A couple months ago, during my monthly pilgrimage to the sooner state, I achieved an airline first: I spent the entire flight talking to the stranger in the seat next to me. I recognize that some people thrive on these situations, they love meeting new people anywhere and everywhere they go. I am not one of those people, especially on airplanes. At this point in my life, I probably fly more than the average person and thus I have developed a routine to help me get from terminal to terminal while remaining as unfazzled as possible. I fly Southwest almost exclusively (I seriously love them and could probably also write a whole post about my faithful devotion to them, but I'll save that for another time) and my first order of business is always picking a seat that is as far removed from children (of any age, but especially infants) as possible. Luckily, this is usually a fairly easy task as I am always one of the first to board and children are often relegated to the middle/back of the plane. When in flight, reading and sleeping are the only two things I desire to do. The only thing I hate more than making idle chit chat is making idle chit chat in a confined situation (ie: a 3 hour flight from DC to OKC).
I say all that not to make you believe that I'm a terrible person (I really just desire to travel in as much peace and quiet as possible), but rather to help you fully apprecaite how unique of an experience this was for me. Anyway, during said flight, shortly after our beverages and snacks had been served, I was working my way through a glass of red wine (another coping mechanism for me when I fly after a long workday) when all of a sudden the woman in the row with me decided to try and initiate conversation. I tried to be polite, responding to her remark, chuckling, and then promptly returing to my book. A few moments later, she returned with more words. I should also interject at this point, just to create a better visual, that we were on a less than full flight (my favorite) and I was nestled against the window, she on the isle, with a seat in the middle of us. At first I was frustrated with her antics. It seemed each time I tried to implement the polite social cue of short response + returning to my book = I'm not in the mood for chit chat, it only warded her off for a few minutes at most and then she was back with another comment!
I'm not sure how she finally wore me down, but she did and I give her props for her persistance as I'm not an easy person to wear down. As I gave in and began to engage in conversation with her, it turned out we had a surprising amount in common. She was probably the age of my parents, but was a retired teacher (my mom's a teacher), hailed from Texas (I'm from Oklahoma), has a daughter who went to law school (as did I), and was returning from visiting one of her children in a suburb of DC (I live in the District). It seemd like the more we talked, the more we discovered we had in common.
Towards the final leg of our flight, we got on the subject of cooking. Her family immigrated here from Mexico and she began to tell me about all the delicious dishes she'd made while visiting her daughter and her family. I was basically drooling by this point (it was nearing the dinner hour and TF and I were headed to my favorite OKC Mexican restuarant the moment I landed), but I was so fascinated I powered through the hunger pains. At one point, homemade tortillas were mentioned and my eyes lit up. During my visit, TF and I were planning to cook a huge Mexican feast (the finished product of which I shared with you here), with the goal of making as many of the elements from scratch as possible. We'd gotten most of the menu sketched out prior to my arrival and had decided to make enchilladas as they would be the easiest to make for a crowd. Not only did my new in-air friend tell me how to make homemade tortillas, but she worked desperately to convince me that they were super easy and I could totally handle it. By the end of the flight I was so excited about all that I learned, I couldn't wait to share the news with TF. Unfortunately, TF (in hindsight, wisely) thought it best not to take on the pressure of making too many new things since we were cooking for others besides ourselves. I was disappointed, but he was right (I'm admitting this only because he rarely reads my blog) and I would've been even more frazzled than I already was if we'd tried to churn out tortillas on top of anything else. And thus, I put my dream to create tortillas in my kitchen on the back burner...until today.
Having spent the day working at home, I was all about taking advantage of the time to whip up something fun for dinner. Unfortunately, with a heat index of 105, I was restricted to using only items I already had on hand to avoid suffering from heat stroke while walking to market. And then it hit me, fish tacos! This meal turned into one of the freshest and most colorful meals I've ever created. I'd be lying if I said I didn't do a little happy dance when the finished product finally revealed itself. Homemade tortillas = success!
Tilapia and Black Bean Tacos on Homemade Tortillas
Ingredients
Filling
- 1 tilapia filet (baked and cut into cubes)
- 1/2 cup black beans (cooked)
- 1/4 cup red onion (chopped)
- 2-3 cherry tomatoes
- 1/2 jalepeno (seeded and diced)
- 2 tsp cilantro (minced)
- 1/8 cup shredded cheddar cheese
Tortillas
- 3 cups unbleached flour
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoons baking powder
- ⅓ cups canola oil
- 1 cup hot water
- Mix the flour, salt, and baking powder with a whisk. Add the canola oil and mix with your fingers until all the oil is incorporated and the mixture looks like fine crumbs. Add 1 cup of hot water and mix until a ball is formed. Cover with plastic wrap and let the dough rest for about 30 minutes
- Preheat oven to 350F
- Lightly glaze tilapia with olive oil. In a ziplock bag, toss tilapia with bread crumbs until lightly coated. (I made my own bread crumbs a while back and the recipe made a ton, so I just pulled out what I needed from the freezer)
- Bake tilapia for 10 minutes, flip, and bake for 5 additional minutes
- Once dough is ready, divide into balls of desired size and roll out one at a time on a floured surface
- Brush off excess flour and cook on a hot, ungreased griddle over medium-high heat. Turn the tortilla when brown blisters form on the first side
- Once tortillas are done, fill with ingredients from above and serve
Clock-wise from top left:
breaded tilapia, red onion, cherry tomatoes (from mother's garden),
cilantro, and jalapeno (also from mother's garden)
Yummy!
No comments:
Post a Comment