More from Bill's Salsa Kitchen

I still had some dried "pasilla" peppers left over from the last salsa that I made, so I checked my salsa cookbook for another recipe that uses "pasillas".

 I found a recipe for "salsa borracha" (drunken sauce).  It gets its name from the fact that "pulque", an alcoholic beverage made from the fermented juice of the maguey plant, is one of the ingredients.  Instead of "pulque" you can also use beer.  I do not like beer, but there happened to be an unopened bottle in the refrigerator that had been left by the previous owners of the apartment.  So, I decided to use some of the beer and make this recipe.

In addition to 1/2 cup of beer, you use 1/2 cup of orange juice, 4 "pasilla" peppers, 1/4 cup of chopped white onion and 1 clove of garlic.

The peppers should have their stems cut off, and the seeds and veins removed.  I was not as meticulous about removing the veins as I was on my last salsa.  I wanted it to be a bit hotter.  The peppers are then lightly roasted on a griddle.  The garlic is also charred on the griddle with the skin on.  After roasting it is peeled.

The "pasilla" peppers are  broken up and put into a saucepan along with the beer and orange juice.  The mixture is cooked for 10 minutes.

The beer / orange juice / pepper mixture is put in a blender along with the clove of garlic, the chopped onion, and 1/4 cup of water (in Mexico, of course, you should use purified water, not tap water).  Blend it into a sauce.  Salt to taste.

The finished product is dark and has a unique flavor.  Mine came out quite spicy since I did not remove all of the veins.

Yesterday I used some of the salsa, adding it to scrambled eggs and black beans.  It was an excellent combination.

I have already selected another salsa from my cookbook to try next week.

Vaccination Continues

Yesterday, on the front page of one of Mexico City's newspapers, there was an article about the continuing outbreak of measles.  The death toll from the disease has now risen to 31.

The vaccination campaign continues.  The photo above shows a line of people waiting for a shot near the Palace of Fine Arts in downtown Mexico City.

Attention! This Is a Drill

Yesterday morning an earthquake drill was held in the greater Mexico City area.  I left my apartment and walked over to the World Trade Center to watch the drill.  At 11 AM the sirens began to sound.  There were also special instructions given over loudspeakers for the World Trade Center.

 

Outside of the World Trade Center there are meeting points at which people are supposed to gather according to floors.

If you worked in an office on the upper floors of the building, I don't see much sense in trying to leave the building.  You cannot use the elevators to evacuate during an earthquake, and there is no way you can go down forty plus flights of stairs in the minute or less of warning that you would have in the case of a real earthquake.  I would think that you would simply find the safest place (under a desk perhaps?) and trust the building's structural integrity.  The World Trade Center withstood the major quake in 2017 with only minor damage.

Customers and employees of the restaurants and stores at the World Trade Center gathered outside.

Guests and employees of a nearby hotel

Workers at office buildings on Insurgentes Avenue headed out to the street.

The next earthquake drill will be held on September 19th, the anniversary of the catastrophic 1985 quake and, coincidentally, the 2017 quake.
  

"Carnaval"

Yesterday was Shrove Tuesday, or "Mardi Gras" as it is known in French.  In Spanish, the pre-Lenten celebration is known as "Carnaval".  In Mexico City, the revelry cannot compare to the festivities in New Orleans, Rio de Janeiro, or some Mexican cities such as Veracruz.  However, in some neighborhoods there are groups known as "comparsas" which dance through the streets in costume.

The "colonia" where Alejandro's family lives, happens to be one of those neighborhoods.  Every year, if I happen to be at their home on the final days before Lent, I will see a "comparsa" parading down the street.  Monday evening, we could hear the band playing as it approached, and we went outside to see them dancing.  The women are dressed in fancy ball gowns, and the masked men wear top hats, poking fun of the wealthy.

Concert at the Palace

Our anniversary weekend celebration continued on Sunday when we went to the Palace of Fine Arts for the first concert of the 2026 season by Mexico's National Symphonic Orchestra.

(selfie taken by Alejandro)

The concert was held in the beautiful main concert hall.  It seemed quite different, however, because the famous Tiffany glass stage curtain was raised and out of sight.

High above the audience, a stained glass dome

Mythological figures decorate the proscenium arch.

 

The first half of the program featured standard works with which I was familiar...  Tchaikovsky's Polonaise from his opera "Eugene Onegin", Dvorak's Slavonic Dance #2, and George Enescu's Romanian Rhapsody #1.

After intermission, the orchestra played a piece by the Mexican composer Manuel Enríquez entitled "Latin American Rhapsody".  It was a medley of tunes from different Latin American countries, some of them familiar such as the tango "La Cumparsita".

The final work was Maurice Ravel's hypnotic "Bolero".

No, they are not in the same class as the Cleveland Orchestra (yes, I am a bit of a snob when it comes to my old hometown orchestra), but it was an excellent and enjoyable performance, and I am sure that I will have no difficulty in convincing Alejandro to attend more of their concerts later this season.

Anniversary Dinner

Getting married on February 14th is very romantic, but restaurants are generally packed on Valentine's Day if you want to celebrate your anniversary with a nice dinner.  That's why we usually celebrate on the weekend before or after the 14th.  However, this year Valentine's Day fell on a Saturday.  We were thinking of having our anniversary dinner on Sunday... but, short of going to Burger King, where could we go that wouldn't be jammed on Saturday?

We had a big breakfast on Saturday morning, so it wasn't until about 6 PM that hunger pangs began to set in.  We have three very good Italian restaurants within walking distance of the apartment.  We decided to try one of them... a little place called "Mangiatore"... that usually is not too crowded.  Our timing was good.  We were in between the afternoon dinner crowd, and the late supper crowd.  The place was busier than usual, but there were plenty of available tables.  Later, as we were enjoying our meal, more people showed up.

To drink, we ordered a pitcher of "clericot", a popular wine and fruit beverage that is somewhat similar to "sangría".  

As a starter we ordered their signature soup, "crema Marta", a cream soup of mozarella, parmesan and gorgonzola cheeses with sliced grapes.  It sounds like a rather unusual combination, but it is very good.

Alejandro ordered spaghetti and meatballs.  We know it's not an authentic Italian dish, but rather something created by Italian immigrants to the United States.  However, Alejandro said that it was very good.

I ordered the rigatoni in a spicy "arrabiata" sauce.  Also very good.

For dessert, we shared a serving of panna cotta, a creamy gelatin with a compote of fruits.

So, we unexpectedly ended up having a very nice supper on our actual anniversary date!

(photos taken with Alejandro's cell phone)

Wuthering Smut

I was looking forward to seeing the latest remake of Emily Bronte's classic novel "Wuthering Heights".  It is the story of a doomed love affair between Cathy and Heathcliff, a love that would have repercussions even after their deaths. 

(image taken from the internet)

Generally, I am not a big fan of remakes, but the male lead Jacob Elordi was so excellent in last year's remake of "Frankenstein" that I wanted to see him in the role of Heathcliff.

Then I started to read that critics panned the movie.  However, there were others who praised it.  So, on Valentine's Day, we went ahead to see it.  The criticism of the movie by many was entirely justified.  I thought the movie was a disaster.

Even though it has been decades since I read Bronte's novel (for a book report in the ninth grade), I could tell that the movie was not faithful to the book.  First of all, the film only covers the first half of the book.  Secondly, many characters have been eliminated completely... for example, Cathy's brother Hinton is mentioned but never appears.  Other characters have been changed.  Cathy's father, Mr. Earnshaw, is a kindly man.  In the movie, he is a cruel alcoholic who nearly beats young Heathcliff to death.  I was willing to accept these changes.  After all, none of the film adaptations, not even the classic 1939 movie with Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon, have been faithful to the book.

But what really turned me off, was what one reviewer called the "smutification" of the novel.  In the book, aside from one kiss, the two lovers never consummate their passionate desires for each other.  In the movie, Heathcliff and Cathy (now married to Mr. Linton) have sex again and again ad nauseum.  There are sex scenes between two of the servants and between Heathcliff and Linton's sister that are strongly sadomasochistic.  I felt like I was watching soft-porn instead of a classic of English literature.

The director, Emerald Fennell said that the movie reflects the way she felt when she first read the novel when she was 14 years old.  Well, she must have been a very dirty-minded teenager!