So up until now I have been sharing my foodventures in restaurants with you loyal food fans. Today we are doing it a little different, I am sharing with you my adventure in cooking.
The best part of living in Houston is a wide variety of groceries and markets where you can get better ethnic foods than you could find at your average run of the mill grocery store. Between the numerous Mexican, Asian, and many other ethnic stores that cover this diverse metropolis, you are bound to find something to suit your needs.
My adventure led me to El Tiempo Fajitaria the other day, this little market is a part of the Laurenzo family chain of operations here in Houston consisting of multiple restaurants and this gem. I had a craving to grill up some killer fajitas, and who better to buy them from than a restaurant that knows how to make them right.
I had never wandered into this place in my life, and it was yet another one of those experiences in which I realized it would not be a bad idea to brush up on my Spanish. Sure I have two years in high school, but when I cannot even order a slab of skirt steak what good does that really do me? I am covered for beer and well beer when it comes to ordering other places, especially when I find myself stranded on a beach in Mexico.
The meat counter was something to behold, a row of meats you find in authentic Mexican cooking that you often have to search harder to find elsewhere, sure there were your usual cuts of steak and chops, but then there was the tongues, livers, tripe, and feet that you find in the real deal. Basically a lot of food you will never see me attempting to cook.
So I settled on 2 pounds of marinated skirt steak (the preferred choice for fajitas, yes it is a low quality cut, but it works great for the delicious little tacos), and in my issues with translation it suddenly became 2.5 pounds and a long exchange in which he tried to explain butterflying and how large to make the cuts.
As I prepared to leave the store with my sack of meat I saw a cooler with “Tortillas Caliente” written on the side and my mouth instantly began to salivate. There are few things better in this world than fresh hot tortillas in my opinion and this cooler was like a beacon of joy calling to me from the corner. Unfortunately, I opened the cooler only to be greeted by the warm shadow of what was once a cooler full of tortillas but was now simply a cooler full of warm air and good smells. In the pits of my sorrow I looked up and saw shelves full of tortillas made in local tortillarias (tortilla shop in gringo talk) here in Houston, such a better idea than buying a pack of Mission tortillas at the neighborhood grocery.
So I make it back to the work zone, let my meat warm up to room temperature and began to prep some sides for the fajita feast. I was in charge of the grilled onions (no fajita is complete without a delicious side of soft grilled onions), the secret to onions as with most items is butter, I put the slices in foil with garlic, pepper, and cumin. My cohorts also created some guacamole and set up the other fixings including cheese, sour cream, and some of my personal favorite chips Tia Rosa Mega Thin Tortilla Chips.
So after a few minutes on each side on the grill the skirt steak was ready to be sliced up and created into little masterpieces wrapped up in love. There isn’t much more that I can say about it so just enjoy the pictures.
No comments:
Post a Comment