Kitchen Chick

Sabor Latino — Photo Tour

Sabor Latino is back, under new and enthusiastic ownership -- and we reviewed them in the September issue of Current.  Check our review out at ecurrent.com. Below, we have photos of some of the dishes we tried.  (As always, click on the photos for larger and tastier versions.)

Sopes with pork al pastor — crispy corn rounds, a bit thicker than a tortilla, with beans, cheese, and guacamole

Argentinian empanadas with chimichurri sauce — a standout appetizer

Alcapurria — plantain fritter, stuffed with pork and a favorite of ours (we eat it with salsa or chimichurri instead of the supplied sour cream, though)

Queso dip — a blend of three cheeses with tomato and pepper

Ropa Vieja — shredded beef, served with rice, beans, and plantains

Masitas de puerco — chunks of pork, with black beans and potatoes

Camarones a la Diabla — shrimp in a somewhat spicy sweet red sauce

Arroz con Pato — not a dish you see often; this dish combines tasty roasted duck with rice and a vegetable side that was way better than it looks

An assortment of tacos

A pupusa, from the yet-undocumented-by-us brunch menu

A flight of desserts arrives at our table.  Clockwise from rear:  sweet Amazon plantain (fried plantains with cajeta!), flan, pastel de tres leches, fried ice cream

 

The Spicy Latino — a shot of Espresso Colombiano with cinnamon and maybe other spices

Taqueria Tour 2008: La Barca Birreria y Taqueria

I've been remiss in finishing out our taco-tour. I did say "three empty stomachs and four taqueries", so time to finish this off because I have a ton of exciting restaurant reports from our not-too-long-ago trip to Chicago. (Amazing Afghani food! Bonsoiree! And Alinea!) So yeah, I'd better get writing. Okay, on to our last taco stop in Detroit's Mexicantown...

By the time we left the King of Chicken, we were getting pretty full, but we were determined to try one more place. It was a scorching summer day, and so it was with great relief that we entered La Barca Birreria's cool air-conditiioned interior. A set of booths line one wall, and a large take-out counter along the other side. We grabbed a booth. A small TV was playing a movie in the corner. Going by the menu board, they appear to do a lot of carry out dinners.

With a name like La Barca Birreria, we had to try the goat. I also ordered an Al Pastor for comparison. Unfortunately, we thought the goat was a bit bland. Though, to be fair, we had just eaten the very spice-ly flavor chicken tacos from Armando's, so that may have affected out taste buds. Also, I've never had a goat taco before, so I don't have anything to compare it to.

I did like the Al Pastor. The pork bits were nicely charred. I'd rank it as my 2nd favorite Al Pastor of the day, after the taco truck. (Joe might disagree.) Though this was our least favorite stop of the day, it takes a lot for me not to give a place a 2nd try. And just because a place advertises itself as specializing in goat, doesn't mean that goat tacos are the best way to sample their speciality. So if anyone else has tried La Barca Birreria, we'd love to hear from you.

 

We finished off with a bit of corn cake for dessert. Simple, nicely moist and not too sweet.

La Barca Birreria y Taqueria is located on Vernor Hwy, in Detroit's Mexicantown.

Taqueria Tour 2008: El Rey del Pollo

Stop #3: The King of Chicken

Joe spotted these guys grilling outside along Vernor Hwy, and said "we've got to check this out." It turns out that they were grilling chicken, and selling it by the half or whole chicken. Since eating half a chicken would have (a) been a departure from our taco theme, and (b) taken us out of the game for the rest of the day, we took the griller's advice and went into the attached restaurant for some tacos de pollo made with the pollo they were cooking on the grill.

A word of warning here:  yes, the restaurant is kind of run down. There's broken stuff, it's dark, and the tables don't match. The booth where we were sitting used to be a hood; we realized after a few minutes that we were surrounded by stainless steel and had fire suppression nozzles pointing down at us. This is not a tourist spot like Xochimilco's or Los Galanes, or even a more upscale authentic place like El Comal or Arandas. But it's clean (even the bathroom was immaculate), and when the tacos came out, we were stunned:

Huge, gorgeous, loaded with juicy red-sauced hunks of that grilled chicken, and so hot we couldn't even pick them up at first. The salsa was great too — spicy and way better than the table salsa they gave us — but the chicken!  The chicken was the real star. Moist, flavorful, not as spicy as it looks by a long shot (some of that red color is achiote, not chilies). We also had a chorizo taco:  equally huge, with a lot of spicy chorizo, and the same sauce.

While we were eating it, the guy on the grill (who may well have been Armando himself) leaned through the sliding window beside our table and asked what we thought. When Joe told him (in Spanish) how good it was, he passed us some chicken pieces straight from the grill as a free sample.  Heaven!

Highly, highly recommended. We'd also recommend you park your car where the grill guys (or you) can keep an eye on it, because there were some folks hanging out in the area drinking.

Armando, the king of chicken, is out there grilling most (all?) of the year. Just drive along Vernor Hwy and look his roadside tents between Lansing and Ferdinand St. in the Mexican Town.

Taqueria Tour 2008: Tacos El Primo

Stop #2: Tacos El Primo, the taco truck

"Hey, I've always wanted to check out that truck!"

One U-turn later, and we were parked across the street from Tacos El Primo. The menu is painted on the board. You give your order to one of the cooks through a small window, and minutes later they pass back tacos hot off the grill.

It was a bright hot summer day, and they must have been roasting inside their silver taco cart, but they sure were enthusiastic as they handed us our tacos. 

We all ordered tacos al pastor, and they were huge! and utterly amazing.  My favorite al pastor of the day, even if not the traditional trompo-style. They have a small table set up with traditional garnishes of radishes, roasted jalapeños and quartered limes. They offered me a small seared onion and told Joe in Spanish that I should squeeze lime juice over it. Oh my! That was delicious!

Across the street a church ceremony of some sort (a wedding? we weren't 100% certain) was just ending, and the guys in their suits and ties started trickling across to load up on tacos. This is clearly a locals' hangout, and it definitely helps to know a bit of Spanish, but if you don't speak any Spanish beyond "al pastor," don't let that stop you from trying their tacos.

The Tacos El Primo truck is located on a small parking lot on Junction St and just across the street from a large church, visible from Vernor if you are heading toward downtown. I don't know if the truck moves or if this is its permanent location, but look for them. They are worth checking out!

Rating:  awesome!

Taqueria Tour 2008: First Stop, Arandas

One Saturday afternoon
Three empty stomachs
Four taquerias in Detroit's Mexican Town

Ah, yes, it's the Taqueria Tour of 2008.

Most local Ann Arborites who have been to Detroit Mexican Town are familiar with what I think of as the "tourista" area on Bagely street, where you can find a mix of restaurants serving up Americanized fare with big margaritas and a few authentic places tucked inbetween, such as Taqueria Lupita, one of our favorite Mexican restaurants. But Mexican Town is far larger than just the short stretch on Bagley street, and it was time to branch out and try the other places we've seen up and down Vernor Hwy. Our first stop was Taqueria Arandas, located at what I think of as the far end of Mexican Town, at the intersection of Vernor and Livernois. We walked inside the door and after making our way past the grill, where the al pastor was on its spit, and were stunned to find a very very large sit down restaurant. (This place is bigger on the inside than it looks on the outside.) Arandas is a full service restaurant with an extensive menu. If you need to seat a large group, this is the place to go.

We were sticking with tacos, but the rest of the menu is definitely worth checking out. They have a variety of dinner plates and Mexican soups. Here's our rundown on the tacos we tried.

Winners:
pollo — very simple and surprisingly flavorful chicken, with nice lime notes
al pastor — quite nice, and made using a real trompo (the spit that you stack meat on and grill it). Joe like this version of pastor more than I did, but we both agree it's good.
goat — not bad

Not so great:
chorizo & egg — a bit bland to our tastes. I doused mine with salsa.

Taqueria Arandas
1807 Livernois Ave
Detroit, MI
(313) 297-7533

Salpicón de Res

Salpicón de Res

A while back I bought some skirt steak from Sparrow Meats and stuck it in the freezer. If you've bought meat from Sparrow before, you know that Bob Sparrow's scrawls on the wrapping paper aren't always legible. (Neither is my handwriting, so I don't really have the moral high ground here.) That skirt steak sat in my freezer waiting for the right moment. Joe had taken to asking me, "What is this package labeled 't-shirt' that's in the freezer?"  "Um, it says 'skirt.' It's skirt steak," I'd reply, squinting at the writing and recalling that I did indeed buy skirt steak.

After three or four of these exchanges, I decided I had better cook that skirt steak before I, too, forgot what the paper concealed. I dug out Diana Kennedy's The Art of Mexican Cooking and looked for some inspiration. Diana Kennedy is to Mexican cuisine what Marcella Hazan is to Italian, and her books can be intimidating to approach, with complex traditional dishes from scratch that are very labor intensive. But if you keep looking, you'll also find simple dishes. The skirt steak is twice cooked — boiled once and shredded, then mixed in with the rest of the ingredients to cook a bit longer. The seasonings are simple: onion, tomato, cilantro, garlic, and chiles with just some salt to bring out the flavor. I'm getting hungry just remembering the simple yet rich savory flavor of this dish!

I served it up on sopes, but it would also go well with rice or served as soft tacos.  (For tacos, you may want to shred it more finely.)

Salpicón de Res — Shredded beef cooked with tomatoes, chiles, and cilantro
The Art of Mexican Cooking (Note: I use the 1989 edition. There is a new edition coming out in April: The Art of Mexican Cooking (2008))

The Meat
1 1/4 lb skirt or flank steak, with some fat
1 small white onion, roughly chopped
3 cilantro sprigs
2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
sea salt to taste

The Seasonings
2 Tbs lard or safflower oil
1/2 cup finely chopped white onion
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 1/4 lb tomatoes (~4 medium?), unpeeled and finely chopped
4 (or to taste) canned chiles serranos en escabeche (pickled serranos)
3 rounded Tbs of chopped cilantro
1/4 of reserved beef broth from cooking the meat

Cut the steaks along the grain into 2 inch pieces. Put the meat in a saucepan with the onion, cilantro,  garlic, and salt. Barely cover with water. Simmer until tender — about 25 minutes for skirt steak and 35 for flank. Allow meat to cool in broth. When cool enough to handle, remove from broth. Strain broth and set aside. Remove any gristle from meat and shred the meat roughly. Set it aside.

In a heavy pan, heat the lard, add onion and garlic, and fry gently without browning until translucent. Add tomatoes and continue cooking over high heat, stirring from time to time, until mixture has reduced and thickened (about 8 minutes). Add the shredded meat, chiles, cilantro, and broth. Taste for salt. Cook over medium heat, covered, for about 5 minutes longer.

Kitchen Chick's Notes: I didn't have white onions, so I used yellow onions, and the dish tasted just fine to me. (In many cases I treat yellow and white onions as interchangeable with no ill effects.) I also didn't have any pickled serranos on hand, so I used whole jalepeños.

Salsa de Tomate Verde, Cocida

It's October, and it's the time of year when I marvel at my garden. The summer flowers are past their peak, the tomatoes are pretty much done, the basil has been harvested, but I'm amazed at how much of my garden continues to grow in spite of the chilly days and colder nights. Most of all, I'm amazed at my tomatillos, which have defied all frost warnings and are continuing to set fruit. At the first good hard frost, they'll wilt and call it a season. But until then, I pretend for a moment — in spite of the chill — that a little bit of August still thrives on in my garden.

I love tomatillos, which is a good thing because although my tomato crop was pitiful this year, my tomatillo crop is doing quite well. I've harvested some eight pounds so far, and I'll probably have another five pounds if we get just enough warm weather for the fruits to get just a bit larger. Tomatillo plants have a disturbing resemblance to deadly nightshade, but I think they're gorgeous, especially after they begin to set fruit. The delicate husks string out along the branches like Chinese paper lanterns. The fruit grows inside until it fills the husk and bursts the seams.

My favorite dish to make with tomatillos is enchiladas verdes de pollo (green enchiladas with chicken). I use a cooked salsa verde that works well for either enchiladas or chilaquiles, and when the harvest is boutiful I scale it up so I can freeze the excess sauce.

This recipe comes from The Art of Mexican Cooking by Diane Kennedy, who has done for Mexican cuisine in this counrty what Julia Child did for French cuisine.

Salsa de Tomate Verde, Cocida (Cooked Tomatillo Sauce)
Diane Kennedy's The Art of Mexican Cooking

1 lb. tomates verdes (tomatillos), husks removed and rinsed
4 chiles serranos (I've used jalapeños when I don't have serranos, but serranos are slightly hotter)
2 Tbs roughly-chopped cilantro
1 garlic clove, roughly chopped
1 1/2 Tbs safflower oil (I use canola)
sea salt to taste

Put the tomatillos and fresh chilies (I cut the tops off) into a pan, cover with water, and bring to a simmer. Continue cooking until tomatillos are soft but not falling apart — about 5 to 10 minutes. Remove from heat.  Strain, reserving 1/3 C of the cooking water.

Put the reserved cooking water into a blender, add the chilies, cilantro, and garlic, and blend until almost smooth. Add the tomatillos and blend to make a fairly smooth sauce. (10 seconds or so)

Heat oil in frying pan. Add the sauce and reduce over high head until thickened. About 8 minutes. Add salt to taste.

Use less chilies if you don't like spicy foods. If I'm not using the sauce right away, I'll stop after the blending step and freeze the extra, and save the frying in oil and reducing step for when I actually use the sauce.

Corn Smut — aka Huitlacoche

Gustad Mody of Iron Stomach asks what is corn smut. Corn smut is a fungus that infects corn. (Hey, it's "corn mushrooms"!) Wikipedia has a detailed entry about corn smut describing its physical characterists and culinary uses and history.

Corn smut isn't pretty -- though it is tasty -- but if you want to see some, take a peek...

Fast & Easy Chilaquiles

When I'm feeling ambitious I make huevos motuleños*, but when I want my breakfast fast I make chilaquiles. This is one of my favorite breakfasts. It's easy, and the variations are endless.

Quick Chilaquiles
All amounts are approximate. Adjust to your tastes.

4-5 corn tortillas, cut into wedges
2 Tbs of butter, maybe a bit of vegetable oil
2 Tbs of finely diced onion, or more if you like
2 lg peeled and diced tomato (or a cup scoop of canned, diced tomato). Add more if you like.
3 eggs or so, beaten
salt and pepper
meat or beans of choice (optional)
garnish of choice (chives, cilantro, whatever you like)

Saute tortillas in butter/vegetable oil until mostly crisp. Add onion and saute a bit to soften. Add tomatoes and simmer 1-2 minutes. Add eggs. Season with salt and pepper. Scramble slowly until eggs are finished to your liking. (I like mine a bit wet.) You can add cheese, if you like. Garnish with chopped chives, or chopped cilantro.

I often add diced bacon. I chop the bacon before cooking and fry it up in a separate pan to minimize the bacon fat in the final dish. I don't like my bacon fat to overpower the flavors of the tomato and tortillas. Or sometimes I add black beans or chorizo.

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*You see, with huevos motuleños there's the fried eggs, and the fried tortillas, and the sauce, and the beans, and ham and peas... And I make two-layer motulenos, so there's food stacking involved. Well, as you can see, it's a bit of work and my stovetop is a mess when I'm done. But they sure are delicious. I'll have to post them sometime.

Taco Boy!

NOTE:  (20 July 2008) This restaurant is closed, and has been replaced by a Mexican buffet we haven't tried yet.  -- Joe

In the past few months there has been an explosion in Mexican and Central American restaurants in the Ann Arbor-Ypsilanti area, and we'll eventually cover them all. (The good ones, anyway.) One of our newest favorites is the oddly-named Taco Boy, which is tucked away in a little strip mall near Golfside and Clark in Ypsilanti.

Four Tacos and a Gordita (clockwise from the gordita at top right: carnitas, inalambricos, al pastor, and chorizo)

Taco Boy has an extensive menu of Mexican dishes, though to be truthful we've barely gotten past the taco and soup sections. They have a selection of the more commonly found tacos: al pastor, carnitas, asada, tongue, chorizo, chicken. Fans of the al pastor style should definitely give Taco Boy's version a try. They also have tacos inalambricos, the delicious but oddly-named -- "inalambrico" literally means "wireless" in Spanish -- variety we've only seen at Taqueria Jalisco before.  They're filled with a bizarre but very tasty assortment of ingredients including steak, bacon, poblano peppers, and plantains. (Taqueria Jalisco and Taco Boy are apparently related in some way.) Their Gordita has fillings that are similar to a taco but served between two halves of a thick patty of masa. (We both prefer the tacos over the gorditas.)

Your server will also bring you a complementary bowl of beans to go with the chips and salsa. Add a few tacos, and you have a full meal already. Vegetarians be aware:  these beans have bacon in them.

With Taco Boy on the scene, La Loma now has some serious competition in the tortilla soup category. Taco Boy's tortilla soup is absolutely delicious and comes with large pieces of avocado. The tortilla strips are added to the broth just before serving, ensuring that they're still firm. I have a hard time not ordering it everytime. One bowl can make a full meal.

Sopa de tortilla

If you're really hungry, try the daily lunch buffet at $8.95 a person. Or try one of the full entrees. I ordered the chilaquiles from the breakfast menu, and it was a huge platter with generous side portions of rice and beans. I could barely eat half.

Flan
I adore flan in all its variants. If you are a flan connoisseur, you'll want to try Taco Boy's flan as it's different from all the other flans served in the area. We found it it sort of "brownie-like" in texture, a bit dry perhaps, with a nice cinnamon coating on top. The serving is large enough to share between two.

Taco Boy Mexican Restaurant
(734) 528-9844
2071 Golfside Dr
Ypsilanti, MI 481