Real Southwestern Pumpkin Bread

This is an authentic sweet pumpkin quick bread from the Pueblos of the southwest.  It calls for canned pumpkin because the government gave commodity foods to federally recognized tribes; stuff like lard, bacon, large jars of jelly, wheat flour, sugar, vegetable oils and canned meats, vegetables and fruits of all sorts.  Some groups got dried fruits of various sources as well; which explains why this bread has dates in it.  Date, of course, come from Arabia and they are not generally grown in the southwest, but they were once a popular treat provided from government rations.  This particular recipe comes from Marcia Keegan's important little cookbook Southwest Indian Cookbook.

SWEET PUMPKIN BREAD

3 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs, beaten
2 cups canned pumpkin (if it isn't puree, mash it)
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 cup dates, chopped
1 cup nuts, chopped
1/4 cup water
2 greased loaf pans


1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Mix sugar, oil and eggs together, whisk to help the sugar to start to dissolve. Add the pumpkin and mix completely.


2.  Meanwhile, sift the dry ingredients together and add, alternating with the water to the pumpkin mixture.  Fold in nuts and dates.  Mix well.  Pour into the greased loaf pans and bake until done.  The original recipe calls for it to bake for 1 1/2 hours, I have found this is too much, so I put the timer on every 30 minutes, and then run a knife or cake tester into them; the amount of sugar in the recipe means that it will burn easily.  They may need to be covered after baking for 30 minutes.  The bread is done when it makes a hollow sound when you knock on it.  

Variations:

You can use roasted or boiled fresh pumpkin in this.

You can change up the spices, and allspice is always welcome in any Native American dish.

More natural sweeteners, like honey can be used in place of the sugar.  Brown sugar can be used too.

Different types of dried fruits are good in this and raisin always go well in any type of quick bread.  

They can be made with any type of winter squash that has been cooked first.

Corn And Huitlacoche Salsa

From chef Mark Miller's cute and helpful Ten Speed Press book The Great Salsa Book, this is really just a pure corn salsa.  Corn smut "infects" corn kernels and turn them into a fungus or mushroom, so it's one type of corn with another:  say, "weird" corn with "straight" corn.  I have cooked with Huitlacoche before--and my Cream of Huitlacoche soup is a household specialty of mine.  Corn fungus as a food ingredient is most often found as a quesadilla filling in an around Mexico City; though it is used as soup ingredient there too.  It also put into skillet dishes, such as with squash, which is used as a side dish or filling for tortillas (tacos); and it doesn show up in a Salsa de Huitlacoche, which is usually served as a sauce for chicken or meat.  Miller's salsa relies completely on the huitlacoche being bought frozen.  It is hard to come by in the this country any other way, unless you pick over farmer's markets or grow your own corn; I have even scored some by picking over corn piles in supermarkets, but not recently.  I guess produce managers are more picky these days--so frozen it is.  There are mail order sources for it.

I know this stuff looks rough, but it is delicious!!

Corn And Huitlacoche Salsa

4 Serrano chiles, roasted and peeled (don't worry if you don't get all the skin)

5 really ripe Roma or farmer's market tomatoes, chopped

2 cups huitlacoche (that's about 11 ounces), thawed, reserve all the liquid

1/2 cup minced white onion

4 cloves garlic roasted in skins

1 tsp. epazote, minced (if using dried, cut to 1/4 tsp.)

Cilantro to taste

1/2 tsp. salt

1 ear fresh corn

2 tbsp. water

1 tsp. adobo sauce (this is easy to come by if you buy canned Chipotle chiles)

1.  Chop the chiles with their seeds.

2.  Place the chiles, the tomatoes, the huitlacoche, any reserved huitlacoche liquid and onion in a skillet, heat and add the garlic, epazote, cilantro and salt.  Cook for 20 minutes, then transfer to a mixing bowl. 

3.  Shuck corn and cut the kernels from the cob.  Place these in the skillet with the water and adobo sauce, heat and then simmer for a few minutes.  Fold this into the ingredients in the mixing bowl.  This good warm with beef and pork.  Allow to come to room temperature and serve it with chips.  In fact, almost all of the salsas in the book can be served with chips if desired, and this is good in or on tacos.

Real Aztec Chocolate Drink Recipe

Spicy Real Aztec Chocolate Drink

It is a recorded that at the time of Cortez's arrival in Tenochtitlan that hot chocolate drinks were reserved exclusively for royalty.  The drink that the sitting emperor Motecuhzoma enjoyed was slightly sweet, made with water and chiles.  Today almost everyone substitutes the water with milk.

2 cups whole milk
4 oz. bittersweet Chocolate, chopped
1 oz. pure bitter Chocolate, chopped
1/4 cup grated Piloncillo sugar (or brown sugar)
1/2 oz. ground real cinnamon (canela) or ground Cassia ("regular" cinnamon)
1 tsp. ground red pepper (if you like it really spicy, use ground cayenne!)
1/4 tsp. liquid vanilla (optional)
Tiniest pinch of salt

1.  Slowly heat the milk and whisk in the chopped chocolate pieces.  Stir well and when it starts to melt, add all the other ingredients; continue stirring until the chocolate is fully melted.  Pour up and enjoy.

Variations

You can make the old way with water for full authenticity.

For a much milder and sweeter spicy chocolate with pure ground Ancho chile.

Omit the chile altogether and use 1/2 tsp. vanilla.

Garnish with sweet whipped cream, chopped nuts or any other favorite chocolate topping.

Substitute allspice for the cinnamon--that's completely native!

Brew favorite sweet herbs in the mixture--mint is good.