I am afraid of avocados turning into brown mush. I love guacamole but don’t dare to make it for everyday use because, unless you eat it all, it soon turns into bad, unappetizing brownish chunks.

Avocadoes rapidly brown after they are cut open because their cells become exposed to air. The oxygen in air reacts with the enzyme polyphenol oxidase (PPO) and forms brown pigmentation called melanoidin. The avocado animation shows browning of an avocado from right after it is cut open to 300 minutes (5 hours) later.

This polyphenol oxidase reaction often causes other produce, such as apples and potatoes, to brown. Often, polyphenol oxidase browning is desirable. Who doesn’t love the deep brown color of raisins, tea or coffee – all due to polyphenol oxidase browning.

But, we do hate unappetizing brownish-green guacamole. People suggest many ways to prevent or slow down guacamole browning. One of my friend’s family members advocates putting avocado pits into the guacamole, while others suggest adding lime or lemon juice. Some folks swear by adding oils to prevent browning while others swear by wrapping it tightly (preventing oxygen). One of the most straight forward ways of reducing enzymatic browning is to apply heat (aka cooking) to denature polyphenol oxidase. However, cooking may lead to unfavorable texture and taste changes.

Being curious, I decided to perform a mini experiment on avocado/guacamole browning.

Normal Avacado
The first guacamole sample was the control with no additional ingredients –just avocados.

Pit Inside the Guacamole

According to my many Mexican American friends, putting the avocado pit inside guacamole is an age old tradition that is believed to reduce the browning of avocados. In our experiments, putting the pit in mashed avocados didn’t have any effect on its browning. On a side note, those small slippery avocado pits are big choking hazards.

Adding Lemon or Lime Juice
Adding ascorbic acid and citric acid can decrease the rate of enzymatic browning of avocados by lowering the pH of the tissue. Anywhere from 12 mg/oz to 1400 mg/oz  of citric acid is found in lemon and lime juices.  The phenolase responsible for browning are most active in the neutral pH range of 6 to 7 while there is no enzymatic activity, i.e., no browning, below pH of 3. This experiment showed that adding the lime juice was the most successful at reducing the browning of the guacamole.

Adding Oil
Some recipes for guacamole include olive oil. I used to have two reasons for not adding olive oil in guacamole. The first reason is that avocado already has 15 % oil, whereas other fruits such as apple only have 0.2 % fat. The second reason is that the unique flavors of the olive oils don’t go well with the avocadoes in guacamole.  Now I have a third reason, adding oil slightly increased the rate of enzymatic browning of guacamole.

Adding Salt
One of the most essential seasonings for guacamole is salt. You can skip pepper, cilantro, or even lime, but not salt. Adding salt to guacamole seemed to drastically expedite enzymatic browning of avocados. Salted guacamole browned quickly, after only a few minutes of exposure to air. The image of unsalted and salted avocados after 15 minutes clearly shows that salt expedites the browning process in avocados.

Covering Avocados with Plastic Wrap
Tightly sealing guacamole by leaving no air between the plastic wrap and guacamole didn’t reduce the browning of guacamole. It is slightly better than open guacamole, but definitely had more enzymatic browning than the acidified (lime) guacamole.

Refrigerated Avocados
Avocados refrigerated at 5 °C or 40°F did far better than avocados stored outside. The refrigerated guacamole still looked green while the surface of the guacamole stored outside turned completely dark brown (as shown on the inset).

During my first experiment, I forgot to put the guacamole designated for the refrigerator inside of it. I conducted the experiment again with a different batch of avocados. This resulted in a different time scale for browning of the avocado, but the ultimate before and after result remains the same.

Each Avocado is Unique
These mini experiments were conducted on three batches of generic avocados bought from local stores. The browning results for each batch of guacamole differ due to the cultivar (variety) of the avocado, ripeness (other aspects) of the avocado, and its storage conditions (humidity, temperature etc.). For example, in most of the experiments noticeable browning of mashed avocados started within 3 hours, while in other experiments browning  barely started around 6 hours.

Fresh Homemade Guacamole
Fresh guacamole is very easy to make. To make homemade guacamole cut and mash the avocados and add seasonings, such as lime juice, salt, pepper, garlic, cilantro, hot sauce, tomatoes, and onions.

The store bought guacamole is preserved by high pressure vacuum packaging, and by adding a lot of preservatives to add to shelf life. Many filler ingredients, such as oils and starch are added to reduce cost. In 2006, a Californian sued Kraft food because their guacamole had less than 2 percent avocados and instead was filled with food starch, oils, and food coloring. An example of a refrigerated guacamole on sale in a grocery store shows that this commercial guacamole has no less than 36 ingredients, avocado being the 18th item on the list.

How to reduce browning of guacamole?
Without state of the art high pressure vacuum sealing or using preservatives, it’s still difficult to absolutely get rid of enzymatic browning of guacamole. However, I suggest the following steps to reduce the rate of browning in guacamole;

1. Cut and mash avocados just before making guacamole. Make sure to prep other ingredients beforehand.
2. Add lime/lemon juice (according to taste) right after mashing avocados. Cover it up with plastic wrap.
3. Refrigerate your guacamole.
4. Delay adding salt until the last moments before serving the guacamole.

Mommy showed me how to make taquitos when I was 12, however I never actually fried them until I was 16 year old. It takes time to learn to cook with oil and Mommy didn’t want the house to burn down. These are the perfect finger foods for dinner, parties and late night snacks. I just made them for my best friend’s baby shower and they were a huge hit.  My husband was so upset that there were none left for him. So, I made more the following day.

Like most things, taquitos are best eaten as soon as they come out of the frying pan. I recommend paring them with Chonti’s Famous Crack Salsa, sour cream, guacamole, beans and basically anything you can scope.

Taquitos Ingredients:
boneless chicken breast
corn tortillas

Taquitos seasoning;
salt
pepper
garlic powder
Adobo Seasoning – Goya Product

Supplies;
tooth picks
vegetable oil

First you will have to boil the chicken for 1 hour. Place the chicken in large pot with water and add the seasonings listed. Once it’s done take the chicken out and let it cool. When the chicken is cool shred it.

Second, after the vegetable oil has been heated in frying pan. Take corn tortilla and place shredded chicken down the middle. Roll it up and put a toothpick through it. If the corn tortilla doesn’t want to roll put it in the microwave for 10 seconds to loosen it, than place the chicken in it and roll.

The first couple you do will burn, it happens. Turn the temperature down until you get the right degree. You will cook the taquito on both sides for couple of minutes. You want it to be a nice golden brown. Place everything on a plate lined with paper napkins to drain the oil.

You are done. Let me know how it cooks. Be sure to have some windows open just in case.

Mother and Child based on Photo by Catnipstudio

I usually don’t make recipes that I see on the TV. After watching Alton Brown making fish taco (recipe here) in Good Eats, I jumped right in to construct similar fish tacos made from pan grilled fish doused in cilantro. I love cilantro and usually don’t like authentic fried fish in fish tacos. Alton used a classic flavors by adding garlic and lime to cilantro marinade, while adding a optional shot of tequila to intensify the flavors.

The fish

Tilapia, a neutral fish with a bland flavors is perfect for cilantrofic fish taco. Also, it was the only fish left in my freezer.For one pound of tilapia fillets, I added marinade made from following ingredients.
1 bunch cilantro leaf (yes I add stems too!)
couple of cloves of garlic
zest and juice of 1 lime
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander
½ teaspoon ground dried cayenne pepper
1 shot of tequila
salt to taste

Blend all the ingredients to paste. Marinade tilapia in it for few minutes to hours. Feel free to change the amount ingredients slightly based on what you want from that meal.

Heat a pan (cast iron pan here). Add some oil and cook fish for just a couple of minutes on each side. The fish surface will change to golden brown color with slight charring. You will know fish is done when you see translucent fish just changes to an opaque color and gets flaky texture. One of the important things to remember is fish cooks very fast and overcooked fish is chewy and not at all appetizing.

The grilled fish was flavorful enough to eat by itself. I may use it sometime as entrée. All I need to make sure is that I don’t invite the cilantro haters for dinner. The hate or love of cilantro is linked to our genes. In 1930s, scientists in DuPont lab discovered that some of the scientists found infused dust of chemical, phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) bitter tasting while others didn’t notice the bitterness. Now phenylthiocarbamide (PTC) is used as a gold standard in testing genetic variation in taste (more here). Scientists have identified a potential chemical for the pleasant cilantro aroma, 2-dodecenal but yet have to show the chemical behind the soapy smell. (more here)

Flour tortillas
I opted to make my own tortillas. In this version of soft flour corn tortillas, instead of adding lard, I added oil because my guests didn’t eat pork. I flavored tortilla dough by adding pinch of salt, ground coriander seeds and ground dried cayenne pepper. Even though coriander seeds come from cilantro plant, it has entirely different flavor. Well, I donno if I can still technically claim that my dish is more cilantorfic by adding coriander.

Contrary to what I expected, I found making tortillas was the most difficult task in this entrée. I added flour and water in 2 to 1 ratio with 2 tablespoon fat per cup of flour. I also realized that it’s difficult to roll out perfectly circular tortillas, rolled tortillas stick to surface even being dusted with flour, and it’s cooked on a high heat within 30 second, each side. Sorry Alton, your recommendation of 4 minutes per side resulted in crispy tortilla/pita chips for my hummus. It’s amazing how seemingly simple things like making a perfect tortilla can be most challenging – well – a good topic for a separate future post.

The crema

I made fresh Mexican fresh cream, known as crema, or white sauce for fish taco by making yogurt out of cream in a yogurt maker (see my saffron yogurt post). I seasoned it by adding a pinch (or few) of cumin/coriander, cayenne pepper and salt. If you don’t have a yogurt maker, add a teaspoon of yogurt in a cup of cream, mix and store in warm place for 1 hour. If you really don’t feel like making cream yogurt, get a cup of Greek yogurt and add the seasonings. Also, chipotle chili in adobo sauce like the ones I used for making chipotle chile verde would go well with the sauce. Sadly, I didn’t have it when I was making fish tacos.

The guacamole

I love guacamole in my tacos. I used avocadoes, lime, onion, and tomatoes. Instead of the regular salt, I used Himalayan pink salt (also known as black salt) because of its tangy pungent flavor. Honestly, I am not sure if the pink salt added any flavors, but it didn’t ruin the guacamole an we all guest loved its taste.

Guacamole is easy to make and best when made fresh. If you are expecting guests, you could do time consuming steps, such as chopping onions, tomatoes cilantro and garlic etc, ahead of time. Wait and add (and mash) avocados, lime juice and salt just before eating.

The crunchy cabbage

I find crunch from vegetables like cabbage an integral part of fish taco experience. A silky texture of soft tortilla, flaky fish texture, and creaminess of sauce/guacamole is balanced with a perfect crunch. I immersed shredded cabbage in lukewarm water, and added a pinch of salt, few pinches of lime zest and freckles of black pepper. After immersing in water for a few minutes, throw out the water. I found adding these simple steps and ingredients made it more flavorful and brought out its bright color.

The Fish Taco assembly

Get flour tortillas (1), add white sauce (2), scoop of guacamole (3), grilled fish (4), shredded cabbage (5), more white sauce (6), fold and eat (7).

The salsa received its name from a college friend in Miami, Candace. She couldn’t stop eating it and said it’s addicting like crack — you just can’t stop. She also asked me if I put crack in it.

My Mommy taught me to make salsa when I was 10 years old. I came in 2nd place at a salsa making contest when my father hosted an Air Force Cinco De Mayo party on Guam. Obviously, I should have won the 1st place but I think the judges didn’t want to show favoritism. This recipe is a favorite for parties, family functions and nights I just don’t feel like turning on the stove. My husband and best friend can eat it by the spoonful.

The secret ingredient is cactus or nopales. If you don’t have this in your salsa it’s not a real Mexican salsa!!! You can buy cut-up nopales in a glass jar in the Hispanic Food aisle of any major supermarket. Remember, when making the salsa it can come out different every time. Seasoning is a huge factor as well as how fresh your ingredients are. The salsa is best served at room temperature on the day it’s made.

Salsa ingredients;
tomato
yellow onion
cactus (nopales)
cilantro
jalapenos

Seasoning;
salt
pepper
garlic power
Adobo seasoning (Goya product)
lemon juice

You will want to cut equal parts of the tomato, onion and cactus. They are no correct measurements, you will have to eye ball everything. Cut the tomato first. When you place it in the bowl add the lemon juice. Next add the onion and cactus. Cut a hand full of cilantro. As for the jalapenos, cut as many as you can handle.

Season according to your taste. Begin small and add seasoning as you taste it. There is no exact science, it can come out different every time.

Here is a tip, you want to make guacamole? Slice 2 avocados in half and remove the pit. Don’t throw the pit away — put it on the side for later. Remove the contents of the avocado shelf and place it in a bowl. Once in the bowl mash it, a fork can work but a bean masher is the best tool for this. Simply add a copy of spoonfuls of Chonti’s Famous Crack Salsa stir and you are done. You place the pit you saved right into the guacamole, this is supposed to keep it fresh for hours.

Enjoy!!!!

Two days ago, I finally unwrapped a slow cooker that I had received as gift more than four years ago. Slow cooking chili verde seemed like ideal meal to serve my visiting family – something new yet familiar to their palate.

Chili verde literally translates into green chilies and used to describe Mexican (or rather Mexican American) slow cooked pork stew containing green chilies and tomatillos. Tomatillos look like green tomatoes but have meatier white filling inside them and are usually sold within dry papery husk. I find tomatillos have slightly tang sweet aromatic flavor. You should try it to get more sense of its flavor. For this recipe, I wanted to get fresh tomatillos, but couldn’t find more than handful of them after raiding three grocery stores around DC. So I decided to also use canned verde salsa made with tomatillos. However, since most people were not used to tangy flavor of tomatillos and hotness of green chilies, this is how I improvised my chili verde.

First thing I did was to substituted green chili with store bought canned Goya chipotles en adobo.  Chipotle en adobo is smoked jalapeno chilies made in tomato sauce, which is spiced with paprika, onions, and other spices. I used chipotle instead of other green chilies because it has distinctive   smoky flavor, goes well with slow-cooked meat, mildly hot and most importantly because I love its flavor. So let it be chipotle chili verde!

Other changes were adding grilled red onions, grilled bell peppers and raw chopped tomatoes .  I wanted to get a fresh vegetables into my chili verde. To grill, I put my vegetables/aromatics in bread loaf pan and put inside oven set to broiler for a few minutes until I saw some vegetables were charred.

I started with big chunk of boneless pork shoulder also known as pork butt for my chili verde.  Fat should be on top so that once it starts cooking, it will start to drizzle down and moisten the rest of meat.

I started by rubbing chipotles en adobo, salt, cumin and garlic to the pork.

I mixed grilled (broiled) vegetables, verde salsa, and lime juice with its lime zest.

Cooked the mixture in high setting in slow cooker for six to eight hours. I placed the slow cooker below the stove fan in order to use the kitchen exhaust fan.

After eight hours, I removed my cook chili verde. As you can notice that I added pieces of zucchini mid way through my cooking.

The chili verde sauce was spicy hot, mild tangy with smoky flavors. It was very satisfying!

The slow cooked meat itself was soft and fell readily apart. Surprisingly it was not that spicy. It was great because it allowed me to share my chili verde with a five year old member of our family and other adults who couldn’t stomach the hotness.

The best way to eat was definitely over basmati rice – just like a spicy chipotle chili verde rice bowl.

My impression of California Tortilla was the place with hundreds of different types of hot sauces. Since I couldn’t custom make (ok instruct!) my burrito, I always preferred McDonald’s former chain Chipotle instead of California Tortilla.

Few months ago, I was pleasantly surprised by fiesta burrito in California Tortilla in Clarendon. I was particularly impressed with the quality of guacamole. So, when I was forwarded a California Tortilla event invitation by DCFUD, I accepted it. The event was for rolling out their promotion on fresh ingredients and fresh menu campaign.

First thing that I learned about California Tortilla is that it’s a local DC metro based (Rockville Maryland) local chain of 38. For sure California Tortilla sounds lot better than Maryland Tortilla. In the event, they provided a complimentary meal and swags to every participant from media, yelp and even customer. I got their new California Screamin’ burrito with queso. I liked it, but since it was media event, I doubt there would’ve been any problem with the food.

Two California Tortilla representatives shared simple joy of making fresh salsa and guacamole. Recipes are as simple as adding fresh chopped tomatoes, onion, cilantro and seasoning for salsa. For guacamole, add avocado, chopped onions, tomatoes and seasonings.

Here’s how they make guacamole.

Fresh salsa and guacamole were perfect. However, they were served with slightly less crunchy chips –maybe due to sitting out too long.

Before finish writing this blog, I went to try California burrito again for fair assessment. I am glad to report that food was as decent. For fast food burrito, I still prefer Chipotle. However, when I need prefixed burrito or some hot kicking sauce, California Tortilla is the place and it’s local as well.

The dining experience in Salt Lake City Utah challenged my beliefs on food culture. I stand corrected – now I believe a monochromatic city can have a vibrant diverse ethnic and local dining and drinking experience

First things first, beer. You would think predominately teetotaling Mormon Salt Lake City would have a non existence brewery scene. For being the 126th largest city in the United States, the city has impressive microbrewery selection. I had the pleasure of enjoying various brews, especially from two breweries, Wasatch and Squatters . My favorite brew had to be Wasatch brewery’s Polygamy Porter and Evolution amber ale.

Next we move to America’s favorite food, the burger. Downtown Salt Lake City has many burger joints. My choice was Acme Burger Company, a restaurant completely devoted to burgers. I was pleasantly surprised to find Indian style Tandoori burger along with bison burger. Obviously Tandoori burger is one of least popular, but the fact it’s on the menu speaks volume. My Tandoori chicken burger was perfectly spiced and cooked.  The portion by itself was comparatively small and little on expensive side. However, Acme is highly recommended for any burger lover, either you like Tandoori style or very old fashion bison meat.

Most popular ethnic food in Salt Lake City, Mexican and South American.  I saw more Mexican and South American restaurants, such as Brazilian, in Salt Lake City than American restaurant. All the street food/carts vendors were in essence Mexican taco stand.

On recommendation of a friend, we tried Blue Iguana. The ambience of restaurant was inviting, except for too many sombreros on the wall. The restaurant was famous of its mole sauces. Most Americans think mole poblano as the mole sauce. Mole poblano is type of mole prepared with dried chili peppers, nuts, cacao and other ingredients such as spice, onions, garlic, etc.  However, mole (which means sauce) can refer to any Mexican sauce, with its own nuisance and can be very time consuming to make.

My enchiladas amarillas came with corn tortilla rolled around a filling of roasted pork (carnitas) smothered generously with mole amarillo.  Enchiladas were good but mole amarillo, which means yellow sauce was better. I didn’t get to try more famous Iguana, the Red Iguana – next time maybe.

Another Mexican food stop was locally Utah based burrito chain called Barbacoa. The store was basically carbon copy of any ubiquitous Chipotle, except it has eco-friendly delivery option via its bicycles. By the way barbacoa refers to slow-cooked meat (whole animal) cooked in hole in the ground covered with leaves in Mexico.

Rumbi Island Grill is another Utah based tropical (Hawaiian?) themed casual dining chain. They have island inspired entrée consists mainly rice bowls, sandwiches, and salad – a good value.

Bayleaf Cafe is newage American restaurant serving globally inspired comfort food. The description sounded good but the restaurant had the slowest service for lunch even when it was not busy. Apart from that, the food was mediocre at the best.

Another surprise to me was number of Nepali/Tibetan/Indian restaurants. On a rough count Salt Lake City had at least four Nepali restaurants. I can’t vouch for their Nepaliness of their food. However, after walking through Himalayan Kitchen, it seemed more like a nice generic American-style Indian restaurant. If you want authentic Nepali food, ask a Nepali friend or politely ask waiter what Nepali food you can get.

I have to admit that the Salt Lake City’s food unexpected diversity maybe attributed to Mormon tradition of sending off missionary throughout world or huge population of outdoor traveling group of people. Nevertheless when people travel, their palates mature and change.

More photos on DesiGrub’s Facebook page.

Out of sense of adventure and to quell my curiosity, I picked a can of Goya black beans 10 years ago. Since it had just two ingredients, black beans and salt, I cautiously tasted the frijoles negros right out of the can to determine spices and other aromatics to add. I was taken aback by its rich meaty mushroomy flavors and instantly fell in love with those minimally cooked black beans.

Canned black beans have been part of my staple diet since then. Often known as turtle beans or Cuban beans, these black beans are easy to make, tasty, cheap, and universally liked. You can eat it right out of the can; it’s relatively healthy, and can be served with enthusiasm to a few vegetarians friend I have. One of my favorite vegetarian meals is, rice and black beans served with fresh tomato salsa on side.

Black beans are kidney shaped shiny black colored beans found rarely outside its native United States, Mexico, Cuba and some parts of Central America. Black beans are traditional staple diet in those regions, where it is served as a side dish as well as in burritos, enchiladas, soups, and salads.

During my last trip to a grocery store while I was mindlessly putting cans of Goya black beans in my shopping cart, I noticed bags of dried black beans. How difficult would it be to make these dried black beans? I can custom cook my black beans and add my own culinary signature to it. So I decided to buy a bag of dry black bean and a can of black bean for comparison.

This is how I cooked dried black beans.

Look over the dried black beans to find any foreign substances such as small stones. Wash them.

Soak overnight 1 part black bean to 3 parts filtered water. You will find by next day, black beans will expand at least twice the initial volume and the water will be dark. Usually, 1 cup of dried black beans yields 2.5 cups of cooked black beans.

Throw or keep the excess water?

Beans consist of complex carbohydrates that humans digestive enzyme can’t convert to absorbable sugars, and are passed on to the lower intestine, where the resident bacteria digest them by producing carbon dioxide, which leads to the embarrassing bean related flatulence.

The soaked water contains some of these water soluble carbohydrates. Thus, throwing out the soaked water will help making beans less flatulence prone. For the same reason, Goya also recommends discarding the soaking water. However, the soaked water also contains vitamins, minerals, colorful antioxidant and other nutrients. Instead of discarding soaked water to reduce flatulence, try cooking longer to break those complex carbohydrates or sprouting the beans so that germination consumes the complex carbohydrates.

Add 1 part bean to 2.5 parts water for cooking.

Cook uncovered in medium heat for ½ hour. Add about 1 teaspoon salt for every cup of soaked bean.

Black beans should be cooked by 45 minutes.

My taste comparison showed that canned black beans are softer, saltier, and lighter in color with smoky flavors.  Goya canned beans may have got the smoky flavor by roasting or toasting its beans before cooking. The canned black beans may have looked lighter in color because Goya may have used usual method of reducing flatulence in beans by boiling them in excess water, throwing out the water and cooking again in the fresh water. Please note it often results in loss of natural nutrients.

Overall, I was happy with the taste of my homemade black beans and amazed by all small subtle customization I could do to make them healthier and tastier.

The thing I love about quesadillas is the versatility… nothing really has to be measured out — vegetables and meat can be added or omitted. This is a great meal for less than $2 a person, which is perfect for our budget. My husband and I opted for whole wheat tortillas and fresh vegetables.

Ingredient Suggestions (Serves 2)
four 8″ tortillas
3-4 oz. mexican or taco blend shredded cheese
3-4 oz. chicken or beef (omit for vegetarian quesadilla)
jalapeno peppers (with or without seeds)
onion, lettuce, black olives, tomatoes, green or red pepper
salsa, sour cream

Grill thin slices of chicken or beef, if using. I sprinkled the chicken with a bit of leftover taco seasoning to spice it up a little (a great seasoning recipe can be found here). Chop all vegetables into ¼” pieces.

Start with one tortilla per person. Lay out meats and vegetables evenly within a half inch of the edges. Sprinkle cheese over top, and place second tortilla on top. Heat a panini press (or a nonstick pan or griddle) on medium heat, and heat quesadilla until cheese has melted and bottom tortilla has slightly browned. Carefully flip the quesadilla over to heat the other side, if necessary.

Use pizza cutter to cut into 6-8 slices.

Serve with salsa and sour cream.