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Wahaca butchery day

We’re always looking for new ways to come up with recipes and to use different cuts of meat at Wahaca, so a couple of days ago Tommi invited all of our chefs over to her house for a day of butchery and recipe development.

Our lovely butcher brought along half a pig, along with a couple of more random cuts to see what we could come up with. It was brilliant to see all of the chefs’ minds whirring at the same time and the results were as tasty as you might imagine.

Dishes included Elki’s rather scary sounding pig head tortas, drowned in chipotle salsa (‘tortas ahogadas’ to you and me) and Leo’s slightly less Mexican, but no less delicious pork and herb sausages! There was also Mexican Pozole, chicken liver tacos and beef cheeks cooked in a red mole.

Are there any Mexican inspired dishes that you would love to see us try out for the Wahaca Menu? Or indeed that you’ve tried out yourselves and would like to share with the team? Don’t be shy.

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Just a little bike ride: Mims is off to Mexico!

Those of you who’ve been following her training progress will know that our training manager, Mims has signed up for the cycle of a lifetime to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support. She’s cycling from coast to coast across Mexico and when we caught up with her yesterday, here’s what she had to say:

So, the moment of truth has come – in just over 24 hours I will be boarding a plane bound for Mexico City and 400 miles of cycling. Am I ready? Time will tell, but one thing is for sure – I have never been so excited in my life! Over the next 2 weeks, I will be sharing a tent with someone I haven’t met yet, cycling 650km in 8 days, climbing 3000m up a road 57km long, eating lots and lots of carbs, bathing in streams and undoubtedly having the adventure of my life.

I would like to express a big thank you to everyone who has supported me over the past few months – you know who you are. Without your support, this dream would not becoming a reality, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Viva Mexico!

We’ll be keeping you updated with Mims’ progress as she sets off on her journey on Sunday, so keep your eyes peeled and your fingers crossed. If you’d like to support Mims and find out more about the great work Macmillan Cancer Support do, you can by clicking here. You can wish her luck, offer advice, or indeed try to talk her out of it by posting a comment below!

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Tequila tasting at Wahaca Soho

On Wednesday night we hosted the second of our tequila tastings in Soho, with the aim of selecting a new range of special guest tequilas to put on our bar list over the next year.

Since opening Wahaca, we knew we had a job to do when it came to tequila in the UK. It is such a misunderstood drink here, and there’s good reason for that – The prominence of low quality tequilas that leave you with a burning throat and a lingering feeling of regret has done huge damage to its reputation as a quality spirit. So we pledged to only stock tequilas that were of superior quality, 100% agave, and that had passed our own taste test. Move forward 4 years and we’ve got a list of tequilas that we’re really happy with, and we are developing this pledge further. We have been working with the Mexican Tequila Board to search out tequilas that are not available outside of North America. Tequilas that have been made with quality in mind, rather than mass production. The kind of tequilas that are sipped by those that really know what they are talking about. Our aim is to not only be able to offer these tequilas to you, but also to give these smaller suppliers the opportunity to give their products international recognition for the first time.

The Mexican Tequila Board very kindly sent us an early Christmas present of around 35 bottles of just such tequilas. None of which are available outside Mexico, none of which we had tasted before, and all of which sounded like they would be welcome additions to our bar list. But we don’t want to just add any product to our list, so they needed tasting. You don’t get this opportunity every day, so we thought that we’d share them around with our most deserving friends. 

We invited our facebook fans to write in and tell us why they should be chosen to join us and we had a great response. We narrowed the field down and selected our panel of experts, who would be lending us their taste buds for the evening.

The evening was masterfully compered by Henry Besant, of the World Wide Cocktail Club, and who is about the most knowledgeable tequila aficionado in the country. He introduced us to a mixed selection of 9 tequilas that he had picked from our consignment and we diligently set to work tasting.

We ended the night having sniffed, slurped and swilled our way through 3 blancos, 3 reposados, 2 añejos and 1 extra añejo. There was debate, an exchange of words such as vegetal, herbal, woody and even bacon, and a pleasant feeling of having been involved in something that signified another small step in the right direction for tequila in the UK. Our voting system led to 4 winners, but there was a general consensus that in fact 3 of these had something extra special which made them stand out: A blanco named Tequila Gran Orendain, an Añejo named La Fortaleza (or Los Abuelos) and an Extra Añejo named Tequila Campo Azul.

Now, we should say here that the funny thing about tasting tequilas that you’ve never heard of before and which aren’t available outside of Mexico, is that occasionally you realise why that’s the case!  We did taste some slight duds on the night, especially in the Reposado category. We happily supplemented them with a comparative tasting of our current house pour, El Tesoro Reposado, and were all agreed that there wasn’t any need to force the issue, none of the Reposados could measure up on the night, so they’d stay in Mexico for the time being.

Thank you so much to Kate, Ed, James, Yashoda, Jesús and Paul for responding to our request and coming along and lending us their taste buds and opinions. Thanks also to the Mexican Tequila Board for supplying us with tequilas that wowed, challenged, delighted and surprised us in near equal measure. And finally thank you to Henry for leading the way once more.

You will be able to see the final results from all of our tastings up on our blog soon, and most importantly taste them for yourself as they each take up their monthly guest spots over the coming year. We really hope you’ll enjoy our choices.  If you have any thoughts on our tequila list, or general musing about this magical drink, please feel free to let us know in a comment below.

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Celebrate Dia de La Candelaria at Wahaca with free Tamales

Tomorrow, February 2nd, the Dia de la Candelaria festival will be celebrated across Mexico. The tradition goes that whoever is lucky enough to find the small baby Jesus figurine in their Rosca De Reyes cake on the 6th of January should treat all of their friends and family to a meal of tamales on February 2nd. Anyone eagle eyed enough to have read about this year’s winter menu will have spotted that Tommi was hugely excited to be able to put two types of tamales on our menu for the first time. And very delicious they are too!

So, never one to let up the chance to have a bit of a party, tomorrow, we’ll be giving free tamales to anyone who comes in with a small baby Jesus figurine. OK, that might be a bit tricky. We’ll be giving free tamales to anyone who comes in with a picture of a baby Jesus figurine, and funnily enough, we’ve put one just here:

So, if you feel like getting into the Mexican party spirit, print out this picture, and head over to Wahaca any time tomorrow and get your tamales on!

Here’s some Ts and Cs:
One free tamale dish offered per printed picture, and no more than one per customer.
Offer only valid during restaurant opening times on Februrary 2nd 2011.
Anyone found not having fun may be evicted from the restaurant at any time, or asked to stand in the corner with a bag on their head, it’s a party after all.

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Not just great Mexican food, sort your Christmas shopping too!

Last night saw Tommi hosting our first ‘in-house’ cooking demo in our brand spanking new Soho bar, to celebrate the launch of The Observer Food Monthly’s brand new book “Cook: A Year in the Kitchen with Britain’s Favourite Chefs”. 

We were delighted to welcome the editor, Rebecca Seal to introduce the book.  She gave an eye-opening peek behind the scenes of what it’s like to put together a cookbook with contributions from over 80 of Britain’s best loved chefs. No easy task by the sound of it!

Tommi made child’s play of our brand new demo equipment, elegantly splicing together an amazing range of salsas – Chipotles in Adobo, Roast Chipotle Salsa and Chipotle Mayonaise – Who knew Chiptole could create such amazing flavour?! They were all delicious and can be found throughout our menu if you look closely.

But we’re not just telling you this to make you jealous, you can join in the fun too. The Observer & Guardian Book Store  have very kindly offered you, the good readers of our blog, a chance to buy the book for half the normal price. All you have to do is visit their website and pop the code “Wahaca” into the field marked ‘promotional code’, then start impressing your pals with a whole range of seasonal treats throughout the year.

Whilst we’re on the subject of books, if you did fancy cooking up your own version of Tommi’s salsas, then you can learn all about them in her book, Mexican Food Made Simple, which you can find nestled nicely here. It’s really rather good.

So that’s this year’s Christmas shopping sorted then.  Inspired by the markets of Mexico you could say.

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We send Jo to Mexico!

Last year’s Wahaca Scholarship was won by Jo, our assistant manager in White City and so she packed her bags and off she went to Mexico! Here’s her report on her trip, the sites she saw and the things she ate. It’s enough to make the rest of us very jealous. Over to Jo…

When I won the Wahaca scholarship and was rewarded with a trip to Mexico I knew there would be a lot to discover, but what I saw totally exceeded my expectations.

Places, people, smells everything was new for me and so exciting.

We started our journey in Cancun where we met our Mexican/ Mayan tour guide Victor. Victor has grown up in the Yucatan Peninsula so we were assured he would show us the real Mexico. A few hours later as I was sitting in my hotel room, margarita in hand, it seemed like a good chance for a rest, but Victor had different plans.

Our hotel was situated in a very small village next to Chichen Itza so Victor decide to give us a tour around Maya-land.
That day he introduced us to a whole population of Iguanas and explained how they would become our friends as they can be found in pretty much all of the archaeological sites we’d be visiting over the following 7 days. After a little bit of a safety talk, we felt much more at ease around them. In fact, later that night we discovered they were also living in our building… I have never heard Kate screaming so loud before!

Our week of touring would take us throughout the cultural sites in our region, listening to Victor talk about Mayan history. I felt like I was in a totally magical world.

From standing in front of the third biggest pyramid in the world CHICHEN ITZA, (one of the seven modern wonders of the world and such a beautiful way of showing the Mayan calendar), to EK BALAM a huge Mayan city which overwhelmed us with its immense size and spectacular views. We were totally moved by the archaeology that we were shown and will never forget the sites that we visited.

After a whole week, thousands of pictures and even more stories my mind and my heart has been infected with one thought: will we ever be able to truly appreciate the true depths of Mexico’s heritage? Victor, in his 35 years of experience has seen more and more of his culture, restored every year. Even in this region there is so much yet to be uncovered, and I’m sure it’s just a question of time and money until the 8th wonder of the world is revealed!

After each long day there was time for food and drinks – something that working for Wahaca has made me really passionate about. I was desperate to try as much Mexican food as I could and compare it to the different tastes in Wahaca.

My aim was to find as many dishes we selling in Wahaca as possible, so that I could then tell our customers what taste better, worse or just different.

At first I struggled with the menu as it was all was in Spanish, but after a while familiar words started to appear, one in particular that I knew I had to try in Yucatan Pibil!

Yucatan is a heart of pibil country and we proudly sell lots of pork pibil in Wahaca so I was very excited when I tried my tender, juicy pork taco and absolutely couldn’t tell a difference! They looked, smelled and tasted the same as ours!
Thoughout the trip I tried some amazing food. I had Guacamole every day, chicken tinga tacos, lots of frijoles, quesadillas, sopa de lima (which I think we should add to the menu, it was so tasty!) and all of it tasted just like the dishes I had got to know at home.

And even though every night we ate in different restaurants, for pudding we always had the same – Flan! And trust me when I say it was heaven.

After that trip I knew Mexico would be one of the places I would always want to come back to. There’s so much more to learn and so many more dishes to try! I hope it’s not too long until I can return to continue my Mexican adventure.

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Free tequila? It must be Day of the Dead

From Tuesday 2nd to Thursday 4th November, we’re celebrating Day Of The Dead at Wahaca, with a free glass of tequila for everyone. Not just any tequila either – It’s our brand spanking new, multi-award winning house pour, El Tesoro Reposado that’s on offer to anyone sensible enough to realise that tequila doesn’t have to mean a wincing face and a morning of regret. Oh no, this stuff is good. There will also be plenty of our home made sangrita available (That’s the nice spiced tomato and orange juice that’s every tequilas favourite sidekick).

If you’re not sure what Day Of The Dead is all about, it’s one of our favourite Mexican festivals and worth checking out. It coincides with all saints and all souls day and in Mexico it’s a way of celebrating the lives of friends and family who have died. It sounds like it would be quite a sombre affair, but not a bit of it. Any excuse for a party eh!

We’ll also be giving you the chance to win a signed copy of Tommi’s book each day of our celebrations – To enter you need to fold up one of our origami skulls (that you’ll find in the centrefold of our new Ola London) and upload a photo of yourself to our facebook page. We’ll pick our favourite each day who will be the happy recipients of a book so they can recreate those Mexican masterpieces themselves at home.

So if you fancy a bit of a knees up, and want to get your hands on some of the world’s best tequila, (yes we think it’s that good), then come along from Tuesday 2nd to Thursday 4th November.

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Mexican Cooking comes to The Dock Kitchen

Stevie is an old friend who I met at Ballymaloe, rather a long time ago now. He is an amazing cook with a passion for exotic spices from around the world, beautiful ingredients and unfussy food. The result is a wonderful mix of simply presented food from around the world, never with too many ingredients competing for attention. His flair with spices produces some sensational marinades, delicious chutneys and daals and he makes a mean biryani. One day he is going to teach me how to make his chaat masala too.

He occasionally lets me come and play at the Dock with him. A coulple of weeks ago we cooked Mexican together. We sat down with three-week old Samuel, his first-born and devised a menu together which we cooked all of this week at the Dock (I only did Tuesday and Wednesday as had other menus to do at Wahaca).

It’s a delight cooking there, as like Petersham Nurseries, you can just pop out of the kitchen to the herb garden to pick whatever herb you think might make all the difference to your chillie paste, sauce or soup…

The kitchen is also completely open lined with glass, rather than the conventional walls. How Stevie moved from the River Cafe, with all that beautiful light, to the only other kitchen in London that I know of, that is also an ode to light, is beyond me, but fairly typical of his natural jamminess. On August 21st they are closing for a fortnight and building a souped up kitchen courtesy of Wolf/Sub-zero, possibly the sexiest, coolest kitchen makers in the world, and the restaurant will double the number of seats it has to 80. What excitement.

Meanwhile a brief sypnopsis of our menu. We started with some corn which we shaved off the cobb and sauteed with sweet onion, garlic, a chipotle paste I made and masses and masses of butter. The result, a sweet, smoky, fiery filling for a white corn taco. It was so popular that I think I am going to put it on the wahaca menu next summer. Yum.

Next up was courgettes, a thoroughly Mexican vegetable, sauteed with girolles and summer herbs…

And then a plate of octopus which we rolled in crumbed crisy pig skin, deep-fried and served with a fruity, fiery habanero salsa…

This recipe was thanks to a friend Roberto Solis of the restaurant Nectar in Merida. Totally yummy, thanks for the idea Roberto, I hope you are enjoying Noma this week, you lucky so-and-so.

We did a sopa de guia next, which is a broth flavoured with wild herbs and leaves, which I first had at Casa Oaxaca, cooked by the wonderful Alejandro Ruiz…

And finally a slow-cooked shoulder of saltmarsh lamb, marinaded in ancho, chile de arbol and pasilla de oaxaca chillies and slow cooked over a bed of carrots, celery and onions and served with the classic shredded cabbage, radish and coriander slaw.

The pudding, which I failed to capture (please excuse my crummy photographs) was blackcurrant, hibiscus and tequila made by the lovely Hannah (ex-Ballymaloer) and Mexican wedding cookies made by the equally lovely Lewen (also ex-Ballymaloer maybe?). I had to go back to take these picces on Thursday, when I was no longer cooking and bumped into Mary Portas, Queen of Shops, who was eating there! Quelle excitement! I love Mary’s love of independent shops, what a woman. She was looking as stylish as ever.
So all in all an idyllic week, cooking with Stevie’s amazing team (here is Stevie and Lewen).

Creating food, talking to great people and feeling that life is good.

Thanks so much for having me guys, good luck with the refurb and thanks for the cooking tips.

tommi xxx

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Puerto Nuevo, Cabo San Lucas, Baja California

A couple of weeks ago, I was lucky enough to go on a trip to Baja California, and just had to tell you all about a wonderful cantina on the outskirts of Cabo San Lucas that I was taken to called Puerto Nuevo. It is a total favourite with all the chefs who I met out there. Antonio de Livier from La Frida described it as the best fish place in Los Cabos. So obviously I was very keen to try it out.

The entrance entranced me. All those bottles of salsas. I do love a hot sauce. The more the merrier. This is just what I love about eating in Mexico.

The first thing we had to try was the fish tostada. I don’t have a very pretty picture of it here. Just a close up of the chopped onion, white flesh of the sea bass and snapper and the layer of mayonnaise that was utterly delicious spread over the crisp tostada. Man, I can’t tell you how fresh it tasted! Yummy, yummy, yummy. This was one of the highlights.

Next up was the aguachile. Aguachile means chilli water and it made by whizzing up green Serrano chillies, masses of fresh lime juice and plenty of coriander leaf until you get a lovely vivid green dressing which you dress your seafood with. I normally add raw scallops or mackerel, but here they had tossed in fat, juicy prawns and amazingly tender pieces of octopus along with lovely half-moon slices of cucumber and thin slithers of sweet, red onion. If only we could get a good sweet onion here like the ones in Mexico….

These are the cheerful chefs, cooking in blistering heat. Although the cantina is literally on the side of the road, open to the elements with the tables on sand, the kitchen, as you can see, is spotlessly clean. I love eating in places like this. Places where the locals go. So much more fun than some of the swankier restaurants that are full of tourists, and the food costs a fortune. This is the real Mexico.

This was our last dish, after the lobster quesadillas which I didn’t photograph as I am not entirely sure about fish in a quesadilla. Once they put this down I started smelling a rat. This looked distinctly Veracruzan to me. I can remember eating a jaiba enchipotlada in Veracruz and not being able to stop eating until every morsel had been finished. I asked the waiters about it and it turns out that the owners of this place are indeed from Veracruz. Sadly this jaiba was not quite up to the one I had all those years ago on my roadtrip to Veracruz. The sauces should be smoky, garlicky and sweet from the crab flesh. It certainly wasn’t bad though, just not quite to the par of their delicious tostadas, the yummy aguachile and the pulsating raw clams that they presented to me as a kinda amuse-bouche. This was a lunch to remember.

Tommi xx

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Baja California’s best sashimi ever

I’ve just returned from the most amazing week of cooking, eating and fishing in Los Cabos, Baja California, Mexico. An amazing trip where I learnt the secret to a great batter for fish tacos, how to cook mole negro and the delights of a good recado blanco (from the Yucatan).

Fishing was amazing. We went with Angelo, the chef behind Nick-San, possibly the best sushi restaurant I’ve ever been to. Last week we had the steamed head of a wahoo and some deep-fried seabass and snapper at his place with an evil habanero sauce, but that’s for another blog post. Here is him making up some ceviche and sashimi on a boating trip we went on…

and here is me eating, as usual…

Here is a plate of the delicious sashimi which Angelo whipped up in a flash (nothing to do with me I’m afraid, though the soy-serrano dressing I have made once or twice before and yes, it is yummy)…

Finally here is a picture of one of the beaches we visited… it is ridiculously beautiful and unlike my last ten trips to Mexico, this time I managed to get out of the kitchen and actually hit a Mexican beach! My first one in six years….at last!

Thanks to everyone who helped me make the trip so much fun! More stories to follow soon.

tommi x

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