Chicken Tacos Salsa Roja Cilantro Cheddar Marinated Red Onion

Ever since making the tacos from the meat of short ribs at my cousin Lynn’s house, I’ve become even more curious about authentic Mexican cooking, even if it only involves tacos. The internet and especially youtube is a great way to find out about products, processes and the like, and I used it quite a bit.

I’ve also been buying dried chiles from an online shop who import them and other products directly from Mexico.

What was driving my interest in this case was to produce authentic salsas. I checked to see what variety there was and decided I would only be able to make a version of the salsa roja, because the green variants require tomatillos, which are very hard to find here.

I also didn’t have dried Morita chiles, but I did have a Pasilla chile and an Ancho chile and made do with what I had. The chiles had to be heated in water and steeped for 15 minutes. After cooling, I removed the stems and seeds and set them aside. In the meantime, I roasted 5 tomatoes, half white onion, 4 garlic cloves and 2 Jalapeños directly under the heat elements in the oven. After they had developed black splotches, I put all the ingredients in my brand new blender 🙂 (skins and all) and pulsed them and the liquid from the chiles to a coarse consistency. After that, the salsa had to cook to lose about a third of its volume. Along with the other ingredients I added a bunch of cilantro.

To make the chicken, I got 2 organic chicken legs and thighs (cost: about $5.50 in Germany), placed them in a deep pot with a Tbs of oil and started to fry them to brown them. After turning them to brown all sides, I added 200 ml/6.5 oz. of chicken stock and placed the pot in the oven for about two hours, checking on it from time to time. Later, I took the chicken out and pulled it apart with two forks. The residue at the bottom of the pot was added to the salsa.

One other thing that I had bought at www.mercadomexicano.de (no endorsement and no financial payback from the company) was white corn flour tacos from Mexico that were in an airless bag. I reconstituted them by basting them with some oil and placing them in the hot oven for a few minutes before filling them with delicious chicken meat, salsa roja, spring onions, cheddar and cilantro. I had just a little bit of the great marinated red onions left, which you can see on the last picture. The salsa roja had a nice bite to it and went well with the chicken. It is a little more work, but it was definitely worth it!

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Quesadilla

Ich stellte fest, daß ich noch Tortillas im Froster hatte (Weizentortillas), und hatte irgendwie Lust auf Fingerfood, ohne nur schlechte Zutaten dabeizuhaben. Also holte ich beim Einkauf Bio-Rinderhack, Spitzpaprika, Frühlingszwiebeln, Cocktailtomaten, Cheddar schon gerieben, Creme fraiche und Koriander. Ich hatte schon Knoblauch, getrockene Ancho und Serrano Chilis, die ich mit Cuminsamen in meiner Gewürz-Kaffeemaschine fein pulverisierte. Beim Anbraten der Knoblauch/Paprika/Hackfleisch/Frühlingszwiebel Mischung gab ich das gemörserte Gewürz dazu und briet alles an, bis das Fleisch gar war. Dann würzte ich mit Salz.

Ich legte eine Tortilla auf ein Backblech, gab einen Teil der Hack/Gemüsemasse darauf und verteilte sie. Dann gab ich einen Teil des Cheddars darüber und dann die zweite Tortilla. Hier wiederholte ich den Vorgang. Dann kam der Quesadilla in den Ofen. Nachdem der Käse geschmolzen und alle anderen Zutaten heiss waren, holte ich das Werk aus dem Ofen und gab noch Frühlingszwiebel und Koriandergrün darüber.

Heute schaffte ich nur eine Hälfte, also nehm ich den Rest Morgen mit zur Arbeit 🙂