EatMx: Real Mexican food, at home and on the road

Cilantro Soup--Straight from Mexico

The next time you buy a bunch of cilantro, don't use it all in salsa. Set some aside for this fragrant soup, a recipe straight from Mexico. 

Pick up some bolillos at a panadería or Mexican market, make a salad with baby greens and avocado, and you have a lovely, light supper.  A crisp, cold Sauvignon Blanc would make it even better.

SOPA DE CILANTRO Y PAPA
Cilantro-Potato Soup

1 poblano chile (about 8 ounces), roasted, peeled and seeded
1 russet potato (about 8 ounces), peeled, boiled and quartered
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 small onion, chopped
1 large clove garlic, finely chopped
1 1/2 tablespoons flour
3 cups chicken broth
1 cup milk
1 cup cilantro leaves
1 teaspoon chicken seasoned stock base
Salt
Cilantro leaves for garnish

Prepare the chile and potato before starting the soup.

Heat the butter in a large saucepan. Add the onion and garlic and cook slowly until tender. Stir in the flour and cook, stirring constantly, 1 minute.

Gradually stir some of the broth into the flour mixture until smooth. Then add the chile, cut into strips; the potato, the remaining broth, the milk, cilantro leaves and chicken base.

Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, 15 minutes. Taste and add salt as needed. Puree with a hand blender, or cool and puree in a blender container.

Reheat the soup and serve in warmed bowls, garnishing each serving with a cilantro leaf.

Makes 5 cups soup, or 4 to 5 servings.

Eggplant, from Soup to Dessert

What do you eat at the headquarters of the world's largest producer of eggplant?

You snack on dried eggplant strips seasoned with chile or sugar, then move on to eggplant soup (at top), eggplant hamburger on a sesame bun (below) and even ice cream with eggplant marmalade, which sounds hopelessly weird but is delicious--you'd never guess what the marmalade was made of.


The place is the Agrícola San Isidro de Culiacán, a huge growing operation in the state of Sinaloa.  It's so important that even the state governor flew in via helicopter for a lunch arranged for the Aromas y Sabores tour group of chefs and media people.

Set outdoors in a shady area, the buffet seemed endless. There were grilled bell peppers and red bell pepper soup, representing another of the host's key crops.

Sinaloa style seafood included oysters on the half shell and succulent scallops, accompanied by the typical sauce of the region, a mixture of soy sauce, tomato, onion and serrano chile.

Other stations offered estofado de aleta, a tuna fin stew, and smoked marlin quesadillas.  At the far end,  thin slices of a beef cut called cabrería, were cooking over a smoky, hot grill,  seasoned with nothing more than Sinaloa sea salt.


The dessert section included the ice cream with eggplant marmalade (above), tres leches cake and pale round pastries called coyotas that were filled with cajeta.

But why the attention to eggplant? It makes sense when you learn that the company was founded (in 1953) by Don Juan B. Stamatopulos Chaprales.

Catch the Greek name there? Perhaps that explains the pine nut garnish on the soups too. And the logo of a purple eggplant in a purple circle on products that the company markets under the brand Leyson.

The soup was so creamy and unexpectedly good that I wanted the recipe.  And I was lucky enough to get it, from Teresa de Jesus Serafín, one of the students from the Escuela de Gastronomía ISIMA who did the cooking and serving.

CREMA DE BERENJENA
Creamy Eggplant Soup

1 eggplant, 1 to 1 1/4 pounds
5 cups water
1/2 white onion, cut up
2 cloves garlic 
3 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup Mexican crema or very heavy cream
1 tablespoon chicken stock base
Salt, if needed
White pepper, optional
Toasted pine nuts for garnish
Fresh basil for garnish

Peel the eggplant and cut it into small chunks. Place the eggplant in a Dutch oven and add the water, onion and garlic cloves. Bring to a boil, lower heat, cover and boil gently until the eggplant is very tender, about 30 minutes.

Using an immersion blender, blend the eggplant mixture in the pan until smooth, or let cool slightly and puree in batches in a blender. Remove the eggplant puree, if in the pan, to a bowl.

Melt the butter in the Dutch oven. Stir in the flour until smooth and cook gently about 1 minute. Very gradually, stir in a little of the eggplant mixture until smooth. Continue adding the eggplant mixture in small amounts, stirring until smooth each time. After you have added about 2 cups, slowly stir in the rest.

Add the crema and stock base, bring just to a boil and simmer gently about 5 minutes. Taste and add salt if needed and the optional white pepper. Turn into heated bowls and serve garnished with pine nuts and basil leaves.

Makes about 6 cups, or 6 to 8 servings.