Frijoles, Take 1: Basic Beans

I'm dating a Mexican, as I have mentioned before. We've been together for 2.5 ish years and some of the perks of being with a Mexican are the access to the amazing culinary world that is traditional Mexican cooking. Like the pure bliss that is a homemade corn tortilla or tortilla hecho de mano. His family are brilliant cooks and naturally the matriarch's want that quality in the woman he is with.

Enter me.

Chef. Check. Baker. Check. Ability to cook Mexican dishes. Not so much. Practice makes perfect as they say, so I bought a couple cookbooks for Mexican food from authors that were hailed as being truly auténicos. My first attempt at something beyond the realm of a tortilla--which was a challenge, by the way, and is also supposedly the most simple--is pinto beans. So I bring you, my attempt and subsequential failure at making frijoles. Oh, and because a sad story isn't what you came here for, my knight in shining armor rescues me at the end. Don't worry. (I know you were worried.)

I made myself some Agua de Sandia and consulted the lovely ladies from Muy Bueno for a simple way to make pinto beans. There are thousands of ways to make pinto beans. Each family from each region does it differently. I always forget to take that into account. So while the lovely ladies from Muy Bueno are from Northern Mexico and Texas, my man is from Jalisco and that's a whole lot of space and recipes between those two areas. To me, beans are beans, but to mi Mexicano, it is a way of life and heritage. Someday I hope to understand that difference.

 


I gathered my ingredients: a bag of dried pinto beans, a white onion, and salt. I happened to have some salt from Colima that we bought while visiting his family in Jalisco. It packs a punch.

I poured out my beans onto a cutting board to pull out any that were shriveled, broken, or discolored; as well as any pebbles, if there had been any--there wasn't.

Then, the directions said to rinse off the beans for about 3 minutes under cold water.

Finally, to soak the beans for 2-4 hours. I was doing this later at night on a Friday, so I figured leaving them to soak overnight would be no big deal.

Friday night pre-soak.

Saturday morning, after soaking for 12 ish hours.

Saturday morning, I woke up, poured out the soaking water, added some new water and put them back on the stove. Turned the heat onto medium-high to get the water to boil and then reduce it down to a simmer temperature. Difficulties ensued. I may or may not definitely added too much water; so getting the whole pot hot enough for a boil was a challenge to say the least. Once it did boil, I then had trouble finding the appropriate simmering heat. C'est la vie! Eventually, they got cookin' real good and I added in my onion and salt. Just in time for the boyfriend to appear and try them out. He said not bad, they were almost done, just needed a bit more salt. They tasted a little salty to me, but he's the expert, so I added more salt and kept on cooking. Fast forward, they are done, and now they are too salty, he says. Damage was done. I attempted to salvage, but ultimately we just had to cut our losses and try again.

My beans after cooking...yeah, they even look like there is something left to be desired.

Enter white knight and his abuelita albeit unknowingly.

Since it was my first time, he cut me some major slack and helped rescue me by showing me how his family makes beans.

Their way:

Javi started by putting the beans in the pot (after washing it) and half filling the pot with cold water. He explained to me that when you do this, rather than laying them out on the cutting board, you will find all the "bad" beans because they will float. Interesting and cool. Next, we dumped out that water and added enough water to fully cover the beans and about 1-2 inches above them. Then, we started straight away to boil them and kept them at the medium high heat for the entirety of cooking. We continually added more water as the level got low enough to expose the beans. 2ish hours later...we got frijoles y'all.

Now these are frijoles de pinto.

I am very thankful for this man, words cannot even express. So all in all the recipe didn't quite work for me but maybe if I'd followed it more exactly (and added less water initially) it would have. Luckily my man saved the day. If you made it this far, I question the amount of time you have on your hands, I thank you for reading and say until next time my friends. Next up: Frijoles, Take 2: Frijoles Refritos.

Love Always,

Joanna Rose

Cream Cheese Wontons (Pick Up Stix Copycat)

When I was living in Southern California, one of my absolute favorite things was Wonton Wednesdays at Pick Up Stix. So. Good! And so Cheap! 25 cents per wonton. I could easily eat 10 of them. But I didn't. Well, most times I didn't. Now you know my true obsession...

Seeing as how Seattle has yet to become home to a Pick Up Stix, there is no more Wonton Wednesdays for me. Well, that is, until tonight, when I decided to recreate them. Actually, I enhanced them. By the way, I only made these because I stupidly bought 6 bars of cream cheese while it was on sale in anticipation of making a cheese cake for my Adorable Latino. (The recipe I ended up using, which was ah-mazing!, only required one bar. Aka, shit, what am I going to do with all this cream cheese? More cheesecakes? Maybe Most likely.) I based my recreation off of Nerdy Baker's, she seemed as obsessed with them as me, which you can find here. But like I said, I changed it up. Being a connoisseur for many years, I added a key ingredient and one not-so-key, but definitely a game-changer.

These wontons are light and crispy on the outside and warm and gooey-cheesy on the inside. Yum. Yum. Yum. Win. Win. Win.

Let's get started, shall we? Gather your ingredients:

I may have gotten a bit ahead of myself and started mixing before the picture taking. :)

Ingredients:

1 8 oz bar cream cheese (Let's be honest, Philadelphia Cream Cheese wins every. single. time. Do your taste buds a favor and use it.)
48 wonton wrappers
1 egg, beaten
1/3 c. green onion, very finely sliced
1 T. Soy Sauce *key ingredient!*
1/2 tsp. kosher salt, then add more to taste
4 oz. water chestnuts, finely chopped (you can use more, but I personally feel it drowns out all the other awesome flavors you are mixing in, so I recommend the "less is more strategy")
Peanut Oil (enough for 2 inches in your pan or pot)
2 tsp. secret ingredient (shh. don't worry, I'll tell you later)
Sweet Chili Sauce, for dipping (optional)
Chinese Hot Mustard, for dipping (optional)

 Process:

Step 1. Put peanut oil in pan and heat to roughly 300 degrees; this will take roughly 10 min. I am not very precise with the temperature; I like to test out the temperature with some wonton strips.

Step 2. Place cream cheese, sliced green onion, chopped water chestnuts, soy sauce, and salt in a small mixing bowl and use a fork (or hand mixer) to blend together. You can taste test here, but I recommend that you make a sample wonton and cook it to taste to really get the full flavor profile to know if it needs more salt or more secret ingredient. ;)

Step 3. Are you ready to add your secret ingredient? Cause I sure was! Sriracha sauce!! I love this stuff. I add it to sauces, sandwiches pretty much everything I can. MMM. Mix the Sriracha in well.
*For those of you who do not like spicy food, this does not make it spicy at all, just little extra/different flavor.
**Keep mixture covered with a damp towel so it doesn't dry out at all.

Step 4. To test the oil temperature, cut three wonton wrappers into strips, separate them. Take one strip (with tongs or a skimmer, no getting oil burns, please!) and dip into the hot oil.
If the oil is hot enough, it should rapidly sizzle. If it is hot enough, throw all the strips you cut and fry them until they are lightly golden brown (watch carefully! they will cook quick). Pull them out and let them drain on some paper towels.
If the oil does not react at all or it only reacts a little, it is still too cold and the heat should be turned up a little. Repeat temperature test after 5 minutes. If still not hot enough, continue heat and test cycle until the desired sizzle-y effect happens.

Step 5. Now that the oil is to the correct temperature, it's time to make your sample wonton to cook and taste test. Lay out one wonton wrapper, put roughly 1 tsp. of the cream cheese mixture in the center of the wonton, as shown below. Brush beaten egg around the edges of the wonton wrapper; I recommend using the back side of a small spoon (this helps get a thin even coating). Take one corner and fold it over towards the opposite corner (forming a triangle); leave about 1/4 inch of the bottom showing. Press the edges to get out any air bubbles. Put just a dab of egg in the center of the folded edge. Bring the side edges over to the dab and again, press to seal the edges and get extra air bubbles out. Finally pull the top down (like an envelope) and press to seal. (Please note: the top already has egg from the initial brushing.)

The top corners will fold to the center where I already placed a dab of egg.

Using tongs or a skimmer, place in the oil and let it cook for 30 seconds. Turn it over, let it cook over another 30 seconds. Continue turning until it is a light golden brown, pull out and let it drain and cool for 1 minute. (I know it's so hard to wait!! I could barely contain myself. But let me just say, molten cream cheese + my tongue = pain for days.)

After my initial taste test, my cream cheese mixture needed a pinch more salt, which I added, and then taste tested again. Juusssstt right.
Step 6. I did my wonton forming in mass assembly. Lay out as many wonton wrappers on my cutting board as it could handle (6 at a time). Then follow the same process in Step 5. Create all of your wontons before you start cooking them in mass quantities. I don't know about you, but when I am cooking, I can't watch and flip things at the same time as other things off the stove.

Step 7. Cook your wontons no more than 5-6 at a time. Even if your pan can handle more than that, this is a small enough number that you can keep track of each one's cooking progress. Drain on paper towels and let cool for 1-2 minutes. Depending on how many you are making, you may want to turn your oven on to 150 or 200 to keep them warm but not crazy hot.

Step 8. If desired, put sweet chili and hot mustard in a couple of small, shallow bowls or ramekins, place on a serving plate surrounded by delicious cream cheese wontons. And last but certainly not least, enjoy!!

Hearts Always,

Joanna