On the Tucson Trail:
Learning to Cook Baja

"When I think of great tacos with fillings off the griddle or grill, my wanders to a little hole-in-the-wall somewhere in northern Mexico where there was a glowing bed of hot coals over which perched a thick iron gate or griddle searing a smoky char into the edges of thin-sliced meat." – Rick Bayless, from Mexico One Plate at a Time










Making the transition from dependent upon the standard variety of Mexican restaurants found here in the cold and chili-less midwest, to trying your own Mexican and Southwest recipes becomes a little intimidating. There are those simplified cookbooks that show you the standards – the taco, burrito, the enchilada, but then you begin to finger through Rick Bayless Mexico One Plate at a Time, and you realize what you should have known all along: authentic Mexican cuisine is bound to be various, historical, and quite different than what you are used to seeing around the block.

Tacos, for example, take on a whole new culinary landscape. Options begin to talk a lot about domed griddles, open coal fires, skirt steaks and poblanos. Or, how's about the Potato-Chorizo Tacos with Simple Avocado Salsa? The American mind weaned on the finely diced and greasy hamburger-based tacos that might climb up the hard corn shell with the likeliest of plain lettuce, chunks of tomato, and maybe a splash of salsa and a layer of chedder turn into something quite wild (more on this recipe later).

The Shrimp Tinga Taco is a nice little marker along the Tucson Taco Trail, with the filling that is showcased by the two dozen shrimp, coated with an orange-chili spice blend which includes dried orange, chili powder, paprika and oregano, simmered with green bell pepper and then the zingy tomato based Tinga sauce. This reduces down a proper stew, quite thick if you let it, then sprinkled over with vinaigrette cabbage and carrot coleslaw for a contrasting texture. Finally, in a nod to the American standard, but completely different in effect, is the famous cotija cheese, the saltiest of cheeses, but a perfect addition to a tomato stewed shrimp. The cotija melts and adds the edible glue. The corn tortillas slightly browned and hardened, and now we are getting a little closer to the Baja.