus taste that marks Mexico's famous salsa verde.

Cynthia David Special to the Star, Published on Tue Mar 17 2015

Tomatillos take me back to San Miguel de Allende, the fabled artist’s colony in the hills four hours northwest of Mexico City. On my first visit earlier this month, I drank homemade margaritas on a rooftop terrace with friends while watching the sun set, and spent days strolling narrow cobblestoned streets and feasting on tortilla soup and platters of enchiladas, sopes, quesadillas, marinated skirt steak and fish tacos.

The city’s lively markets sell everything from dried beans to rubber tires, but even the smallest grocer offers the essentials for a Mexican feast: avocados, fresh and dried chili peppers, white onions, plum tomatoes, pungent cilantro, tiny limes and shiny tomatillos, wrapped in veined papery husks.

With their meaty white flesh and bright citrus taste, these firm green tomatoes range in size from cherries to golf balls. Cooked briefly and blended, they become Mexico’s famous salsa verde, served as a dip with nachos, simmered into a mole and spooned over everything from tacos to grilled fish.

For the rest of the story go to http://www.thestar.com/life/food_wine/2015/03/17/fresh-bites-tomatillos-add-fresh-zip-to-anything-mexican.html

Chilies and Chocolates

Aylin Öney Tan writing in the Daily News informs us about the origins of moles and Mexican cooking:

"Exactly 18 years ago, I was at the National Day of Mexico reception at Singapore Raffles Hotel. Finally, I would be able to taste the legendary mole poblano, wild turkey smothered in the scary dark bitter chocolate-chili sauce with a zillion spices. I fell in love the moment I tasted it, but ours would be a love of separation and longing. My instant decision to go to Mexico as soon as possible was never realized and I seldom had the chance to taste real authentic Mexican food again.

"I was always amazed by the diversity of Mexican food, and I thought we had much to share between the two countries. So many tastes and dishes seemed to be so similar. Years later, about eight years ago, I met a culinary historian friend living in Mexico who opened up a whole new world in my perception of Mexican food. Rachel Laudan, the author of the recent colossal book “Cuisine and Empire: Cooking in Word History,” has lived in Mexico City for many years. I met Rachel at the Oxford Symposium on Food & Cookery, where she was immensely supportive of my first paper delivered to an audience of crème de la crème of food researchers. Rachel has a very interesting theory on how Spanish-influenced-Mexican food had its roots in Middle East, going as far as India. I could not agree more. When I was doing my research on Turkish-Sephardic cookery, I traced similar links between the cuisines of Andalusia and medieval Arab cooking, which sometimes explains why we find some Mexican tastes so very much like ours.

"The cookery of the Iberian Peninsula before Columbus discovered the Americas carried strong traces from the early Medieval Arabic cuisine from the Middle East. The same was very true for the Ottoman court. Two cookbooks, 13th century Iberian Al-Andalus and 15th century Ottoman Şirvani, were both greatly based on the early 13th century Baghdad text Kitab al-Tabikh, also known as al-Baghdadi. Many Muslims and Jews living in medieval Spain were originally from eastern Mediterranean countries, still maintaining their eating habits. Ziryab, a freed slave from Baghdad, brought over the latest fashions in the Abbasid capital to al-Andalus in the 9th century and introduced the practice of dining in courses to the West. The eastern tastes were synthesized in Spain to an even greater sophistication where people of all creeds intermingled. These cooking traditions were carried to Mexico by the first Spanish conquistadors, followed later by many Middle Eastern immigrants after the break of the Ottoman Empire. The latter is more responsible with el Pastor being a popular street food in Mexico, just like the Döner Kebab in Turkey, Souvlaki in Greece or Shawarma (from Turkish çevirme-to rotate) in Syria or Lebanon. The former influence however, may well be the reason for today’s mole dishes in Mexico. Laudan suggests the Mexican mole has roots deep in these historical connections, stretching the influences as far as Indian curry. Well, the result is a delightful combination of indigenous ingredients like cocoa or Mexican bitter chocolate & red hot chilies with a plethora of old-world spices on the only truly native American bird, that is the turkey!"
Further reading: https://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/2004/the.mexican.kitchen.s.islamic.connection.htm

A recent conversation on Mazinfo had an expat seeking info about flour weevils. What to do if you find contaminated food and how to rid your kitchen of it. Stephanie Raney in "How to Get Rid of Flour Weevils and Keep Them Away," writes that you should take all your food out of your cupboards, throw away all that you know is contaminated or that you think might be contaminated. "Be sure to check all sugars, grains, dried beans and breakfast cereals for signs of flour weevils. Do not throw the contaminated food away in your kitchen trashcan you will want to remove it from your home immediately." Then, thoroughly clean and disinfect your cupboards. Even replace the shelf paper.

When you bring in new sugar, flour, cereal, beans etc. first put them in the freezer for four to five days. The freezing will kill any weevils. Raney writes that "...the most important things are to keep foods prone to infestation sealed in airtight containers, to use older food first, and to only buy small amounts of foods that are prone to becoming home to flour weevils at a time. Good advice!

Our friend Marsha reviewed a cooking class she and Darryl attended in San Miguel:

Marsha Wadsworth reviewed Sazon, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico

"Wonderful day in the kitchen"

Reviewed January 21, 2013

My husband and I took the cooking class at Sazon and had a great time. Emanuel was a great teacher. He first took us and six others on a shopping trip to several markets. We filled up our bags and tasted several different foods along the way. Once the groceries were purchased, we made our way back to the kitchen and put on our aprons for several hours of cooking bliss. Emanuel was very patient with us all (especially me since I don't cook all that much). Once all the food was prepared we sat down for a wonderful feast. We highly recommend this school.

See all 5 of Marsha's reviews.