A few weeks ago, I was running errands with my Dad and we stopped at Costco. I could not believe my eyes when I saw a two-pound bag of chia seeds! Not sure how I feel about buying them in bulk.
- Are chia seeds that de moda right now?
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Long, cold winter nights mean one thing in my house: we’re making hot drinks to warm us up! One of my favorite cold-weather drinks is atole, especially because it’s customary to drink with breakfast or after dinner. The two most common flavors are vanilla and strawberry—atole de vainilla y atole de fresa. If you make it with chocolate, it’s called champurrado.
It’s a masa-based drink where the dissolved masa acts as a thickening agent to make this hot drink the kind of hearty treat that will really stick to your ribs. I’ve talked before about the availability of atole that comes in powdered packets, but next to my champurrado recipe (which uses prepared store-bought masa from my local tortillería), this version using Maseca instant corn masa flour is even easier to make and a sure step above the flavor from a packet. It’s a homemade taste without all the work of grinding your own nixtamal or having to dissolve masa using cheesecloth. It’s what you might call a semi-homemade version, if you will.
This drink dates back to pre-Columbian times in Mexico and is well documented as a form of sustenance amongst the Aztec and Mayan cultures. Historical texts tell us it was often flavored with fruits, spices or chiles.
Sometimes atole is also made with different colors of corn (I’ve personally tasted atole made with white, yellow and blue corn bases) and milk or water as the liquid. I don’t like my atole to be too thin so I have a habit of making it very thick at the beginning and then thinning it out with milk or water as needed. If you prefer yours to be thinner, you can use all water instead of milk, and reduce the portion of Maseca instant corn flour to your liking.
If you want more berry flavor, you can add another whole cup of strawberries and use more water than milk so it doesn’t thicken too much or dilute the berry flavor.
This recipe produces the best strawberry flavor when you use berries that are very ripe. A trick to my recipe is that I macerate the strawberries before I put them in the blender (which just means I slice them up and, place them in a bowl and sprinkle sugar over them to allow the natural juices to come out).
If you won’t consume the atole immediately after cooking, store in an airtight container with plastic wrap pressed to the top of the liquid so a skin doesn’t form over the top. If a skin does form, you can gently remove it with a spoon, but then you’re not getting to enjoy your whole batch. A final note: make sure the Maseca you’re using is specifically for tortillas and not tamales or you’ll get a different consistency.
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I spotted this amazingly huge jicama in the grocery store a few weeks ago and couldn’t believe my eyes. I didn’t think anyone would believe how big they were, so I had to take a photo! I picked one up and don’t think it would have fit on the piddly little fruit scales in the produce department. Two of the largest ones I picked up were definitely each heavier than my laptop.
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¡Feliz Día de Los Reyes a todos!
We took a long vacation with family for the holidays and part of our trip included a day in Ensenada, located on the West coast of Mexico in the state of Baja California (the northern part of the peninsula, a little more than 70 miles south of Tijuana).
Since we wouldn’t be together on Día de Los Reyes, we found a little rosca to celebrate a few days before. And guess who got el niño Jesus… again. I swear it’s a conspiracy because I get the baby in my piece of cake every single year. The rosca was so small that I didn’t even think there would be a baby inside, but there he was when I broke my piece off. Guess I’ll just have to make tamales for Día de La Candelaria on February 2!
Read more about how we celebrate Día de Los Reyes here on The Other Side of The Tortilla and check out the links below to see how some of our friends celebrate as well. If you haven’t celebrated yet, it’s not too late. Even if you can’t buy a rosca, you can certainly try making one on your own! You can also serve Mexican hot chocolate or champurrado alongside your cake….