Timeless Secrets Of Grandmother's Kitchen
The Age
Monday June 16, 1997
DANIEL ALVAREZ chuckles and shakes his head when the talk turns to tacos and burritos. That, says the Mexican chef, is North American food. It has nothing to do with what he creates.
Alvarez, who speaks little English, uses his hands, his arms and his whole face to paint a picture of the dishes he loves to cook in his kitchen at the Sheraton Buganvilias Resort in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.
He is excited about a recipe using green tomatoes and squash seeds, which he learnt recently from the mother of a colleague, who in turn learnt it from the monks at an abbey where she worked as a young woman.
The secrets of Mexican cuisine have always been passed on by the women, says Roberto Calleja, the Sheraton Buganvilias' food and beverage manager. "In Mexico, we all go back in time to our grandmother's kitchen," he says.
Alvarez and Calleja will be drawing on tradition for a Mexican food fiesta at the Sheraton Towers, South Gate, until 12 July. In so doing, they hope to dispel the notion that the cuisine is only refried beans and oily nachos. Calleja says modern Mexican food is more likely to be steamed, baked or boiled.
For a lunch to launch the festival last week, Alvarez prepared a four-course meal that included aspirina bacalao (cornmeal cases stuffed with salt cod), and a dish of prawns in annato seed batter (made with the peppery orange seed of a tree native to Central America), served with grilled zucchini, a lentil and banana salad and pomegranate dressing.
"People from the States think we use a lot of oil and fried food but we have very light, very healthy food. What is fried is the food you find in the streets. It's the same in the States - they have fast food, we have fast food," Calleja says.
Mexico has three main indigenous groups: the Mayans, the Aztecs and the Toltecs. Alvarez weaves influences from each into his cooking.
The Aztecs, especially, used flowers such as rose petals and squash blossoms, to decorate and flavor their dishes. The Mayans love chillies, especially the hottest of the lot, the habanero - guaranteed to have you breathing fire. (Calleja says newcomers to Mexican food need to gently work their way up to habaneros.)
Herbs play a large role in the Mexican diet. "We use a lot of herbs because our food is so strong and when you use a lot of chilli you have to use different herbs to help the digestion. They are good for the health," Calleja says.
More than 20 ingredients go into Alvarez's mole poblano, a spicy chocolate-colored sauce made famous by Mexico's best-known modern film, the mouth-watering hit Like Water For Chocolate.
Puerto Vallarta, Mexico's second largest beach resort, is known internationally as "an important place for food", says Calleja.
The locals share their fascination with food. The city library has a section dedicated to the culinary arts and the population of 300,000 has more than 220 restaurants to choose from.
Many of Puerto Vallarta's chefs were visitors who fell in love with the city and decided to stay. They blend Mexican cuisine with traditions from Italy, Spain, China and elsewhere.
"People from around the world who come to Mexico . . . once they have the chance to taste something they will always want to try more," says Calleja.
* Daniel Alvarez and Roberto Calleja will conduct cooking classes and team Mexican dishes with wines from the Yarra Valley during the Sheraton Towers Fiesta Mexicana, until 12 July.
© 1997 The Age
