Cooking in Oaxaca

Over the past few weeks, I´ve had the opportunity how to prepare a few kinds of local foods. Each week my abuela gives me a short cooking lesson. So far I´ve learned how to make chocolate, guacamole, juevos con tortillas (one of my very favorite breakfasts), juevos Mexicanos, which have been appropriately named for the presence of red, white and green ingredients (tomato, onion and jalapeño) and flan napolitano, a delicious combination of flan, chocolate cake and fruit.

Yesterday afternoon, Natalie and I decided it would be nice to bake chocolate chip cookies for our families to show our appreciation for the numerous culinary lessons they have provided. So we walked over to Chedraui to buy ingredients. Chedraui is a huge grocery store that stocks food items from all over the world. Their candy aisle is quite impressive because one can buy all sorts of local and European chocolates. Having known this, we figured we would have absolutely no problem finding chispas de chocolate (chocolate chips), for our delicious creations that remind us of home. After searching the baking aisle, candy aisle and various cannisters holding large quantities of sprinkles, nuts and other types of food toppings, we realized our chispas de chocolate were nowhere to be found. Of course this wouldn´t prevent us from baking the famed chocolate chip cookies we were looking forward to sharing with our families. So we decided to buy three large bars of chocolate to cut into pieces as our substitute chispas.

Once we returned with our ingredients, Natalie´s family was eager to help us bake. So we proceeded to chop up the chocolate and prepare the cookie batter. When we got to the step where we needed to add the brown sugar, we realized the cookie batter somewhat resembled the consistency of bread dough. So we decided to add a little milk and a bit more flour in hopes of salvaging our soon to be delectable creations. As Natalie stirred in more ingredients, the batter became so thick she had to use her hands. We decided to proceed anyway and added the "chocolate chips" and a few M&M´s because after little Ruby ate about six pieces of chocolate, there really wasn´t much for the cookies.

When it came time to put the cookies in the stove, we realized no one in the family really new how the oven worked. The dial on the stove, which would typically have various degrees, simply had the numbers one through five. I assumed five was really hot, so we stuck the cookies in the oven on the third setting and waited a ridiculously long time for them to bake. As we checked periodically, Natalie and I realized our cookies were beginning to look like dinner rolls with brightly colored candy pieces. Because the cookies baked more like rolls, it took a long time for them to cook through. Natalie´s dad even recommended that we flip the cookies to ensure even cooking. After the first batch came out of the oven, we sampled our creations and sure enough, we had somehow managed to create chocolate stuffed dinner rolls.

These were the strangest cookies I´ve ever made in my life! I almost didn´t bring any home with me, but decided to share the product of my afternoon with my family, even if only for sheer comic relief. Surprisingly, my grandma thought the cookies were sabrosa (delicious)! And Marco, my brother, even claimed he would eat more at will.

Since I´ve been living here for a little over a month now, I´ve sampled a number of cookies de Oaxaca. And until yesterday´s revelation, I never really understood why most of them (even though shaped like cookies) generally taste like bread with sprinkles. I guess this goes to show, when in Oaxaca, do as the Oaxacans do-stick to bread!