American Classics VIII: Tacos - Recap

Alton stands before the stars and stripes to open another episode of the series-in-a-series, American Classics. As patriotic music plays softly, the flag lifts to reveal the Good Eats kitchen, and on the counter, the rotating drum from which Alton selects the topic of each edition. A few spins later, Alton opens the door and extracts a card that bears the name of this edition's topic: tacos.

The taco has (for better or for worse) been fully assimilated into the American meal experience, so the choice isn't as odd as one might believe. Alton has at times contemplated owning a “taco truck” from which he might dispense the tasty handfuls. But he is no Mexican chef and doesn't even know much about Mexican food. However, being an American “mutt” he does know sandwiches. And, yes, the taco is a sandwich.

At this point a fop appears: the Earl of Sandwich and putative inventor of the sandwich as the concept of stuffing meat between two pieces of bread that served as hand holds. Alton dismisses this dandy and his simple meal of bread and meat (earning himself a derisive slap). Then he considers the taco through the red, white and blue lens of... Good Eats!

Folks in the United States may be unaware of the wide variety of tacos found in Mexico, which fall into two categories – breakfast tacos, and dinner tacos. There are no lunch tacos. Varieties include a version made with thin pork steaks wrapped around a spit and slow roasted with vegetables, which may owe its origins to the Lebanese shawarma. Slow-roasted beef and pulled pork are represented, and even “lengua” - from the same root as “language” and made from... tongue. Alton proclaims them tasty. There are even tacos made from crispy pork skins.

But while lovely, none of these are Alton's subject. Instead, he plans to address two varieties that have been abused by gringos just like himself. One is “tacos de piscados” or fish tacos, and the other is a version of “tacos dorados” or fried golden tacos. The latter traveled eastward and elsewhere from New Mexico starting in about the forties until, Alton laments, its fate was sealed by a New York restaurateur named Juvenico Maldonado who filed for a patent on a taco shell molding device in 1947. This, Alton continues, eventually doomed the American hard taco to the lowly fate of the drive-thru burger. But Alton can take matters into his own hands, starting from corn tortillas. Alton fetches a dozen from his fridge. He could make them himself from masa (cornflour dough), but it's easier and no less authentic to purchase them. In his case, from a local factory (these are more common that people may realize and many sell right there).

Alton does need a mold, though. To make it he starts folding aluminum foil at ten inch intervals until he has four thicknesses of the foil. Then he uses a straight-edge to tear the foil neatly. He folds the resulting packet in half, then turns that ninety degrees and crimps the top and bottom edges. He's almost done; to finish the mold, he lightly folds the sides, and then uses the aluminum foil tube as a form to fold the foil packet into a U-shape. As long as this can stand up by itself it is strong enough.

At the stove, Alton heats peanut oil in a 12” iron skillet over medium heat – about five minutes. While that heats he gathers other tools he'll need: tongs and a cooling rack set into a half-sheet pan (to catch the oil). And his trusty Kosher salt cellar. He's ready to cook his tortillas into shells.

He molds a tortilla around his form and holds is there with tongs. He dips the “spine” (the part folded around the form) into hot oil for twenty seconds, then rotates the form so that one side is immersed for thirty more seconds, rotating it once more to cook the other side for thirty seconds (a total of a minute twenty seconds of cooking). He slides the cooked tortilla, still wrapped around the form, onto the cooling rack where he cools it spine up for a final thirty seconds. In just under two minutes total time, he has manufactured a taco shell from a tortilla; he slides the shell off the form to continue cooling, sprinkling on some kosher salt. If he waits until all the shells are cooked, the salt will simply bounce off the cool ones. Each must be salted while still hot.

Once he has cooked all his shells, Alton removes most of the fat from the skillet, returning just a little. He uses that to cook a quantity of onion for a few minutes until it is just brown around the edges. To the lightly browned onions Alton adds some garlic and some kosher salt. Now his skillet is ready for the meat: ground sirloin.

Alton hastens to point out that he does not mean hamburger, which could contain as much as thirty percent fat (meat packers are even allowed to add fat to reach this threshold). “Ground meat” is similarly out – fat cannot be added, but it may already be there, again as much as thirty percent. Ground chuck contains too much connective tissue, and ground round tends to be dry and mealy when cooked. What Alton wants and recommends is ground sirloin, which comes from the flank of the animal near the back, between the dryer round cut and the expensive short loin cut. If there's no ground sirloin in the case, choose a sirloin cut and ask a butcher to grind it for you.

Alton cooks the meat for a few minutes until it is nicely browned. It is delicious, but it is not taco meat until it gets the potion. Alton's potion – his nineteenth attempt – is a mixture of spices and thickeners that turn cooked meat into a flavor fiesta! Into a glass jar, he decants chili powder and cumin, cornstarch and kosher salt, hot smoked paprika, ground coriander, cayenne pepper. The entire batch goes into the cooked meat, and Alton stirs it around to distribute it through the meat. That done, he adds beef broth and brings this to a simmer, cooking it uncovered for a few minutes. This gives the cornstarch time to become a gelatin, which will help hold the mixture together when Alton loads his shells.

Alton's ready to prepare his tacos. He loads a shell with some meat, and selects from an array of traditional toppings (lettuce, tomatoes, cheese and so on) those he likes: a few pickled jalapeno peppers for spice, and some cheese. But not cheddar cheese, doubtless left behind by that wily Earl of Sandwich (the Earl skulks by in the background, pausing long enough to mock Alton). No, to assimilate a culture properly, Alton believes one must eat its cheese.

Mexican quesos (cheeses) fall into four categories. There are fresh, melting, aged, and creams. Alton selects panela, a cheese he fetches from a brine solution. He notes the weave pattern on the outer edge of this cow's milk cheese harkens back to its origins as a Greek basket cheese. Alton likes it for tacos because it will not melt even when laid atop the hot meat filling.

And now for something completely different...

In this case, different means Ensenada, Mexico (on the northern part of the Baja peninsula). This town has been the culinary epicenter of the fish taco world for many decades. In the early 1980s, the fish taco migrated north to San Diego, where it took up residence as that city's unofficial “official dish”. Since then restaurants all over have sought to put their own spin on it. Most of them, in Alton's view, have missed the mark. Some of them have missed the mark widely.

But Alton knows how to fix this. He starts by making flour tortillas in his food processor. To flour, he adds some kosher salt. And then... some lard! Noticing the viewer's shock, Alton points out that lard is likely better for folks than they think. It contains less saturated fat and more monounsaturated fat than butter. Some commercially prepared lard may contain trans fats, but Alton's (which he rendered himself from a Tamworth pig) is free of trans fats. And finally? Lard is entirely authentic.

Alton breaks the lard into chunks and adds these to the processor bowl, pulsing a few times until he produces a mealy, crumbly mixture like pie dough. Then, with the machine running, he adds cool water. This produces a sticky ball of dough. He dusts a counter with flour and kneads the dough, letting it accept as much of the flour as it wants (but no more than that; too much flour would harden the dough). He wraps the resulting solid ball of dough in plastic and parks it in the chill chest for an hour or so.

Baja fish tacos normally use bits and pieces of whatever fish the boatmen are catching that day. Really, any kind of light-fleshed finned critter will do the job. Snappers like cod, bass, mackerel and Alton's personal favorite, tilapia, work fine. Tilapia is a freshwater fish from Africa. It's not at all authentic, but it is cheap, easy to work with, and sustainable (it thrives in an aqua-cultural environment on vegetable food sources). Its mild flavor draws scorn from some fish taco enthusiasts, but since Alton intends to heavily marinate it... At this point, the butcher catches Alton behind the counter where he does not belong, and runs him off.

Back in the kitchen, Alton uses the small work bowl insert for his food processor to prepare some flavor accelerator. That contains garlic, cilantro leaves, lime zest, cumin, kosher salt, and black pepper. He gives that enough pulses to blend it while leaving it chunky. Then he pulses in some resposado tequlia (this variety is aged at least two months but less than a year; resposado means “rested”).

Alton adds this mixture to fish fillets in a zip top bag and uses his fingers on the outside to distribute the mixture before rolling up the bag and tucking it into the refrigerator for a few minutes. While the fish marinates, Alton returns his attention to his dough.

Adding more flour to his workspace, Alton rolls his dough into a log so he can slice it into eight pieces. He forms each piece into a ball, then mashes that into a disk and uses a rolling pin (a dowel will also work) to gradually thin and widen that disc to about seven inches diameter. He stacks these raw tortillas onto a tea towel to keep them separate until he has rolled them all out, then cooks them on an electric griddle set to about 375° F. It will take them just a few minutes per side to cook, and they will blister, but those blisters will collapse quickly. Alton stores the cooked tortillas in a moistened (not wet) tea towel atop a heating pad set on low because he knows they will become crunchy if they sit at room temperature for too long. If not needed immediately, cooked tortillas may be stored in the freezer, separated by parchment and in a tightly sealed zip top bag. The unsaturated fat in lard will absorb oxygen or flavors from its surroundings unless protected, and that is not good eats!

Alton's griddle is still at 375° F, which is also good for cooking his fish, so he adds a little olive oil to help the fillets brown before laying them out to cook for a few minutes per side. While they cook, he discusses crema.

Crema is a condiment that resembles sour cream, but isn't. It is a slightly fermented cream that one does not buy, one makes. To make his, Alton microwaved some cream until it reached about 100° F and then added a little buttermilk. He lidded that tightly and parked it someplace warm for a day or two. When he opened it, it was properly curdled, so he finished it by adding a chipotle pepper and some kosher salt before using a stick blender to mix it to the consistency of heavy cream. He chilled it for use later.

At the griddle Alton removes his cooked tilapia – it falls apart somewhat, which is fine. To assemble his fish taco, he squirts a bit of crema onto a tortilla, then a few strips he has cut from his fish, some red cabbage, lime juice for acidity, and finally some more crema. Simple and delicious.

Alton suggests this dish can “beat the pants off any sandwich” and offers it to the ever-skulking Earl as proof. All that earns him is another disdainful slap. The taco may have been born into a different culture, but it definitely qualifies as good eats!

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