Tortillas los tres tiempos
In Guatemala we are lucky to still have vendors who provides us with fresh goods every day. Perhaps, it is the fact …
Guatemalan Cuisine: Chojin
Chojín is a word that I learned recently. Most of my life I just thought that radish salad was ensalada de rábano. …
Making Guatemalan Tortillas
Blame this photo on Eric, who just yesterday invoked the tortilla-making ladies. It is interesting how the aroma of freshly-made tortillas can …
Myths and Facts about the Guatemalan Sompopo Ant
Even though the Guatemalan winged sompopo ant appears every year in May, on average most Guatemalans know very little about them (myself …
Guatemalan Cuisine: La Enchilada
If tostadas had a kingdom, La Enchilada would be the queen of the tostadas. Good, you say, I’m glad to know, but …
Guatemalan Tortilla Basket
Right now, the going price for tortillas is 6 tortillas per one quetzal (Q1 = US$0.13). This fact brings me to another interesting aspect about tortilla selling in Guatemala: tortillas are sold by units and not by weight, which means some tortillas could be tiny or really thin or worse yet use maseca flour in the mix. 🙁
How to make the perfect Guatemalan Tortilla
Well, for starters you need ‘real’ nixtamalized maize dough (nothing of the maseca flour that Manolo uses), a ‘real’ comal (baked clay griddle) and you need to use ‘real’ leña (wood logs, quite possibly pine). After that, you need a good pair of hand to tortear (hit into shape) a real looking tortilla. You don’t need no sticking mold to shape your tortillas ma’am. 😉
Traditional Guatemalan Christmas Food: Dobladas
Dobladas (turned over) is our last meal at the Virgen of Guadalupe Celebrations. Dobladas are made from nixtamalized masa (maize dough) like tortillas, but other ingredients are added before the masa dish is folded over itself and cooked. The ingredients that are added to the doblada are normally ground pork rinds, cheese, mashed potatoes, whole beans, et-cetera, but could be anything really. For instance I would like to find dobladas with cheese and loroco flowers; that would be very tasteful. Dobladas are normally fried or cooked over a comal (griddle made from cooked clay); just like tortillas. Dobladas are very similar to pupusas, except they are turned over. Check out the giant pupusas or Mayan pizza photos. Once dobladas ared cooked they are top with repollo salad (cabbage salad or coleslaw), tomato sauce and/or chile sauce (hot and spicy sauce).
Load of Wood Fuel
Recently while reading the National Geographic en español, I learnt that not all instances of the use of wood as fuel are bad. According the article about barbecuing wood and charcoal do indeed pollute the atmosphere with smoke and ashes, but it is a recycled-type of energy when compared to other energy sources like gas or electricity.
An Old Guatemalan Cowboy
I captured this image on a show about horses in San Miguel Escobar, a little village just outside La Antigua Guatemala. In …
Making Tortillas in Guatemala
Yesterday I mentioned that the traditional baked-clay comales are disappearing in Guatemala in favor of the metal comal; heated through gas. All …