Mexican Mixup
Joy Mendleson
I was wondering if anyone could tell me what distinguishes burritos,
chimichangas, enchiladas, fajitas, and quesadillas. I would really love
to know!
Thanks,
Joy
--
Leigh in raLeigh
As far as I can tell, a burrito is a really large flour tortilla filled
and rolled with meat, beans, veggies and covered with some sort of sauce
(varies by region).
A chimichanga is a fried burrito, with or without sauce.
Enchiladas are usually made from corn tortillas and are filled and
rolled with cheese and/or meat/chicken/shrimp/etc and are covered and
then baked with a sauce (again, sauce varies by region). In some area
(New Mexico, perhaps others?), the tortillas and fillings are layered
and then served with a fried egg on top.
Fajitas are soft tacos using flour tortillas that are filled with skirt
steak meat which has been marinated to tenderize and then served with an
assortment of extras (cheese, onions, green peppers, sour cream,
salsa).
Quesadillas are flour tortillas that are filled with cheese and/or meat
and veggies and then heated in a skillet to brown the outside while
warming the filling.
Leigh in raLeigh
(Texas native)
dakota
Victor M. Martinez
>Bravo! You have the patience of a saint and know your mexican food.
Just to note that a few of the items described are more of southwestern
influence. However, I thought the person asking for those descriptions
was being a troll.... I dont' know, when I get questions like that
I rarely pay attention to them.
Cheers.
--
Victor M. Martinez, Jr. | The University of Texas at Austin
mar...@che.utexas.edu | Department of Chemical Engineering
http://www.che.utexas.edu/~martiv | Austin, TX 78712
If we knew what we were doing it would not be called research, would it?
Wayne Lundberg
sandwich. Stuff the quesadilla with flor de calabaza (squash flowers),
cheese, black beans, --- anything you like. Fold, and fry in very little
oil, just enough to make the tortilla rubbery and flexible, just starting
to turn hard. Remove, eat.
Victor M. Martinez
>Quesadillas are made with corn tortillas - made much like a grilled cheese
Not necessarily. In fact, most mexicans (away from the north) will only
use flour tortillas to make quesadillas. Unless I have fresh masa to make
the quesadillas (put the cheese in it before cooking), I prefer flour
tortillas.
konama...@my-dejanews.com
mar...@bullwinkle.che.utexas.edu (Victor M. Martinez) wrote:
> Wayne Lundberg <Wayn...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> >Quesadillas are made with corn tortillas - made much like a grilled cheese
>
> Not necessarily. In fact, most mexicans (away from the north) will only
> use flour tortillas to make quesadillas. Unless I have fresh masa to make
> the quesadillas (put the cheese in it before cooking), I prefer flour
> tortillas.
We always use flour tortillas to make quesadillas in NM, and the restaurants
that we've ordered them have used flour tortillas as well. (Cal, NM, Ariz)
Kona Mac Farmer
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Wayne Lundberg
From Torreon and Durango south all the way to the Guatemala border corn
tortillas rule the roost. I often heard my friends say that a real Mexican
wouldn't be caught dead eating a flour tortilla. I didn't say it - my
friends say it.
Quesadillas are corn tortillas filled with something good, folded and
lightly fried until the inside cheese or whatever melts then the quesadilla
is either drained of its oil or patted to remove the excess oil and served
either with a sauce or by itself.
This is a reflection of my experience of living in Mexico, studying ancient
ruins, teaching in Mexico and traveling in Mexico since 1942 - That's
roughly 56 years from which one surely must learn something.
konama...@my-dejanews.com
"Wayne Lundberg" <Wayn...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> Flour tortillas are virtually unknown south of Chihuahua and Monterrey....
> From Torreon and Durango south all the way to the Guatemala border corn
> tortillas rule the roost. I often heard my friends say that a real Mexican
> wouldn't be caught dead eating a flour tortilla.
I'm sure your experience in those places are accurate. My point was that
North of the border, flour quesadillas have been my experience. BTW, in its
450+ year history, New Mexico has been either part of Mexico or Spain for
about 80% of the time (except of a short bout of Texasitis, which we of
breeding don't discuss...)
:-}
Heather Allen
it just depends on where you are. They both taste wonderful so I say
"lets eat".
Heather A.
--
Heather Allen
sha...@macwhiz.com
Victor M. Martinez
>Flour tortillas are virtually unknown south of Chihuahua and Monterrey....
Perhaps back when you lived in Mexico, but as I've been trying to tell
you... Mexico has changed a lot in the past 10 years. Bimbo started making
flour tortillas (under the Tia Rosa brand, called them "tortillinas") back
in the 80's. That's my first memory of a flour tortilla (at the time I was
living in Irapuato, Gto.)
Now flour tortillas are very common, but usually reserved for two things:
quesadillas and "gringas" (basically a quesadilla with al pastor meat).
>Quesadillas are corn tortillas filled with something good, folded and
That's the Mexico city definition, where they have quesadillas without
cheese. Elsewhere, if you order a quesadilla they will bring you a
grilled/fried cheese taco, usually made with flour tortillas.
>This is a reflection of my experience of living in Mexico, studying ancient
>ruins, teaching in Mexico and traveling in Mexico since 1942 - That's
>roughly 56 years from which one surely must learn something.
When was the last time you lived in Mexico? We are not the same country
we were 10 years ago, I've lived through the change...
Wayne Lundberg
Guadalajara, Mexico D.F., Puebla, Veracruz, Cancun, Zacatecas,
Aguascalientes, Torreon and that's just the start of the list. I was
teaching management principles to all the managers and directors of the
sixth largest company in Mexico who have 197 retail outlets dealing with
food and general merchandise. Each manager received 110 hours of training
over a period of one year. Part of my training was in researching the local
consumer tastes, needs and wishes then converting them into solutions.
As has been said again and again in the newsgroup - Mexican food consists
of part of the US and most of Mexico so who is to say what is legitimate or
not.
I sense Victor's frustration in that possibly, like me, we would very much
like to share central Mexican cuisine with those of you who grew up and are
used to northern Mexico foods. So we keep trying to share deep south stuff
but invariably we get told to be more eclectic in our opinions. OK, so be
it.
Heather Allen
> I sense Victor's frustration in that possibly, like me, we would very much
> like to share central Mexican cuisine with those of you who grew up and are
> used to northern Mexico foods. So we keep trying to share deep south stuff
> but invariably we get told to be more eclectic in our opinions. OK, so be
> it.
I would love to hear about the central Mexican cuisine.. however, I don't
want to exclude southwestern or any other kind of Mexican food because
it's "not *truly* Mexican"
sherry ostrom
konama...@my-dejanews.com
sha...@macwhiz.com (Heather Allen) wrote:
>
> I would love to hear about the central Mexican cuisine.. however, I don't
> want to exclude southwestern or any other kind of Mexican food because
> it's "not *truly* Mexican"
>
> Heather A.
>
Amen!
Wayne Lundberg
Texan or Californian when two or more 'chefs' come together. There will be
arguments and they may become heated. What I'm seeing in this newsgroup are
a lot of people who love to poke without really contributing anything. I
guess they loved to pull the wings off butterflies when they were kids -
maybe still do.
In any case I enjoy learning and only hope that those of us who remain in
the group will give and take with a little more grace and less name-calling
or lectures on newsgroup protocol as they see it.
Mexchican food evolved from Toltec which evolved from Mixteco, Zapoteco,
Maya, Totonaca, and a dozen other civilizations which evolved from Olmec
and Tlatilco which evolved from some inspired person or persons who were
smart enough to spot a corn cob larger than the one they saw the last time
they were at that particular camp site and who invented hybridization. But
that was just the beginning. Sometime later some inspired genius - and
don't say there is not an infinite intelligence at work here - they
discovered that corn could be stored and would feed the tribe during scarce
times by soaking the dried corn in lime treated water and mashed into a
dough then cooked.
It just so happens that the cradle of the American continent civilizations
appeared almost simultaneously in the high valley in which Mexico city now
exists, and in the jungles of Veracruz in La Venta, Tres Zapotes and
elsewhere. So 'real' Mexican food has it's origins in central Mexico.
Could it be possible to establish this as a simple fact of truth and then
perhaps explore where and how the zillion variations came into being?
There is a huge amount of talent on this newsgrup - we see wonderful
flashes of intelligence and insight between the cyberpunchers and I sure
would like to see more talent and fewer punches.
Cheers from Tijuana and Chula Vista!
Dave Dodson
Wayne Lundberg wrote in message <01bdd7a5$34229820$7e1d480c@wayne>...
//snipped//
>In any case I enjoy learning and only hope that those of us who remain in
>the group will give and take with a little more grace and less name-calling
>or lectures on newsgroup protocol as they see it.
posts on this ng...What I see is a bit ethnocentrism and ethnic pride coming
to the fore. This is not a bad thing but seems some take it a little too
much personally...Which I hope was not the intent...
>Mexchican food evolved from Toltec which evolved from Mixteco, Zapoteco,
>Maya, Totonaca, and a dozen other civilizations which evolved from Olmec
>and Tlatilco which evolved from some inspired person or persons who were
>smart enough to spot a corn cob larger than the one they saw the last time
>they were at that particular camp site and who invented hybridization. But
>that was just the beginning. Sometime later some inspired genius - and
>don't say there is not an infinite intelligence at work here - they
>discovered that corn could be stored and would feed the tribe during scarce
>times by soaking the dried corn in lime treated water and mashed into a
>dough then cooked.
Just a little trivia here...Does anyone know the origin of the lime
treatment for corn (maize actually)? This from an
archaeologist/anthropologist - in any maize based culture, that is one which
uses corn (maize) as a primary food resource, one finds the maize used in
conjunction with squash and beans and/or treated with limewater/lye (from
wood ashes)...The reason is that the enzyme lysine is needed by the body
human to extract the nourishment from the maize kernels...Normal body levels
of lysine is insufficient for this process and must be supplemented. Squash
and beans contain high levels of lysine, naturally...Lime water/lye water
treatment starts to breakdown the covering of the maize kernel so that the
nutrients can be extracted by the body more easily...
Just a bit of totally useless info....
DaveD
Heather Allen
(Sophelyn) wrote:
> On 3 Sep 1998 15:59:45 GMT, "Wayne Lundberg"
> <Wayn...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
> >For the past three years I traveled from Tijuana, Ensenada, Monterrey,
> >Guadalajara, Mexico D.F., Puebla, Veracruz, Cancun, Zacatecas,
> >Aguascalientes, Torreon and that's just the start of the list. I was
> >teaching management principles to all the managers and directors of the
> >sixth largest company in Mexico who have 197 retail outlets dealing with
> >food and general merchandise. Each manager received 110 hours of training
> >over a period of one year. Part of my training was in researching the local
> >consumer tastes, needs and wishes then converting them into solutions.
> ObMexicanCooking: Rosa's Salsa Verde from Austin, Texas, is a delight
> to the (my) mouth and I believe usually makes a good showing in the
> annual salsa competition there, or used to. Does anyone have a recipe
> which duplicates this exact product? Not a yummy green sauce recipe,
> but *that* recipe?
>
I couldn't really tell you the recipe because I have no access to this
brand here. However, if you want to send me a jar I'd be glad to taste it
and get you a recipe that way (it's a gift I have, got it from my
grandmother). It may not be their recipe, but it will taste identical. :)
Wayne Lundberg
ancient Americans invented or discovered the process we call nixtamal -
that of lime water soaking. Your explanation helps a lot. I knew ash
contained some elements but did not know about the squash -- which in fact
is one of the first crops the early civilizations used as a foundation for
their agriculture -- others being chile, maize and hundreds of herbs along
with fruits and nuts from all over.
This is such an important discovery. Without it there would not have been
the great civilizations whose ruins continue to fascinate us today.
janelaw
Are you serious? Can I send you one too?
Karen
Karen
Dave Dodson wrote:
>
> (interesting stuff snipped only for space)