Rhubarb Cocktails (Review)

People are often impressed that I can bake.  Remember the yellow cake I made for one of my ESL students' 60th birthday? "You made this? Wow!" said the birthday girl after she realized that it was a real cake and not a plastic one. I have no idea why she thought I would bring a plastic cake, but hey, who knows? Maybe she received a plastic cake in the past!

A few weeks later, it was another student's birthday. Since I made vanilla the first time, I decided on chocolate cake with a Texan flair: Texas Sheet Cake from the Homesick Texan. I left out the chile powder because I wasn't sure how well that would go over. I assumed they would like it because 11 of the 12 students are from Central and South America. But, what if the birthday girl didn't like spicy food?

Really, they can be a tough crowd! We were learning adverbs this week and I was trying to think of an example of an annual event to teach the word "annually." Trying to give a relatable example, I used the World Cup assuming that my students were soccer fans. Plus, I'd walked away from the USA-Ghana game to go teach, so it was the first thing that popped into my mind. "El Copa Mundial!" I said, hoping to get a "VIVA MEXICO!" or "VIVA HONDURAS!" out of someone. Maybe if my argentinos had been there I would have gotten a stronger response; instead, I heard crickets chirping. Then I realized that the World Cup is quadrennial and well, I changed the subject. Thankfully, one of my students threw out "Rodeo." Whew! Since someone was able to give a better example than I was, I knew that they understood the word.

The moral of that story is that I can't make assumptions when it comes to my students. They are adults ranging in age from 25 to 60 with real life experiences. They certainly aren't the caricatures of people used as examples in my high school Spanish textbooks. They don't all love soccer and they probably don't all love spicy food. Instead of chile powder, I went heavy on the cinnamon. "Canela, no?" one of my students asked. "You made this? Wow," said my 60 year-old student, "You can get married."

Where am I going with all of this? I'm getting there. Whenever someone is impressed that I can bake, I tell them that baking is mostly about recipe selection. Baking differs from cooking because, for the most part, you can't taste and add along the way. What you put into your dough or batter and your baking parameters are going to dictate the outcome (well, that and the ambient temperature, humidity, amount of stirring, precision of measurement, etc.). I don't find baking challenging because baking is all about following the recipe. Sure, you can go on to adapt recipes or create your own, but for the novice baker, your goal is to follow the recipe exactly. Maybe that's easier said than done. I'm a scientist, so that's my job. Baking is a lot like chemistry lab (but hopefully only microbiology lab if you're using yeast or starter).

What I do find challenging is mixing drinks. C is a drink-mixing all-star. Really, I think he could make or reproduce anything. And if I mess something up, he can taste it, tweak it, and fix it into something delicious.

For the summer solstice, I wanted to make a summery cocktail. Enter the Rhubarb & Strawberry Collins. I muddled and poured and stirred. Exit a boozy rhubarb milkshake. My highball ended up watered down and lacking flavor. C was on call at the hospital (his last call shift for at least 13 months!!), so it was up to me to do the tweaking and fixing. I tried salvaging it by adding more rhubarb syrup but it wasn't quite right. Inspired by Rhubarb Floats from Not Without Salt, I added ice cream. It wasn't a knock-your-socks-off kind of drink, but I was happy to drink it.

Why rhubarb? I bought a half pound of rhubarb on a whim with the intention of baking. Instead, we (well, C) made it into rhubarb simple syrup. Basically, chop up your rhubarb (we used 3 stalks), add enough water to cover it and add an equal (or half for a longer infusion) portion of sugar, simmer 20-30 minutes until the rhubarb becomes mush and the liquid becomes a syrup, strain, and chill. Save the mushy "compote" for something else and use the syrup for cocktails. There aren't a ton of rhubarb cocktails to choose from, though it's not hard to find a rhubarb version for most of the classic cocktails. It's a little trickier to use than say grapefruit juice because the juice and flavor are in the simple syrup, so balance is key.

Our Rhubarb Cocktail Recommendations:

C's vote: Ginger Rhubarb Bees Knees from The Bonjon Gourmet
Ingredients: muddled ginger, rhubarb syrup, gin, lemon juice, and orange bitters, shaken with ice.
Tweaks: more lemon juice.
Flavor: tart and fruity, like a rhubarb drink should be (according to C).

A's vote: Rhubarb and Rose Ramos from Food52
Ingredients: London dry gin, lemon juice, lime juice, rhubarb syrup, cream, and rosewater, stirred then topped with ice and soda water.
Tweaks: left out the egg white for lack of pasteurized eggs.
Flavor: rhubarb ice cream in drinkable form.

Obviously the quality of the base spirit and liqueurs plays a role, but I think the secret to mixing drinks is the selection of ingredients: pairing flavors and picking up on the subtleties of each component. For example, I used the wrong base spirit when trying to make a melon infusion. I picked an aromatic, herbal gin instead of a milder dry gin, so the juniper and herbs overpower the melon. I suspect the other secret is practice by way of trial-and-error. I'm still a novice drinker let alone drink-mixer. Because I don't drink much and and I don't drink often, I'll probably just stick to baking! Anyway, I already have a resident "mixologist!"

My highball attempt. Note the beautiful rhubarb syrup!

Espresso Milkshake from Summermoon (Austin, TX)

One Saturday in late March, we ditched Houston and headed to Austin. It was a beautiful sunny morning with hardly a cloud in the sky; there was enough of a breeze to stay comfortable in the 80°F weather. We saw plenty of bluebonnets and wildflowers along the highways and I even convinced C to stop for pictures along highway 36. I was shocked he stopped after we'd spent a whole Saturday the prior weekend driving around looking for bluebonnets, with success!

Just like our first trip to Austin, our first stop in town was at Summermoon Coffee Bar. Last November, C had a "golden weekend," those coveted two days off in a row that only come around every few months, so we visited his best friend from high school who lives in Austin. As soon as we arrived, we stopped at a coffee shop for a "study date" so that C could knock off a few sets of practice questions for his third (and final) medical licensing exam (which he passed! Woo hoo!). While he studied, Elliot and I goofed off.

At one point, Elliot disappeared and returned with an espresso milkshake for C. I'm not a coffee drinker (nor is Elliot), but  C convinced us to try it. It was amazing. Creamy, but not from ice cream, sweet, ever-so-slightly chocolatey, with an earthy, coffee flavor. Summermoon fire-roasts their coffee in-house, so their coffee has a distinct woodiness. Every time I bring up that milkshake, C laughs at me because I claim that I don't like coffee. He also got a kick out of me finishing all of his lattes in Guatemala. Ok, I'll admit it: coffee is growing on me. Now, can I have another espresso milkshake, please? I set off to recreate it at home.

This second time we were at Summermoon, I watched the barista make the milkshake. First, he put ice cubes and a tiny bit of moon milk in the bottom of the blender. He grabbed a to-go cup and drizzled in chocolate syrup. Then, he poured hot espresso into the blender. After that, I got distracted, but I'm pretty sure he added more moon milk (and maybe more ice cubes), blended it, and poured it into the plastic cup. I started drinking it, and the rest is history. It was gone by the time we made it to the Barton Creek Green Belt for our walk.

According to Summermoon's Facebook page, an espresso milkshake is "espresso, moon milk and ghiradelli sweet ground chocolate, blended with ice." So, what is moon milk? Summermoon's top secret, homemade creamer/milk made of 7 ingredients. Coupled with the wood-fired coffee, moon milk gives their drinks a uniquely delicious flavor that their devotees can't get anywhere else. Though many of their patrons are convinced it's made of crack cocaine because it's so addictive, I have the impression that moon milk is made of cream, sweetened condensed milk, other milks and vanilla.

Materials
ice cubes
sweetened milk?
espresso
chocolate syrup

Methods
1. In a blender, combine the ice cubes and milk. Pour in the hot espresso. Blend.
2. Drizzle chocolate syrup into a cup and pour in the milkshake.

Ok, that's not a helpful recipe. I don't even know what one of the ingredients is. So, I tried another route. I stopped at Whole Foods and picked up a jug of double espresso iced coffee with almond milk. I tried blending it with both ice and ice cream but neither gave me the desired result. To be fair, I wasn't digging the flavor of the coffee (I like almond milk, but apparently not with coffee). When I told my mom about the experience she asked, "Why do you always try to recreate things? Why not make it a treat for yourself whenever you're in Austin?" Though I don't want to, I will listen to her. Next time you find yourself in Austin, Texas, head over to Summermoon and try their milkshake!

Interested in making an espresso milkshake on your own? Here's the closest recipe I could find based on the ingredients I saw added (though it uses espresso powder instead of espersso). Give it a shot (pun intended) and report back!

Mexican Chocolate Brownies

The we-move-in-less-than-2-months-so-we-better-start-eating-from-the-cuboards time crunch has begun! So far, we've successfully eaten through most of the canned goods (by canned goods, I mostly mean refried black beans and tomatoes). Still, there are random things that need eating like oats, dates, millet, de puy lentils, sunflower seeds, pine nuts, and a ton of flour (whole wheat, whole wheat pastry, all-purpose, buckwheat, rye, potato, tapioca, etc.). Also, we have at least 15 bags of chills from the Chili Cook-Off that we hosted over Easter weekend in 2013. If you can think of a dried chile pepper, we probably have it! Ancho, cayenne, chipotle, cobanero, guajillo, Japonese, morita, mulato, New Mexico, pasilla, pequin…

The other thing we bought for the chili cook off was a bright yellow and red box of Mexican chocolate for C's chili. I think I used it for something after the chili cook off, but I don't remember exactly what I made. It might have been ice cream. Whatever it was, it didn't turn out, so the box has been sitting in the cupboard taunting me since. I haven't known what to do with the rest of it. The obvious solution would be to make hot chocolate. However, it's currently June in Texas and there is no chance we'll have a day below 80ºF in the next two months. Iced Mexican hot chocolate? I don't know about that.

On Sunday, while C was on call in the hospital, I decided to bake him Mexican chocolate brownies. He says he "hates" chocolate. I find this suspicious because he loves brownies and recently came home with a pint of Steve's Mexican Chili Chocolate Ice Cream "for me," yet only gave me a few bites. Adding to my suspicions, the chocolate ice cream appeared just a day after I made cobanero chili chocolate dairy-free "oat cream." I believe that when he says "I hate chocolate" he really means "I hate chocolate cake." His hatred of cake has somehow tainted his view of chocolate.

Anyway,  last time I made brownies, he gave me a little grief. I told him that I had a brownie recipe that I was excited to try and he told me not to bother, that he had gotten the best brownie recipe from his friend Nick. He asked me how many eggs my recipe called for and told me that since it called for fewer eggs than his recipe, my brownies wouldn't be as good. We decided to have a brownie bake-off. When he pulled up the recipe from his friend Nick, he told me it was the Baked brownie recipe, the exact same recipe I was planning to make. (Clearly he didn't remember how many eggs Nick's recipe called for!)

Objective
Make the Baked brownie recipe with part dark chocolate and part Mexican chocolate.

Materials
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
pinch ground cinnamon
pinch ground hot chile pepper (ex. cayenne, cobanero, or chipotle)
4.5 ounces dark chocolate
1 ounce Mexican chocolate, grated (ex. Ibarra or Abuelita)
1/2 cup butter, cubed
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar, packed
2 1/2 eggs (crack three, whisk together and remove 1 tablespoon)
1 teaspoon vanilla
sliced almonds, for topping (optional)
flaked sea salt, for topping (optional)

Methods
1. Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Grease an 8x8 inch square pan and set aside.
2. Sift together the flour, salt, cocoa powder, cinnamon and chile powder. Set aside.
3. Set up a double boiler (bring about an inch of water to boil in the bottom of a saucepan and set a tight-fitting glass or metal bowl over the water but not touching). Melt the dark chocolate, Mexican chocolate and butter.
4. Whisk in the sugar and brown sugar. Add half of the eggs, whisk, then whisk in the rest. Stir in the vanilla. Do not over mix (unless you like cake-like brownies; if that's the case, whisk away).
5. Sprinkle the sifted flour mixture over the top of the batter. Fold in the flour until just combined. The mixture will be a bit lumpy from the eggs but not from clumps of flour.
6. Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan. If desired, sprinkle with sliced almonds and sea salt. Bake 20-30 minutes (mine took 22 minutes), rotating the pan after 15 minutes of baking. The brownies are done when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with a few crumbs on it (so that it still has moisture but isn't still gooey batter).

Results
Yum! Moist, creamy, and a little spicy. A nice crunch (and flavor) from the almonds.

Discussion
When I first met C, he was disappointed to learn that I liked pickles. He joked that his dream girl was one who hated pickles so that he'd always get to eat two. While we agree on pickles, we disagree on brownies. He's a crust guy, I'm a gooey-center girl. Thankfully we're both in the fudgey not cakey camp, so our brownie sharing partnership is nearly perfect. The only problem is that C is a purist and I like a little crunch now and again (like nuts or chocolate chips or candy canes). Even without that crunch, I'll happily leave him the crusts and dive right into the center.

To give C credit, the Baked brownie recipe makes good brownies. You do have to be mindful of your stirring or you can easily ruin a masterpiece. My only complaint about the brownies is that they are thin. Why not double the recipe for a nice, thick chuck of chocolate gooey goodness? It's possible that it would take too long for the heat to get to the center and leave you with burnt edges and gooey, uncooked, eggy centers. Once I have the heart to try wasting that much chocolate (if it doesn't turn out), I'll let you know and report back with the results!

Rhubarb Sour Cream Crumble Pie

I just got back to Houston after a wonderful week spent at home with my family and friends. The weather was absolutely perfect which is rare for Memorial Day in Madison. We had warm (but not too hot), sunny days and cool, clear nights. It was even clear enough overnight to see the meteor shower! My mom and I bundled up in warm clothes and blankets and each saw 2 shooting stars. She saw both of hers around 10 pm but I had to go back out at 3:30 to see mine. It was neat to lay in the hammock all bundled up in my down comforter, listen to the sounds of the lake and the trees, look for shooting stars and watch the sun begin to rise. That's not something I get to do in Houston!

I spent the rest of the week visiting friends, running a few errands, eating picnic salads of every imaginable kind, burgers and brats (no, I didn't go to Brat Fest). On Saturday morning, I went to a yoga class then met two of my good friends (and their adorable 11 week-old baby boy!) at the Dane County Farmers' Market. I had my fair share of cheese samples but the only things I bought were a cream cheese filled croissant for a very late breakfast and a pound of rhubarb. I made two stalks into Rhubarb and Rye Scones from Apt. 2B Baking Co. and I made the rest into pie.

Objective
Adapt my strawberry rhubarb sour cream crumb pie recipe to a tart, thin (because a two-inch thick piece of rhubarb pie would be a little too much) rhubarb sour cream crumble pie. Based on my Blueberry Sour Cream Crumble Pie.

Materials
1 unbaked pie crust
2 cups rhubarb, chopped in 1/2" pieces
1/2 cup sour cream (low fat is fine or even Greek yogurt)
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup sugar
1-2 tbsp. flour (optional, for a thicker pie)

Crumble topping:
1/4 cup flour (whole wheat)
1/2 cup oats
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup butter, cold and cut in small cubes

Methods
1. Preheat the oven to 450ºF.
2. Place the chopped rhubarb in the bottom of the unbaked pie crust. Whisk together the sour cream, vanilla, sugar and flour. Spread over the rhubarb.
3. In a medium sized bowl, prepare the crumble topping. Use a pastry blender to cut the butter into the dry ingredients or simply use your finger and pinch the butter into the dry ingredients until you have coarse crumbles. Sprinkle over the pie.
4. Place the pie on a baking sheet and bake at 450ºF for 10 minutes, then lower the temperature to 350ºF, tent with foil to prevent the crust from burning,and continue baking 25 to 30 minutes. Cool then chill completely before serving.

Results
Yum! The crust is a deep golden brown and the filling holds it's shape sort of like a cheesecake. The filling is tart and lightly sweetened.

Discussion
I used a store-bought pie crust (which tends to make a smaller pie than homemade 9" pies) and the thickness was just right. In thinking more about it, I might use a graham cracker crust next time I make this pie because the texture of the filling reminded me of cheesecake and that would make it even more cheesecake-like. If you omit the flour, you'll get a runnier pie (check out the pictures of the blueberry version). If you pride yourself in food presentation, I'd recommend adding the flour for clean-edged slices.

I'm sorry I don't have a photo of the pie to share. I didn't even think to take a camera home with me while I was packing! But to be totally honest, in my family, it's not about how pie looks but rather, how it tastes! I'm pretty sure it tasted good because we offered my brother a bite as he was walking out the door and he turned right back around and decided he could wait to leave until he'd had a whole slice. I'd call that a success!

Balsamic Roasted Strawberry Ice Cream

Strawberries and melons are my favorite summer fruits.  I rarely buy melons because I can never finish a whole melon before it goes bad. We even struggle to eat strawberries quickly enough! I frequently panic once I notice that one or two of the strawberries in a carton is moldy. Often, I'll make the remaining berries into a galette, but if I'm not in the mood to make crust, I sit on the internet looking for strawberry recipes feeling defeated. Once, I made a strawberry compote from two pounds of strawberries that were going bad. Aat the grocery store, I suggested that 2 pounds was probably too much, but I was told "don't worry. I'll eat them." That's a phrase I will never believe! So, then we ended up with a giant bowl of strawberry compote that was on the brink of going bad and the only way I could think of to use it was on waffles! The rest of it was frozen. It's probably still in the freezer somewhere..

The next time we had molding strawberries, I gave up.  I washed the strawberries, sliced them and froze them. Unlike the bag of whole frozen strawberries we have lurking in the bottom of our freezer, sliced strawberries can go into the blender and come out smooth, so I made a lot of smoothies. Smoothies are great, but ice cream is so much better.

I've had my eye on a recipe for roasted strawberry ice cream for the past few years.  Whenever I had strawberries, I forgot to roast them.  The same thing happened with bananas. I kept planning to make banana bread with roasted bananas, but every time I made banana bread, I forgot! When I finally bought bananas with the intention of roasting them, I made the banana bread and was disappointed with the results. I didn't think that roasting the bananas made a difference. Fortunately, I wasn't disappointed with my roasted strawberry ice cream!

Objective
To make strawberry ice cream with roasted strawberries. The recipe is a combination of both Zoe Bakes' Strawberry Ice Cream and Homesick Texan's Strawberry and Guajillo Chile Ice Cream.

Materials
For the roasted strawberries:
12 oz. fresh, ripe strawberries, washed with tops cut off
2 tbsp. granulated sugar
1 tbsp. balsamic vinegar

For the ice cream:
3 cups half-and-half
2 tbsp. light corn syrup
1/2 cup granulated sugar
juice of 1/2 lime

Methods
1. In a small bowl, toss the strawberries, 2 tbsp. sugar and balsamic vinegar. Set aside for an hour to macerate (or leave in the fridge while you go to work, run errands, whatever). Preheat the oven to 300ºF. Roast the strawberry mixture on a foil lined baking sheet until you can easily mash the strawberries with the back of a fork. Remove from the oven and thoroughly mash the strawberries.
2. In a large bowl (batter bowl if you have one), stir the mashed strawberries, half-and-half, corn syrup, 1/2 cup granulated sugar and lime juice. Leave in the fridge to chill completely (4-6 hours, or even better, overnight).
3. Once the base is cold, freeze in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's directions. Move to a pre-chilled bowl with a lid and freeze until firm (2-3 hours). Eat within a few days for the best texture.

Results
Creamy, strawberry goodness! Excellent flavor, though its pink color edges toward brown.

Discussion and Future Directions
This is a lovely, light in feel strawberry ice cream. This one wont leave your mouth coated with fat. Excellent to eat in a bowl and also excellent blended with a little milk to make a quick and easy strawberry milkshake! Be sure to eat it quickly, because it will freeze fairly solid in the freezer since it's not as high in fat as a traditional ice cream. If you leave it in the freezer for awhile, just know that it will take awhile to soften up before you can eat it.

This ice cream would be the perfect end to a dinner party with friends or a Memorial Day barbecue. It's sweet, fruity and creamy, but light. It's sure to be a crowd-pleaser!

Guatemala: Rice and Beans (and a Volcano hike!)

One of the best meals C and I had in Guatemala was also one of the cheapest meals we had. It was late on a Tuesday night after we hiked Volcán Pacaya. We struggled to find an open restaurant that we could agree on, so we ended up at the same restaurant we'd eaten at the night before, the Rainbow Cafe. Our meal, Tomato Tarragon Soup for me and Rice and Beans for C, rang up as a whopping 22 Quetzals or roughly $2.85 USD. It was cheaper, more filling, and much more delicious than the sandwiches we ordered the previous night. It might have been an extra delicious meal because of all of the extra calories we burned on our volcano hike (minus the calories we added back by eating volcano-roasted marshmallows).

Volcán Pacaya is an active volcano just south of Guatemala City. When I say it's an active volcano, I'm not pulling your leg. Twelve days after our climb, it erupted, closing the park and airport in Guatemala City. While at first take, it seemed unfortunate that we didn't see any lava, we were extremely thankful that we didn't. We are grateful that we didn't have the same bad experience that family friends of mine had a few years back. They family was forced to run (literally) down the volcano as it erupted. I heard that story after we got back. Thankfully none of them were seriously injured. We learned that maybe volcano hikes aren't the greatest idea. Consider yourself warned!

View on the way up

Ascending into the clouds

Clouds parted briefly so that we could see the "Peak"

Marshmallows roasted in a vent

Back to the food! The Tomato Tarragon Soup was warm and hearty, very appropriate for the chilly February night. My only complaint was that there wasn't nearly enough bread to savor it slowly! The Rice and Beans were simple. The rice was seasoned with a little bit of salt and the black beans were seasoned with garlic. What made it tip the scales was the small bowl of sour cream that they served alongside it. There was something absolutely perfect about the combination of rice, beans, sour cream and hot sauce (which we added from a jar on the table).

Objective
Create a rice and beans dish comparable to the one at Rainbow Cafe in Antigua, Guatemala using dried black beans to capture the right texture of bean.

Materials
0.5 pounds dried black beans
2 cloves garlic, minced
0.5 small onion,chopped
salt and pepper
3 cups rice, cooked
Chipotle Salsa, to serve
sour cream (full-fat), to serve
coarse salt, to serve
cilantro, to garnish

Methods
1. Sort and rinse the black beans under cold water. Add to a large saucepan and cover with 5-6 inches of water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from heat. There are two choices to finish preparing the beans (a) overnight or (b) same day. To prepare the beans the same day, cover the pot and let the beans soak for one hour. Drain, rinse, and cover with fresh water. Bring to a boil with the garlic and onion. Boil the beans until they are soft (1.5-2 hours). Once the beans begin to soften, season with salt and pepper. To soak overnight, rinse the boiled beans under cold water until cool. Place in a large storage container, cover with water and let soak overnight. Then, drain, rinse, cover with fresh water and boil as stated before.
2. Once the beans are soft, drain the liquid.
3. To serve, put a scoop of rice in the bottom of a bowl. Sprinkle with coarse salt. Add a scoop of beans on top of the rice. Add a dollop of salsa and a dollop of sour cream. Garnish with cilantro leaves and serve.

Results
Delicious! Seriously, it's the spicy salsa plus creamy sour cream combination that takes it from beans-and-rice-rice-and-beans to a delicious meal. The beans have texture, setting them apart from canned beans.

Discussion
There's really nothing more to say about the dish other than that you should make this next time you're craving comfort food (warm and hearty but healthy). So, instead, let's talk about beans. I tried preparing dried black beans once before. It went so terribly that I used the rest of the bag for pie weights instead of food. So why didn't I just use canned beans for this recipe? Texture and technique. The texture of canned beans is a little mushier than what I wanted (after all, black beans are a star player in this dish). So, why do I care about the technique? The technique is a good life skill. What if there is an aluminum shortage and we run out of cans? Just kidding. Seriously though, what happens if I get plopped down in an area where everyone uses dried beans so the grocery store doesn't carry canned beans? Do I really want to learn the technique out of necessity? No, I want to be prepared for that day because I suspect that it'll be coming soon (in 74 days to be exact).

Dried Chipotle and Tomato Salsa

Mexico has been on my mind a lot lately, especially Guanajuato. It started with our trip to Guatemala. We spent half of our time in the former capital of Guatemala, Antigua. With it's bright colors, colonial style buildings and cobblestone streets, it reminded me a lot of Guanajuato. One thing that sets Guanajuato apart from other colonial cities is that it's situated in a valley. The main streets of Guanajuato were built where rivers once flowed between the hills, explaining all of the curves and the reliance on a tunnel system. Houses were built up the hillsides, so the colors of the city rise up from the valley. A climb up to El Pípila monument gives a beautiful panoramic view of the city. Unfortunately, none of my photos of the city do justice to its beauty.

In Guanajuato, I lived with a family. My host mom was incredibly welcoming and my favorite part of the day was mealtime because she would stand across from my roommate and I in the kitchen, talking to us. The best practice I got speaking Spanish was with her. I didn't see her husband often because he worked up north in the mines. He frequently came home on weekends and it was nice to have him because he too was very friendly and caring. Whenever he was home for the weekend, he'd spend Sunday on the balcony barbecuing. I didn't see my host siblings much because the only one who lived with us was a high school student who spent all of his time with his girlfriend. The others lived elsewhere (Michigan, Switzerland, and I'm not entirely sure about the youngest but I think he lived with a Swiss couple somewhere else in Guanajuato).

There was a lot of coming-and-going of faces. We frequently had other language students stay with us. One was a friendly guy from Canada who loved to share his sweets from La Catrina. Another was from Korea and mostly kept to himself. Our host sister was home from Switzerland with her boyfriend for a week or two. The only two people who were consistently home were our host mom and her maid, Lupe.

Lupe was quiet and kept to herself. I always said hello and asked her how she was doing, but that was the extent of our relationship. Lupe did a fair bit of the cooking. Every day at lunch, we'd get a huge bowl of soup or rice followed by some sort of meat. Along with the first course, we'd get a stack of warm, fresh tortillas, a plate of limes and avocados, and dishes of salsa (usually two--one green and one red). I believe the green salsa was bought commercially, but when the red one was chipotle salsa, it was made by Lupe. I don't remember exactly how it tasted, but it was my favorite. I could have eaten just her chipotle salsa on corn tortillas for lunch and been perfectly satisfied. I will always remember Lupe by her chipotle salsa and shy smile.

Unfortunately, I have no idea what went into Lupe's salsa. Since I can't remember what it tasted like, there was really no hope that I'd be able to recreate it. If I ever make it back to Guanajuato, hopefully I can learn her secret! If not, this version will have to do! It's surprisingly flavorful for the few ingredients  used to make it.  The color is a deep brownish red. It has a good amount of kick from the chipotles, but it's not super hot. Really, I know that it seems like a lot of chipotles, but it's delicious and not too spicy. It's easy to make and can easily be doubled (or more) for a large crowd. Be sure to let it sit in the fridge overnight to cool and meld. It's a great salsa for tacos but is also great as an appetizer with tortilla chips.

Chipotle Salsa
Adapted from Mesa Mexicana
Makes 3 cups

Materials
1 14-oz. can diced tomatoes (feel free to use a flavored variety or fresh tomatoes)
1-2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 1/2 cups water
5 dried chipotle chiles, stems cut off (about 1.25 ounces)
salt and pepper, to taste

Methods
1. Combine the tomatoes, garlic, water, and chipotles in a medium saucepan.
2. Bring to a boil and simmer for 20-30 minutes (until the liquid has reduced by about 1/3 or the mixture is thick but there's still a little water). Set aside for awhile to cool before blending.
3. Pour the mixture into a blender and puree. Season with salt and pepper. Allow to cool completely then refrigerate overnight. Will keep for a week or two in the fridge (just give it a stir before serving).