The Background :

Some of my fondest memories in my childhood was making chicken enchiladas with my family. As a child my mother would tell my siblings and I that it was my father’s favorite dish and how she made it out of love.

The story has it that when my mother first took my father to meet the family back home in Arizona my tias made chicken enchiladas. My father loved them so much that he requested my mother to get the recipe before they returned back to California. From that point on my mother would make chicken enchiladas for my father for Valentine’s Day and his birthday. When my parents broke up my mother would only make enchiladas for my siblings birthdays or if we begged her enough and did all the preparation for our assembly line.

Back when I was a kid we would have to shred the block of cheese with a cheese grater, bake or boil the chicken, and or dice up the white onions. Since there were some many steps I would assign each of my siblings a task and get everything ready. All my mother had to do was make the enchiladas sauce which she makes from scratch. My mother would put on some music while my siblings and I would dance and sing to the beat as if cooking with music gave us life. I truly feel like we would put our blood, sweat, and tears into each batch as there was always an episode. Someone would always cut themselves on the cheese grater, burn themselves with the hot oil, or my little brother would eat all the cheese before we were done. No matter who was mad at who we would laugh and joke around as we prepared each step as if nothing else matter but the food.

Since it is a little easier to prepare as we can buy many items pre-made, Here is a quick recipe for chicken enchiladas.

Ingredients :

1 Bag of Baked or Rotisserie Chicken
2 Cans of Las Palmas Enchiladas Sauce (preferably Mild)
1 Pack of Corn Tortillas (approx. qty 30+)
2 Packs of Shredded Cheese (Preferably Mixed Blend)
About 1 cup of Vegetable Oil (depending on size of cooking pan)

Prefered Utensils :

1 pair of tongs
1 – Stir Spoon
1 – Non stick frying pan
1 – saucepan
1 – 13 x 9 baking pan
2 – medium bowls

Preparation Instructions (buliding the assembly line) :

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Place shredded cheese in bowl
Shred chicken and place in bowl
Warm up enchilada sauce on low heat to a shimmer
Place oil in frying pan and warm on medium heat until oil starts to bubble
With tongs place tortilla in hot oil for 15 – 20 seconds then flip tortilla over for another 15-20 seconds so that the tortilla is slightly cooked

Assembly Line :

Line up the following:
Bowl of cheese
Bowl of chicken
baking pan
Saucepan

Let it ROLL :

Splash some enchiladas sauce in baking pan

Dip the slightly cooked corn tortilla in the warmed saucepan soaking up the sauce
Place tortilla in baking pan
Grab a pinch (or desired amount) of chicken and form a line down the middle of tortilla
Grab a pinch (or desired amount) of cheese and re-trace line down the middle of tortilla
From the left middle part of tortilla begin to roll then tuck the enchilada then slide to the right side of baking pan
Repeat until all tortillas have been rolled

Add additional enchilada sauce and cheese on the top
Place in warm oven for 20 minutes (or until all cheese has melted)

Remove from oven and let cool for 10 minutes
Enjoy 🙂

Symbolic Analysis :

It is a dish that brings my family together and truly made with love

Nutrition Facts :

may vary due to the type/amount of cheese, enchiladas sauce, and other products added to recipe.

Based on Wikipedia calories can vary from 238 – 400 per serving.

Reference :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enchilada

Prior to refrigeration, my grandparents preserved meals by the process of dehydration and hydration through the cooking process. Currently, my family continues to dehydrate meats; pork, fish as well as seeds and other fruits.
Dried Meat/Carne Seca is made of thin slices with sprinkled salt, hung up in the sun to dry, roasted over coal and beat turning it into machaca. I have brought cachaça with vegetables. It is cooked with onions, tomatoes, and chili. Beans and hand-made tortillas are typically included in this entrée. There are other ways to prepare this meat some are machaca with eggs, cachaça soup, burrito and machaça with vegetables along with a side of beans and tortillas.

STEP 1

Dry the Meat under the sun.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/14323530@N05/2150993455/in/gallery-163196158@N08-72157664286097697/
STEP 2
Break it up into shred.

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My grandparents, parents, siblings, my children and husband are the most important people in my family. I lived with my grandparents as a young child during the time my
parents migrated to the United States. During that time my grandparents cared and gave me what they knew and had to offer that includes food. They also taught me the value of a good work ethic as all food was made from scratch and it was hard work to prepare a meal.

Final product Machaca with Vegetables

Picture by Nora @ El Sinaloense

One of the many foods that are symbolic to me is cinnamon rolls. I have fond memories of eating freshly baked cinnamon rolls dripping with cream cheese frosting many mornings before school throughout my childhood.

Several mornings, after eating a big homemade breakfast, it was oftentimes finished off with the gooey cinnamon dessert. There was something about the smell of baked goods fresh out of the oven in the morning that somehow evoked a feeling of family, love, and comfort for me. I vividly remember how starting my mornings off this way was a precursor as to how my entire day would be. The little pastry roll brought me joy and I knew I was ready to take on the day. Off I went, grabbing my backpack and lunch pail with the extra box of rolls and other pastries and headed to school to share.

Seeing that I am the daughter of a restaurant and bakery owner, I like to tell people I grew up having my own personal chef and baker. But more than the cinnamon rolls, pastries, and big meals I was spoiled with, it was my father’s love of sharing the food he worked so hard throughout the night to make that I relate my childhood and cinnamon rolls (and food altogether) with. I know pastries were not the healthiest way to start off a day but it sure was good for the spirit and soul.

Not only do I connect my childhood with eating the cream cheese delight but with learning how to make them. Although my father was not known to be the most patient man he did his best when teaching me how to cook and bake. Since I was the only one of my three sisters who had a desire to learn, I can only assume his patience would have been tested even further if having more than one young student trying to follow his quick instruction. Even beyond learning how to combine the perfect amount of ingredients to create the blissful dessert is my father’s journey to the business he worked so hard for. Born of Mexican immigrants and raised in Lincoln Heights, he began working for German chefs and bakers at the age of twelve. Having dropped out of school to help his parents financially, his youthful years of employment afforded him the opportunity to become his own boss by the age of twenty-five. He never worked for anyone else again. Unfortunately, he passed away three years ago, but the memories he left me are by far, irreplaceable.

Yes, cinnamon rolls are significant to me not only because of my childhood memories of the delicious aroma that filled the house as a child or the way they were able to get me ready for a great day but of the hardships my father endured and overcame. The unconditional love and support he gave to my mother, sisters and I, are what I think about every time I enjoy this soft and fluffy treat.

It was a difficult choice choosing a recipe that was closest to my heart. There are so many recipes I enjoy cooking depending on how I feel. I find cooking and baking relaxing, therapeutic and it connects me to a time I spent working alongside my grandmother as a child. I love working with my hands, too. I chose to combine a Russian Tea cake and Mexican Wedding ball cooke. It is a simple recipe using few ingredients and embodies the flavors I love. It is a delicate cookie that is buttery, sweet, nutty, and pairs well with coffee. It is easily adaptable too.

Russian Tea cake/Mexican Wedding ball cookie recipe: 

2 cups organic flour (using a dry measure)                 Preheat oven to 400 degrees

1 cup walnuts and pecans pulsed in a food processor

1 cup salted butter (unsalted can be used)

1/3 of a cup of organic granulated sugar

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups organic confectioners’ sugar

Russian Tea Cake Photo attribution by Tamara Clark

Directions: Cream butter and sugar together until smooth. Beat in vanilla. Sift in flour and mix. Add nuts and mix until they are well incorporated into the dough. Using a tablespoon, shape into 1 inch balls and place 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 9-12 minutes or until golden brown. Let cool. In a large bowl, add confectioners’ sugar and roll each cookie in the sugar until fully coated.

Every Christmas, my grandmother, Irma, would give each of her five grandchildren a large cake box containing a variety of cookies. Beautifully arranged into three layers and sectioned. Every year, I would anxiously await her gift of cookies over all other material goods. It was the gift I always opened first, and to receive them was simply divine. My grandma would bake 28 different types cookies or more and pack a half dozen of each in our boxes. My grandmother was a commercial baker for over forty years. She worked for Hostess and Ramona’s Bakery in San Pedro. Baking was inherent to her. Her parents were Russian and German immigrants who owned restaurants in Philadelphia, PA, and in later years, a delicatessen near USC.

For the approaching Christmas season, my grandma would strategically start her dough prepping process the day after Thanksgiving. She would start by making a few cookie dough’s a day, freeze them and repeat. She meticulously labeled her dough’s with name, weight and cooking time. Depending on the weight of the dough, she could determine the yield. In the days leading up to Christmas, she would start baking. Some of her cookies were the standard fare like ginger snaps, thumbprints, molasses and lemon shortbread’s. But the majority of her cookies were more unique like chrusciki, pin wheels,hamentashchen, checkerboards, almondcrescents,tassies, mandelbrot,vanillekipferl and bourbon balls. Her cookies were meticulously shaped and uniform. They were bite sized and absolutely perfect.

My grandma turned ninety five this past November. She has lost her appetite for food and her health is declining rapidly. I take my son to see his great grandmother as often as possible. What I have come to understand is that time is the greatest gift you can give to a person. When my grandma passes away, which will be a sad day for me, I will still have the recipes she has gifted me and a son that loves to help me in the kitchen.

Grandma Bush & Matthew 1/12/2018 Photo by Rochelle Tomic

Frijoles puercos (pork beans)

Today I will present to you a different way of preparing a simple but delicious traditional Mexican recipe for beans. This traditional Mexican side dish is one of my favorite dishes. I love food, especially my Mexican food. Frijoles puercos is simply translated to pork beans. This recipe is just one of the many ways to cook beans. I am not a great cook as a matter of fact I am not a cook at all, but I try my best. The kitchen is not really my friend, so I must be very careful whenever I enter that zone. After a long day at work, I can only cook quick and simple meals on a daily basis.

Frijoles puercos is a traditional side dish from Nayarit, Mexico, where my mother was born. My mother was raised in a small poor village where frijoles puercos were served as a side dish only as part of a great feast celebration such as weddings, quinceañeras (a young lady’s XV year celebration), first communions, etc. As she explained to me, pork chorizo was an ingredient that was not so affordable for her family of 11. My mother explained to me that her family was so poor that they would only be able to eat beans cooked in water and salt. Now, we prepare frijoles puercos almost on a daily basis they became part of a daily meal. This dish has a symbolic meaning to me because 26 years ago my mother thought that frijoles puercos was a side dish that deserved to be prepared as part of a big celebration. In my mother’s eyes, her only daughter’s wedding feast deserved to have frijoles puercos. From that day forward, frijoles puercos became part of a possible daily meal in my home. This is how this food connects with me now.

The way I prepare these frijoles puercos is a quick and simple way.  Frijoles puercos are not difficult to make and do not include many ingredients. My simple recipe includes the following ingredients: cooked beans (I like to use pinto beans for this side dish), pork chorizo, sliced pickled jalapeño peppers, and queso fresco (part skim milk cheese). The ingredients do not have to be of a specific brand.  

I like to make frijoles puercos because it is one of the few ways I like to eat beans. The other way I like to eat them is when they have been cooked in plain water with salt. They are nice and hot directly from the pot (frijoles de la olla). I cook the pinto beans in water with salt with no other ingredients. I mash the beans in a sauté pan once they’re cooked, I set them aside. On another pan, I cook the pork chorizo until it begins to darken, then set it aside as well. The sliced pickled jalapeño peppers must be drained. I grate the cheese so that it can be easy to drizzle over the finished dish. Once the chorizo is browned, I transfer the beans over to the pan, add the jalapeño peppers, and mix everything over low heat. Once the ingredients are mixed, I drizzle the grated cheese over them. All there is left is to enjoy.

Gil Hurtado’s Blog Entry:

Lily’s Potato Salad

First of all, I love my wife’s cooking. She makes every effort to provide a meal that is tasty, healthy, and economical. It was difficult making a selection. I sat at the table and began making a list. It started getting a little too long. Sure enough, I ended up choosing the first thing on the list. Lily’s Potato Salad.

Before I go on, I need to share a little about me and Lily. She was born and raised in Mexico. While I was born here in the U.S. Before my mom passed away, she had been very good friends with Lily’s mom. Don’t ask me why but, they would throw us in the same crib. So yes, I’ve been sleeping with my wife since we were about two years of age. We kind of just got used to each other but were unaware of each other’s feelings. I asked her to marry me when we were twenty. We never even dated. She said yes just as her boyfriend arrived. He was bringing her a box of chocolates. I suggested that she take the chocolates first, then break the news to him. I guess she was classier than I was because she didn’t take the chocolates.
We got married on March 30th, 1981. That’s the day Ronald Reagan was shot. It was a great day marred by that tragic event. In any case, it was Reaganomics that caused some of our financial problems. Hiring freezes kept me unemployed. Times were tough.

We got by on some savings that I had. But, we needed to stretch this money somehow. Lily found a way to make meals that we could eat as a snack or as part of a meal. Potato salad was one of those meals/snacks. She would read a variety of recipes and pick and choose how these ingredients could be personalized. The measurements vary every time she makes it. She is constantly tasting it and adds a pinch of this and a pinch of that. The result is fantastic. Family and friends ask her to bring this when we do potlucks.

Here are the ingredients with more or less the measurements that she would recommend:
(Serves 5-6)

• 4 Large Potatoes. (High in Potassium, which fights loss of muscle mass, fights off kidney-stones, lowers risk of stroke, and blood-pressure. High in Vitamin C, which is great for fighting cancer and great for the immune system).
• 3 Celery stalks. (Lowers cholesterol, high in potassium, great for weight control)
• 3 Scallions. (It’s the lightest of the onions in regards to taste. Not too strong.)
• ½ Cup of pitted black olives. (Low in calories.)
• 2 Hardboiled eggs. (Good source of Protein. Great for muscle mass.)
• Mayonnaise. The amount is based on your taste. Some people like a lot.
• Salt, Pepper, and Garlic Salt based on your taste.

This meal is symbolic of our struggle early on without sacrificing taste or nutrition. Ethically, perfect for vegetarian. My seven-year-old granddaughter says it best, “Gemma, you cook better than Taco Bell”.

Red Velvet Cake – my favorite! A classic red velvet flavor cake frosted with cream cheese frosting that’s whipped perfectly, you can’t pass up a piece of this deliciousness!

red velvet cupcakes with mini chocolate chips!

What’s so special about a red Velvet Cake? Some may say it’s just a chocolate or white cake tinted red, but that is not the case. What makes a Red Velvet cake special are the textures, flavors, and frosting used to complete this cake.

Growing up, every time I would go visit my grandparents at their house they would always have a pie, pastries, or ice cream in the house for all of their grandchildren to eat! They would serve us whatever we wanted, and we’d sit on the edge of their bed and destroy those sweets together. As time went on I developed a love for sweets or as some like to call it a “sweet tooth”. As a young girl going to grandma and grandpas house meant you got to eat whatever you wanted. We would celebrate birthdays or have family dinners at their house ending with something sweet baked by my auntie.

My auntie would bake something special for every occasion even if it was as small as getting a certificate at school or getting your driver’s license. She was the baker in our family. I remember siting on the counter tops watching her mix in the ingredients for whatever recipe she was making. The best part about sitting on those counter tops was waiting until the end so I could lick the spatulas! My sisters and I would wait patiently to get our hands on those spatulas.

Although, I was just sitting on the counter top waiting for the spatulas I was watching my aunties every move. As she would begin her process for a recipe I would be so amazed at every little thing she would do and how the end result looked and tasted. My passion for baking began to grow. The first cake I ever baked was a pineapple upside down. I was so excited I made everything from scratch with the help of my auntie every step of the way. Taking that cake out of the oven I was so confident that it was going to taste just like my aunties being that she helped me …but it didn’t!

I was now determined more than ever to bake a cake that was the tastiest cake I’ve ever made! My auntie told me “when you bake it takes practice and patience, some cakes you’ll throw away while other will be a recipe keep forever”. Trial and error is what I like to call it.

Red Velvet Cake was a cake I had always heard of but had never tried myself. I baked my first red velvet cake and I remember being extra careful on every step that went into making this cake from sifting the flour and sugar to softening and whipping the cream cheese. This cake had come out SO good I was proud of myself. I sliced pieces of my cake for my family to tastes and I received nothing but good feedback. (Unlike my pineapple upside down cake) After mastering my Red Velvet cake recipe, this became my specialty cake adding mini chocolate chips on top!

There may be nothing healthy (unless, the dairy in the frosting counts as a nutritional source) about these red velvet cupcakes but to me they are very healthy because of the memories I have while baking, reminding of my childhood at grandma and grandpas house learning how to bake! I hope you all enjoy these red velvet cupcakes as much as I do!