Tomatillos!

We visited the Prahran market on Christmas Eve, and the first thing I spotted was a tray of tomatillos, fresh and glorious in their papery husks. The guy sold them for about $5/pound, though he was just throwing out a number. He said they would typically be 50¢ each...yikes!

In any case, they've been nestled in the crisper for a few days, but today they finally got turned into a lovely tomatillo sauce. Extra spicy this time...I threw in some Birdseye peppers, bring short on jalapeños. 

Who knows when I'll find them again...the seller said it had been 18 months since his last batch, and these were from "someone's backyard." Well, three of my seedlings are hanging in there and getting stronger. Hopefully soon I'll be the one with more tomatillos than I know what to do with!

We have seedlings!

As of yesterday, a pepper seed has sprouted.

The tomatillos came up in just about 4 days and two of them are already potted on into larger containers. A third is ready for that, too, and two are growing more slowly.

Recent adventures in Mexican food

We've been doing our best to enjoy Mexican food, both at home and out in the world. Our recent visit to the US was a good excuse to eat as much Mexican food as possible, in LA, San Fran, New York, and even Honolulu.

Here in Melbourne, we visited the Mexican Independence Day celebration at Federation Square. There, we discovered huaraches, at the Los Amates stall--and they were so good that not only did we go back for more, but then we sought out Los Amates' restaurant. It's in Fitzroy (or is it North Carlton at that point?), and conveniently right across the street from Casa Iberica, one of my favorite Mexi-Latino markets here.

We've also gone twice to Radio Mexico, in St. Kilda. In Winter, they had a great happy hour, with a taco and a Mexican beer (I gave mine to Noah) for just $10. They don't have this special anymore now, but they do still have good crab tostaditas and a yummy shrimp-poblano dish.

At this point, my ranking of Melbourne Mexican restaurants is:
1. Los Amates
2. Radio Mexico
3. La Tortilleria (Kensington)
4. Blue Corn (St. Kilda)
5. Bay City Burritos (St. Kilda)
6. Mamasita (CBD; and yep, no higher than this)
7. Zambrero (Port Melbourne)

Finally, here are some of the favorite new recipes I've been using in home cooking. They've worked out REALLY well.
Sopes
Elotes (off the cob)
Requeson Revuelto

Moving is really disruptive

Uh....it's been a while. During the last few months, we've found and moved into our "permanent" house (more on that some time); I've taught my first three courses in Australia; I got dreadfully sick for three full weeks and then mildly sick for three more; we took our first trip back to the US, with stops in Hawaii and New Zealand on the way back; and we did a whole lot of shopping.

Speaking of which, we were prepared for Australia to be expensive. We did our research, checked Expatistan and Numbeo, looked at websites, even walked through stores with a list and a calculator during one of our visits. But we were utterly unprepared for just how expensive Australia actually is. It's kind of insane. We can't figure out how people live on "average" salaries. I may write more about this in the future. But if anyone ever reads this who is considering a move...on our visit back last month, we visited several of the most expensive cities in the US--LA, San Francisco, New York, Honolulu--and kept exclaiming over how cheap everything was, without exception. It is hard to understand how much more it is here, until you're here.

Meanwhile, here's an update on my growing progress. I posted my germination set-up way back in May, then nothing. Why? Because absolutely nothing happened. Here's what my set-up looked like weeks and months after my previous post:

The big problem, I think, was that I didn't understand how to manage watering of the little peat pods. At first, I was worried about their being too waterlogged. But very quickly, they dried out, and I probably never watered them properly afterward.

I'm about to try again. This time I won't bother with jalapeños, which are readily available here in Melbourne. I can find poblanos with some frequency at the Coles on Bay Street in Port Melbourne, and recently at the South Melbourne Market as well; but they're not regular enough, so I've planted another 5 seeds. If they don't work this time, when I'm pretty sure I know how to water, I'll blame my hand-harvested seeds (I just cut open poblanos from Coles), then I'll order seeds from a garden center.

I did also order tomatillo seeds from Beautanicals, and I've planted 5 of those along with my 5 poblano seeds. Come on, hot weather!! (First...come on, germination!)

Finally, I also ordered some supplies to make cotija cheese, following instructions I found here and here, from Cheeselinks. That project has to wait until I figure out where to buy a high-quality milk for cheese-making. More soon, I hope! 

Step 1: Growing chiles

During our pre-move visits to Melbourne, my husband Noah and I stopped several times at grocery stores and big markets to check out the resources for Mexican cooking. I was rather concerned about the chile situation: Though there were jalapeños and many, many Asian chilies, I did not see any of my Mexican standbys, such as Poblanos and Hatch chiles. Among the dried chiles available at local markets such as El Cielo, I can find Ancho, Pasilla, and Guajillo, but not Chiles Negros (though I must admit, I'm wondering whether the local Rancho Market in Salt Lake City actually sold real Chilhuacles, or some Pasilla-oriented substitute?). And though I've seen chiles that look much like Anaheims, I've read that these Australian versions don't have the correct flavor profile.

Imagine my joy when, after we moved, I discovered that the local Port Melbourne Cole's grocery story carries poblanos! But the friendly produce guy warned that they don't always have them and can't predict when they will and won't.

What to do? Well, obviously, to grow our own!

I started by buying some poblanos and jalapeños at Coles. When I cooked with them, instead of throwing away the scraped-out seeds, I saved them, drying them between layers of paper towel in a shallow plastic tray. (Note that I've started this project while still living in our small, temporary post-move apartment with very inadequate kitchen facilities. Note too that it's mid-winter.) After 5 days of drying, the seeds looked ready for the next stage. I'll save space here by saying that I followed the directions in this YouTube video as precisely as possible. I soaked and planted (in peat pellets) 6 poblano and 6 jalapeño seeds, and put them into a heated propagator that I found at Bunnings, along with a propagation thermometer.

Because this is my first time propagating from seed, let alone growing chiles (which I gather are tough to grow), I relied on a couple of other sites for tips, as well. But that UK YouTube video was my main tutor.

It's now just day 2 of germination and there's not much to see.

Just trying to keep the temperature steady between 20 and 30C, and to figure out the proper level of moisture. The video guy said to water with a pipette every day, but the pellets look too wet to me so I am not watering today. Perhaps I'll mist tomorrow. Anyway, I'll update as new things occur!

Of course, just as I start this new blog project, my teaching term at the university is about to begin, and that may slow me down--the priority will be keeping these chiles alive over posting. ;-) Plus, we move into our new "permanent" house in just a week, and that will certainly mean some upheaval. Stay tuned.

Site reboot! Why this is becoming a Mexican food blog!

This post represents a new era for this blog. After 7 years (!!) of inactivity, it's being rebooted as a place for me to document my new Ordinary Life adventures in my new home: Australia. Some day I may tell the story of how this came to be, but right now I want to cut to the chase of this new blog era. Australia is awesome (if expensive) in so many ways, but it has one major deficiency: a lack of the kind of Texas-Arizona-California Mexican food that we love so much. Sure, there are Mexican restaurants, but they are a higher-end niche serving more delicate and refined items than we know from home. There are only a few markets selling Mexican items, and those are heavy on the canned goods (and sometimes, thankfully, good corn tortillas) and very light on fresh produce, cheeses, and other staples.

So, a new hobby is born. I'll be spending a fair amount of my leisure time in Melbourne on gardening, cheesemaking, and cooking--all in an effort to keep good, hearty, Southwestern-Mex meals abundant at our house. Stay tuned for updates and let me know if you are a local reader with any suggestions or tips!