Mexican Cookbook

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Mexican Cookbook
By
Erna Fergusson

Illustrations by
Li Browne
Nadie sabe lo que tiene la olla mas que la cuchara que la menea.
No one knows what's in the pot but the spoon that stirs it

University of New Mexico Press

Albuquerque
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Copyright 1934, 1940, 1945
by Erna Fergusson.
Copyright renewed 1973
by Mrs. Li Browne Caemmerer.
All rights reserved.
Nineteenth printing, 1999
Manufactured in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 46-214.
International Standard Book Number 0-8263-0035-9.
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Foreword
Mexican food has, ever since the "American Occupation," been a
part of the Southwestern diet. At first chile and beans and corn in
many guises were all one could get. Later the deliciousness of
slowly-cooked and richly condimented dishes won them fame
among people who could not even pronounce their names. In every
Southwestern town tostadas are served with cocktails, chile
suppers are served regularly in many homes, and the family often
goes out to a "chile joint," and the tamale vender with his tinkling
bell and musical call moseys along the streets or lingers wherever
people gather.
Now that everybody has been to the Southwest and even into
Mexico, Mexican food has become a part of the national cuisine.
Restaurants which prepare Mexican food correctly are
demonstrating that much crude, hot food that used to pass as
authentic lacks the subtlety of flavor characteristic of real Mexican
cookery. The national palate is beginning to distinguish between a
hot stew with chile dumped in and a smoothly blended dish of meat
and spices; between heavy pancakes topped with a fried egg and a
burning sauce, and a
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balanced combination of eggs, cheese, and chile on tender tortillas.
An all-inclusive Mexican cookbook would contain many recipes
that call for tropical fruits and vegetables. The recipes in this book
are limited to those which were in common use when the province
of New Mexico was a part of the Republic of Mexico. They
represent Mexican cookery that belongs to the United States.
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Contents
Introduction 1
Mexican Cookery 3
Chile 11
Corn 15
Fruits 17
Spices 19
Soups 21
Entrees 27
Meats and Poultry 35
Eggs 55
Vegetables 59
Salads 71
Breads 87
Cakes and Cookies 93
Cheese 103
Candies and Preserves 105
Beverages 111
Comidas 115
Index 119
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Introduction
The Mexican Cookbook has been out of print for several years, but
its friends continue to ask for it. To a native New Mexican "chile
food" is something he keeps on wanting even in a new world of
tightened geography and atomic bombs. New Mexicans proved that
by writing home from earth's farthest corners for chile and beans
and blue corn meal and the necessary herbs. In England they found
chile con carne almost warming enough to offset the climate; on
Pacific atolls they loved to sit on their heels around a pot bubbling
with succulent frijoles and smelling just like home; and in the
Philippines they could show a trick or two to Spanish-speaking
people who knew not New Mexico's piquant food. Now that they
are coming back with brides, they think the girl from New Zealand
or Iceland, Italy or Scotland, should know how to cook up a mess
of beans for a hungry man.
So the little book comes out again, in a new jacket and with new
illustrations by a granddaughter of New Mexico. It greets returning
New Mexicans and welcomes new New Mexicans who may find
useful hints here.
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Since the book's first appearance it has become constantly clearer
that in the old days every recipe had as many variations as there
were cooks: a natural result of the fact that cookbooks were
unknown. Some of these cooks made kindly comments on our
recipes and offered new ones. In 1940, some of the original recipes
were changed where it seemed that they might be made even easier
to follow in a modern kitchen; and twelve new ones were included.
These were offered by Miss Mela Sedillo and Señora Máxima
Tafoya de Salazar. Señora Florinda Barela gave valuable advice
and assistance in adapting the recipes. They were all tested again
by Mrs. E. A. McDevitt as painstakingly as she tested the original
ones when she was Miss Estelle Weisenbach.
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Mexican Cookery
Now
Most of these recipes were given me by Doña Lola Chaves de
Armijo, who also helped with the menus.
With very few exceptions, these dishes date from the days when
cooks were limited to what was raised in New Mexico and a few
importations; and when all the work of preparing food was done in
the home kitchens and placitas. All old and excellent cooks
maintain that the full flavor of Mexican cookery depends upon
doing everything as in the old days, when women worked slowly
with their hands and with only the simplest equipment. Corn, they
say, is never just right unless it is hulled and ground in the old way;
and the proper blending of spices requires long and gentle
simmering.
To an extent this is true, but Miss Estelle Weisenbach, a domestic
science teacher who has tested all these recipes, finds them
thoroughly practicable for a modern cook in a modern kitchen.
Mechanical devices can lessen the strain on the human back.
Commercial products may often be substituted for ingredients that
call for laborious preparation. And all the ingredients may now be
bought ready and correctly prepared.
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These recipes were tested in a high altitude and a shorter cooking
time may be allowed at sea level.
Each recipe will serve six people.

Then
Nothing more surely reflects the life of a people than what they ate
and how they prepared it. When the railroad came to New Mexico,
fifty years ago, it changed everything, even what went on in the
kitchen. Imagine the difference when flour and meal could be
ground in mills instead of on metates; when white sugar could be
bought, and lemons and oranges; and machinery made ice; and
there were iron stoves.
Before that, New Mexican cooks had to handle materials which
came to them not in cellophane or glass, but in the rough. Great
carcasses were dumped at their feet by the butchers who brought
beef and mutton and pork. Hunters came in with buffalo ''jerky''
and the more delicate venison, birds, and fish. What the family
could eat was used fresh. As there was no refrigeration, all the rest
had to be dried. One woman might do that job and nothing else the
whole year through. Another might understand the herbs which
were used for seasoning and for medicine. From early spring until
late fall she would watch for the exact moment to gather the leaves
or blossoms or seeds which she dried and
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stored away. As fruits and vegetables ripened, they were eaten fresh
or sun-dried for the winter by the expert at that job. By fall the
rising tide of good things had filled the placitas with piles of parti-
colored corn, trays of drying fruits, hanging bunches of grapes, and
yellow pumpkins on sticks until they seemed to overflow in the
brilliant strings of aromatic chile hanging from the roofs.
In the great kitchens all this food was cooked over open fires in
iron or copper pots, or in the outdoor ovens still so generally used
in New Mexico. Almost everything was cooked for hours, the sort
of cooking that blends flavors until only an expert can tell what
went into the dish. Apparently everything was done in the hardest
possible way, but these methods were the result of conditions so
primitive that we can scarcely believe them now. Corn and wheat
were ground on metates because there were no mills. Chile
likewise. Fruits were dried because there was no sugar for
preserving.
Markets were two months' journey away, so the only importations
were articles that could be kept indefinitely: coffee, sugar,
chocolate, and spices, all from Mexico. As trade with "the States"
developed, manufactured articles came from there until they
gradually changed all of life. Nowadays the foreign importations
are easier to get than the old-fashioned hand-ground meal or native
herbs. At least one store in each New
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Mexican town usually has these old things. Often one can also
purchase nixtamal, the hominy called for in the recipes, or masa,
the freshly ground meal.
The menus are based on meals as served at a gentleman's table
before the general adoption of American ways. Then eating was a
serious matter, interfered with only by famine, war, or Lent. The
day began with a preliminary breakfast in bed; coffee or chocolate
and sweet rolls. At nine o'clock came the real breakfast which
included eggs or meat and more bread and coffee.
After that the Señora put in her heavy work of unlocking
cupboards, storerooms, and chests; of dispensing food for the day;
and of directing her servants. Naturally she felt fagged by eleven
o'clock and ready for the caldo colado or clear soup, which came
as a pick-me-up at that hour. Probably the gentlemen came in then
from their business of ordering the outdoor work, and children
escaped from tutors and governesses.
At noon formal dinner was served; a heavy soup, meats and
vegetables, and desserts. The service in a wealthy family was of
silver: platters, plates, and goblets. As there were no knives, the
food was prepared in such a way that it could be managed with the
silver forks and spoons. In a typical menu there were several meats
and only one vegetable, various health rules not having been
discovered. Beans and rice took the place