Blog Post #4

This week, I created my first main dish; chile and jalapeño cheddar corn bread.  I previously made mainly Mexican dishes, but this time my food was inspired by the Southwestern United States. 

 

The Southwestern United States includes New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, and Arizona, which typically consists of “Tex-Mex” style food, which Chef Blackney and I previously discussed (see Blog Post #3).  The word ‘Tex-Mex” is a combination of “Texan” and “Mexican”, which makes sense considering it is most popular in Texas and other border states, such as the ones I mentioned above.  Tex-Mex is originally based off of the food of the Tejanos, who are from Northern Mexico and Southern Texas, and includes food now popular all over North America, like chili, burritos, tacos, and cornbread. 

 

Because I wanted to try something complex, I decided on traditional chili and jalapeño cheddar corn bread.  Although combining the ingredients in both recipes is fairly easy, the prep work (chopping, trimming, etc.) was something I knew prior to this project I needed to work on, so this was the perfect opportunity to do so.

 

After I decided on my chile recipe, I read it over several times and then collected my ingredients.  Once I did so, I knew I had a challenge ahead of me; I had to learn how to chop many different vegetables, which I’ve found to be one of my greatest weaknesses.  Before beginning, I watched several videos online, such as “How to Finely Chop an Onion” by Gordon Ramsay (watch here at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCGS067s0zo / Gordonramsay. “How To Finely Chop An Onion – Gordon Ramsay.” Youtube. Youtube, 15 Nov. 2013. Web. 15 Mar. 2017.).  After a few failed attempts, I finally got it!

 

As for the rest of the chile, it wasn’t very difficult to make, but I had to improvise because I wanted to add extra “heat” to it (make it spicier).  I diced and cooked jalapeños, and then added them to the chile.

Once the chile was complete, I set it aside over low heat and began working on my jalapeño cheddar corn bread.  Similarly to the chile, I had to dice jalapeños as well as scallions, and then measure out the rest of my ingredients.  Although the amount of ingredients needed was excessive, I learned that all of them blended together to create the perfect texture needed for a light corn bread.  Unfortunately, my corn bread was quite dense once it was baked!  Although it had air pockets (a sign that it is light), the batter may have been too heavy.  If I were to create this recipe again, I would adjust it so there was more liquid in the batter.  By itself, I found the corn bread too “heavy”, but when paired with the chile, it was perfect.

The cornbread had MANY different ingredients!

Before and after cooking the jalapeño corn bread

From here, I will begin researching how to create dishes as a whole, and will also be practicing my cooking skills individually.  Besides this, I would like to work on my time management, and maybe run a sort of “Chopped” competition for myself.  Hopefully by next week I will be able to make another Southwestern main dish, and possibly some sides.  Thanks, and check back soon!

This week, I commented on Meltzer, Zarrow, and Miles.