On a recent trip through Casa Lucas Market, in San Francisco, Laurie Mackenzie, the program manager of La Cocina Community Kitchen (
www.lacocinasf.org), a San Francisco–based nonprofit organization that helps lower-income women start food businesses, walked
Real Simple through the following fundamental ingredients in Mexican cuisine.
If you can’t find these items at a farmers’ market or an international grocery store in your area, try these mail-order shops (recommended by Diana Kennedy, the author of
The Essential Cuisines of Mexico): Kitchen Market (
www.kitchenmarket.com), the CMC Company (
www.thecmccompany.com), or Amazon.com’s gourmet-food shop (
www.amazon.com/gourmetfood).
Nopal
The paddle of the nopal plant, or the prickly-pear cactus, is a green oval vegetable about four inches wide and six to eight inches long that can be purchased whole or already cleaned and cubed. “If you buy them whole,” says Mackenzie, “place a plastic bag over your hand like a glove when picking them up, to avoid being pricked by the tiny hairlike spines on the nodes of the paddle.” Shave the spikes off the surface, give the paddles a rinse, and they’re ready for cooking. Mackenzie suggests brushing the paddles with oil and salt and grilling them until limp, or roasting cubed nopal in the oven for about 20 minutes and then adding it to scrambled eggs or salads.
Tuna
These egg-shaped fruits of the prickly-pear cactus come in colors ranging from unripe yellow green to ripe ruby red. “Look for deep red or purple ones that yield slightly to the touch,” Mackenzie notes, but be careful to avoid the tiny spines. “Keep them loosely wrapped in the refrigerator. Then to eat them, cut off both ends, and make a slit down the length of the rind and peel it off. The flesh of a cold tuna can be very refreshing on a hot, dusty day of exploring pre-Columbian ruins.”
Chayote
Look for the smooth-skinned version of this pear-shaped summer squash, which can be eaten with or without the skin and with or without the pit. “Chayote can be sautéed or steamed in wedges, or cubed and roasted like potatoes,” says Mackenzie. In Nicaragua, she adds, “they make a casserole, mixing cubes of steamed chayote with a béchamel sauce, then putting it in a gratin dish, topping it with bread crumbs and cheese, and baking it.”
