Tacos Ahogados

Here is the latest recipie from our anteojitos cooking class. Drowned Tacos!

Ingredients (how much depends on how many you want to make)
Tacos
boiled potatoes (maybe 2 or 3 small to med size)
shreaded chicken (just about as much as you have potatoes)
Corn tortillas
Salt
Vegtable, canola, or corn oil
Wooden tooth picks

Sauce for the Drowning
Garlic (4 cloves)
boiled tomatoes (think like 5 or 6 to make tacos for the family)
Chicken broth (save the water from boiling the chicken to make shreadded chicken or purchase it)
Tomatoe Pure (optional to increase your sauce quantity or thickness)

For toppings
Grated cheese (I imagine you can use what you like, we used a salty white cheese that they probably sell in Mexican grocery stores)
sliced onions (slice very thin and let them soak in some water, it will make the flavor a little less strong)
Crema (this is like sour cream but isn´t sour, you can use sour cream or get crema from a mexican grocery store)

Tacos:
First, put oil in a deep pan and heat it up. Just like last time it should be very hot before you drop the tacos in it so they don´t soak up all the oil.

While that is heating. Mash up the potatoes and mix it in with the chicken and add a little salt not too salty because the sauce will have some as will the cheese you put on top). This mixture will be your taco filling. Obviously you can really put whatever you want inside them. Make sure your corn tortillas are warm, stick them in the microwave if they are not. Put a small amount of filling inside the tortilla and roll it up like we think of a taquito. Take two thus rolled tacos and put them together with the open flaps of the tortillas facing one another and stick two wooden toothpicks through them one at each end to hold them together. As our teacher pointed out, it is rather important not to use plastic toothpicks in this step as they will melt when you fry them. Repeat until you run out of stuffing or tortillas. Drop your tacos into the hot oil and let them fry until they are a nice golden brown. Take them out and put them standing end for end in a collander with a pan underneath so the oil will run off of them.

In the mean time you can make your salsa (in this case it is more like we think of sauce than salsa, but salsa really just means sauce in spanish). In a sauce pan heat a small amount of oil. Take one garlic clove and toss it in when it is hot. Leave it there until the garlic is all brown and almost burnt. In the mean time drop your boiled tomatoes, the chicken broth, and the other garlic cloves into the blender and blend it so it a pretty thin puree, think a little thinner than enchildada sauce. When the garlic is all brown take it out and throw it away and put the tomatoe mixture into the sauce pan. Let it simmer for a while, maybe 15 or 20 minutes. During this time you can add tomatoe puree to make it thicker or more broth to make it thinner. Add Salt to tast.

**Take the tooth picks out of your tacos before serving them, the tacos may be drowning but we don't want you to be choking!**

To serve place the tacos on a plate and them dump the salsa on them. (This is where the Ahogados or drowning piece comes from). then put a little dolop of crema, a sprinkle of cheese and some thinly sliced onion. Enjoy!

Fotos!

Sorry that new photos have been so long in coming. We've been having bad luck with computers in getting them uploaded. Now all I have to do is figure out how to get the slideshow to work on the page, and you can see all of our photos from the trip so far. For now, here's a bunch from the last week.

Here's Emily preparing a gourmet meal at Chez Cuarto 11 (i.e., on the bed in our room):

Below is one of the stelae at Cobá. It depicts a Mayan ruler standing atop the backs of two defeated slaves (can't you tell?):

Here is a classic ball court, one of several at Cobá--the circle up the side of the wall is the goal (there's another opposite that you can't see):

Here is El Castillo at Cobá, the tallest pyramid in the Yucatan at about 12 stories:

Emily and I at the top of El Castillo, with a view over the entire jungle:

Here's Emily on the way down. It's a bit trickier climbing down than up:

After walking (and running) through the downpour that marked the end of our visit to Cobá, Emily and I posed, dripping, at the restaurant where we ate lunch:

A couple of shots of Tulum, during our visit last Sunday--it's a gorgeous site, as you can tell:

Emily and I at Tulum, in front of the beautiful Caribbean:

On our way out of Tulum, we saw this crab making its way across the street:

Here we are walking along the beach near Tulum--that's Emily in the pink and Emelia next to her:

Here we are on Sunday night after dinner with our dueña, Emelia, and our new Italian friend, Francesca:

Observations on being Obvious and on Food

As Michael mentioned in an earlier post I have found a gym here and have been taking spinning classes for the past week and a half (Alright, so I have taken 4 in total, but that is pretty good for being on vacation--I wasn´t averaging any more than that at the Y¨). It has been a fun adventure. First of all, as it turns out I don´t understand Spanish at all if an extremely fit instructor is yelling it and it is combined with loud fans, really bad loud techno versions of Madonna songs, and the sound of 10 other huffing and puffing people in a room with no air conditioning. Despite how it sounds, it is really fun. The classes here have a bigger focus on keeping a fast rhythmical pace than the ones I took in the states which means less going up big hills and more speed which is hard for me. One of the things I do understand it the ¡Ritmo! ¡Ritmo! ¡Ritmo! shouts, being the gringa that I am, my ritmo just really isn´t that good. The other thing about my gringaness is that I stick out like a sore thumb. First of all I am dressed funny. My shorts are way to long and not nearly tight enough (I didn't bring my bike shorts) and my t-shirt is way too big and floppy. The subtle differences in dress that mark someone as a foreigner are hard to put your finger on--but trust me I look different. The more salient reason that I stand out is that I am GIANORMOUS compared to the other women (and men) in the class. When we do stretches and reach up to the sky you can't see anyone in the row behind me (I sit up front so I can see the instructor to make up for my poor comprehension). When you look over in the mirrors, there is my head popping up a foot above everyone else's. The bikes actually don't fully adjust to fit my body, my arms are too long and the seats don't move far enough back. The one bike that might is stuck in a very low seat position. I am not sure if that is just a function of the brand of if they sell smaller bikes here in Latin America. It has been fun to be the gangly awkward one and it has given me some insight into what it would be like to be really tall compared to everyone else in our own culture. It hasn't been negative, it is just very obvious.

The second part of my post is unrelated really to the first and it is about the food here in Mexico. One of the things I have noticed as Michael and I have shopped in the supermercado for our little cold food picnics we have in our rooms is that there seems to be two extremes of food here in Mexico. Either everything is made from whole ingredients, chicken, tomatoes, oil, corn massa, milk, chilies, fruits, and veggies, or it is highly processed packaged food. They don't seem to have the kind of intermediate kind of packaged foods like we have in the states, stuff you might find at Trader Joes. Like cookies that you can read and recognize all the ingredients in but still buy in the store or packaged salads. Most likely this is because in the states most of our food is processed or packaged to some extent so there is a market for the middle of the road stuff that is a little less processed than gummy candies and Pringles. It is a fun adventure to eat in a new place. Yesterday I bought home a new fruit from a little veggie shop, I couldn't get the name but it looked kind of like a pine cone but broke up really easily had white flesh and big black seeds. Actually the one I tried in the shop when I asked the girl there about it was really yummy but the one I brought home was over ripe so Michael didn´t get to enjoy it really. That is all for this post.

Send us your mailing address in an email and we will send you a post card. Think of it as bonus for following our adventures on our blog!

Tulum and New Friends

Yesterday was a really wonderful day. So was today, so I am in a happy mood. Today was good because I have a new teacher and he is really good. I think I am going to learn a lot this week and I really hope I stay with him the next two weeks we are here in Playa. But on to yesterday. We woke up lesisurely and went off to use the internet and then returned for a "bed picnic" which is our version of eatting in ( see pictures in Michael's next post). Around two we decided to head to the beach and I went down stairs to ask the owner of our hotel, Emelia, how to get a collectivo to get to the beach we wanted to go to. She told me that she and her nephew, Joel, were heading to Tulum if we wanted to hitch a ride they could drop us off, or better yet, we could go with them!

So we decided to head to Tulum instead of saving it for next weekend. Tulum is another archeological site but this one is famous for its location right on the coast, and it was pretty incredible. In addition, there was the added benefit of spending the whole day with native speakers and only speaking in Spanish, which of couse is the main goal of this whole adventure. Tulum was a major location for trade in its time and well defended, one side to the sea and three large walls surrounding the main city. Much of the stone carvings were better preserved here than those we saw in Coba and you could make out the intricate designs of the stone heads at the corners of the buildings. In addition, the views were just breath taking. With the vibrant blue sea as a back drop to the ancient ruins. Perhaps one of my favorite parts was the iguanas who make their home at the site in modern times (probably in ancient times to I imagine). They were huge! There should also be pictures of them coming soon. After exploring the site the four of us returned to the car, and on our way, saw a large cangrejo (crab) running across our path, a fair distance from the sea. I think they may actually live on the land as I vaguely remember reading about land crabs at some point in one of the guide books.

After the crab, we headed for one of the local beaches which was a bit difficult to find but well worth the effort. The sand there was more like white powder than sand and there were sponges and other interesting sea treasures washed up on the shore to look at. (At least that is what I was looking at, Michael informs me there were also topless women, but I, of course, didn´t notice this.) When we returned we were all famished. Together Emelia and I put together an impromptu dinner with some chile verde con venison that came from the deer on her family farm and our spanish tortilla (which is actually an omlet) that we had bought at the grocery store on Saturday night. We sat around until almost 11 chatting with Emelia and Joel and Francesca, a classmate of Michael´s who is from Italy. It was one of those days that you hope for when you are traveling. Where plans just happen, people are just nice, your timing is just good, and everything is just fun.

Our mission this afternoon is to get our clothes washed, I am on my last clean outfit. Given how hot it is here wearing things multiple times is a sure fire way not to make many friends in class. This evening there are plans for watching an open air movie on the beach. Right now it is time for lunch and to let others use the computer.

Mexican Ruins and Ruined Mexicans

(Updated) Alternatitle: Arresting Views and Viewing Arrests

We'll start with the second subject of today's brilliantly conceived blog topic line. Friday afternoon, after the conclusion of our first week of classes and with possible storms messing with our beach time this weekend, Emily and I went down to the shore for a dip and the ocean and some relaxing on the sand. The dip in the ocean was uneventful (though very nice--the water here is lovely, and the sand is mostly soft, with a few big rocks thrown in to keep you guessing). The fun started when we got back to our shady spot under some palm trees, just in time to see the local police arresting a Mexican man who had apparently been trying to steal some stuff out of someone's bag that was lying around on the beach. The two tourist girls who owned the bag must have come back in time to catch him in the act, and the police came onto the scene. If there was any doubt about the man's guilt, they got rid of it when they pulled one of the girls' watches out of the guy's bag. Our stuff, thankfully, was safely stashed amidst the group of locals under the palm trees who weer all tsk-tsking about how this kind of thing (theft) is bad for tourism and so bad for the city.

On a much more positive note, Emily and I went with two of our schoolmates yesterday to the Mayan ruins at Cobá. The city of Cobá was one of the largest of the Mayan empire, and served as a crossroads between other Mayan cities and even other nearby civilizations. The site spans several kilometers in every direction, with roads extending from Cobá to cities at least a 100km away, and the city is thought to have been the home to about 40,000 Mayans. It doesn't get as much press as places like Chichén Itzá or Uxmal because it hasn't been as well excavated, and maybe also because given its size, it's not as tourist-friendly. Still, it's an interesting site.

The four of us took the bus down to the Cobá bus stop, from which you have to walk about another kilometer to get to the ruins. Along the way, we passed by a large lake and got a peek at a couple of iguanas and two crocodiles lazing in the water. There's actually a small, rickety-looking pier built out into the lake for tourists to walk down and get close-up croc shots, but according to the man who so swiftly ran from across the street to inform us, we had to pay to use the pier. It wasn't worth it, so we kept walking.

At the ruins, we passed on the option to have a guided tour, as well as the option to rent a bike, and we set off walking along the path through the site. Cobá is nestled in a jungle, and the path is well-shaded by trees. There are several small paths that branch off from the main one, but our guidebooks all warned that those paths were unclear and there wasn't anything to see worth the risk of getting lost in the jungle for the rest of your (now likely brief) life. We stuck to the path and headed straight towards the high point (quite literally) of the ruins. About 1.5km down the path (sorry for speaking in metric, but such is life down here), we came to El Castillo, among the tallest pyramids in the Yucatan, if not the tallest. It's also one of the few you are still allowed to climb to the top of--I just learned that you can no longer climb up the pyramid at Chichén, as I did when I was there in 2002. So, Emily and Francesca (an Italian friend from school) set out for the top, leaving our German friend, Nancy, down on the ground on account of her fear of heights. The climb amounts to about 12 stories, and the view at the top is a lovely one high above the top of the jungle. We also had a beautiful view of the storm clouds--the effect of Gustav--creeping in and invading our beautiful blue day.

After a little bit on the top of the pyramid, we made our way carefully back down (it's much harder down than it is up) and spent some more time walking through the site. Most of the rest fo Cobá are smaller stone structures and a number of stelae that were apparently engraved with meaningful pictures and symbols but which now look like little more than big rocks prominently displayed. Several of the stelae have pictures displayed next to them to help the unknowledgeable viewer (i.e., us) figure out what was once depicted on them. But even with the visual aid, there's not much to behold. We also came across a couple of ball courts, which are present in just about every Mayan ruin, and which were the sites of ancient games played for political and sometimes religious purposes, often followed by the sacrifice of the losers or, on occasion, the winners (not much to play for in that case, is there?).

Finally, after a few hours of walking through the jungle, we decided to wrap it up and head out to lunch. As we left the park, the rain started in earnest, so we made our way back down to the bus stop, where there was also a reasonably cheap restaurant that promised to get us lunch within the 30 minutes we had until our bus arrived. On the way to the restaurant, we all got pretty well soaked by the storm, but nobody got hit by lightning, so we had that going for us. After a rushed lunch, we got on the bus and headed back home, well satisfied with our first of what promises to be many adventures through ancient Mexican history.

Pictures to come in the next few days. In the meantime, check out the link to the Wikipedia page to see previews, given that the pictures posted there are unsurprisingly similar to the pictures we took ourselves.