With Cinco de Mayo right around the corner, my brain is buzzing with thoughts of Mexican food -- burritos, tamales, chorizo. But at some point, thoughts switch to faux Mexican dishes, the US concoctions that are more fusion than ethnic. This then leads me to my first forays into recipe creation. I've been cooking and baking since I was a little kid, but it wasn't until I hit puberty and got sick of those too-simple Old El Paso taco mixes that I discovered that recipes are nice, but not necessary.
My mother handed the kitchen over to me, and told me to make my own tacos, since I wasn't happy with the dry, plain mix. In a flurry, I was pulling out old spices that were covered with dust, sniffing, shrugging, and throwing them in. I scoured the fridge for anything that might work and added that. In a blink, I had a meal that was better than any powder or simple sauce. It was just as easy, there was no extra mess, and the result was so very worth it.
Check out the "recipe" after the jump, and let me know what your first unique creation was.
Cheese Course: Brebis Pardou
A transcendent summer tomato salad
Sliced bread turns 80 today
