I bought most of my ingredients from St. Lawrence Market and needed to because I needed some special chili peppers (guajillo and pasilla) for the tacos. I didn't find pasilla but did find it ground up into a powder and just used dried ancho and guajillo peppers instead... with a little dusting of pasilla powder.
TACOS AL PASTOR (with seared pineapple salsa)
First I sliced and marinated the pork with white wine and lime and put it in the fridge.
Then I started making my sauce/marinade by toasting about six of my dried ancho and guajillo chilies on a pan and then soaking them in hot water. I let them soak until they were quite soft.
While they were soaking I finely diced about half of a large onion, four cloves of garlic and four slices of pineapple. I fried the onions and garlic as well as a whole tomato. Once the chilies were ready i put them into the frying pan as well and added the pineapple, then mashed the whole lot together. I added a bit of orange and pineapple juice and few small squeezes of lime juice.
I spiced up the sauce using cumin, cloves, black pepper, salt and, of course, pasilla powder. I let this simmer, then cool.
Once the sauce was cooled sufficiently, I drained most of the wine/lime out of the pork dish, then coated each and every piece of pork in the rich and spicy sauce. I poured any remaining sauce on top of the pork and then put it all back into the fridge and let it sit over night.
Here is where I started to get nervous... I read online, after I finished of course, that pineapple can actually break down the pork due to its acidity. All turned out fine though.
The next day I cooked the pork on a frying pan, getting a nice sear on the outside. I then chopped it up and served on fresh tortillas with a pineapple salsa (recipes to follow).
I chopped up a load of peppers, onions and cilantro for all of the following recipes.
SEARED PINEAPPLE SALSA
First thing I did, sear the pineapple...
Then I chopped them up into smallish chunks, added, peppers, cilantro, onions, chopped jalapenos, crushed garlic, salt, cumin, adobo spice and a tajin (a mexican fruit seasoning).
I mixed all this together and tasted, added more onion, tasted, added more tajin, tasted... loved!
Then I forgot to take a picture of the salsa... boo.
For the vegetarians in attendance I made a Bean Taco with cabbage, Jack and blue cheese, sour cream and fresh tomato salsa.
SLOW COOKED MEXICAN BEANS
The night before, I drained a can of pinto and black beans and put them in a pot with the water I soaked the ancho and guajillo chilies in and added cumin and a bit of adobo spice. I let them soak over night.
The next day I added half a can of diced tomatoes, onions, garlic and 3 peppers out of a can of chipotles in adobo. I let that slow cook for an hour. I added some corn, then put them on for a little while longer. I tasted then seasoned with salt, pepper and more cumin. I put them on low and let them simmer until we were ready to eat.
These were amazing! Maybe a bit spicy but on the tacos they were great! (and really for me they were perfect, the right kind of spice)
TOMATO SALSA
I made this one with no chilies as to not overwhelm people. I just threw tomatoes, peppers, cilantro, onions and garlic into a bowl. Then seasoned with salt, pepper, cumin, adobo and a tiny bit of chili powder.
This tasted fresh and fragrant and went very nicely with the beans.
Again, no picture. wonderful.
SOFT TORTILLAS
My secret? MASECA!
Add water and salt... the back of the bag lies, I always need way more water.
Roll into balls.
Use tortilla press to flatten between plastic wrap. We don't have a tortilla press so we do a little... improvising.
We use a plate and plastic wrap. We press down on the plate then flip it over and pull out the tortillas... a rolling pin doesn't work well with these.
We fry on a hot frying pan and they turn into this:
Amazing, authentic and sooo delicious.
We served the whole thing up with some limes, cilantro, onion, peppers and all the fixun's. Everyone was very happy... and so was I! They were really great. The pork could have used a bit more seasoning (I was shocked considering it was basically chili and chili marinade) but the pineapple salsa more than made up for the lack of flavour. The beans were just... delicious ;) The combo of jack and blue, cabbage, tomato salsa and sour cream with the beans was very good.
My camera battery died so my final pictures turned out... mushy. My presentation could have been better too. Sorry, I'll get better at this blogging thing... I promise.
