Guacamole

When I was younger, I would love to go to the local "Mexican"restaurants and order guacamole. At first I thought it looked gross, I mean it was green and icky. Then I tired some. I was converted forever. Guacamole is something that you can put on just about any food. It is a great appetizer or topper to any dish. When I made it for this blog, I put it on top of a corn tortilla and refried beans, topping the entire thing off with tomatoes. I made a Tex-Mex pizza, or a chapula. The guacamole was my favorite part of the recipe. I used a recipe from, The Tex-Mex Cookbook by Robb Walsh (page 167).

El Fenix Guacamole Salad:
4 ripe avocados
2 tomatoes, parboiled, peeled, and minced
1/2 teaspoons salt
3/4 garlic powder
1 jalapeño chile, seeded, minced
1/2 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
1/4 onion, minced
1 tablespoon olive oil

Scoop out the avocado flesh and combine in a food processor or molcajete with the other ingredients. Serve in iceberg "cups"with shredded lettuce, chips, and molcajete sauce on the side.



Variations:


1) Mash 4 avocados and blend with 1 teaspoon garlic powder, salt, and pepper.

2) Mash 3 avocados and combine with 2 chopped tomatos, 1 chopped onion, and salt.

3) Chop 2 avocados and mix with 1/2 cup Spanish Sauce, juice of 1/4 a lemon, and salt.

I loved the second variation but they all looked so good! In The American History Cookbook by Mark Zanger (page 430) there is an interesting story behind their guacamole recipe. G. Gordon Liddy was a former FBI agent who was sentenced to five years in prison for breaking into the Democratic Party headquarters. After being released and submitting the recipe to the book he was quoted saying, "This I learned from the Chicanos in prison. These ingredients were used because they were what could be smuggled out of the mess hall."

6 ripe avocados
4 eggs
3/4 cup prepared salsa
1 bag tortilla chips, or ,
Sliced raw vegetables (celery, carrots, red and green peppers)
Equipment: Knife and fork smuggled from the prison mess hall, potato masher, egg slicer.
1. Boil eggs 15 minutes. Cool in cold running water and shell.
2. Halve avocados and remove the large seed.
3. Mash the avocados in a large bowl.
4. Mix in the eggs and salsa.

I really want to try all of the recipes. With the different guacamole recipes, it is easy to see how the food of a culture evolves as the people evolve and adapt to their environment as in the Gordon Lidddy story.