Mexican Tapas Part 1

Although I have been concentrating on breakfast and brunch dishes, I like to digress a little and talk about appetizers. I was talking to the owner of one of our local Mexican restaurants and the conversation turned to the food that could be served for groups. We discussed the possibility of serving Mexican style tapas and I said I would work on coming up with some ideas for some small appetizers. With my recent discussion of form, some of my ideas did not fit into changing shapes but scaling down regular dishes into an appetizer handheld form. I am adding to Form the subgroup scale, which would be defined as keeping the same shape but increasing or decreasing the size. For example, I might serve chicken wings instead of a whole piece of chicken or scale down a chimichanga to a bite sized version. After some thought I made a preliminary list of possible appetizers.

Chicken Wings  -

   1. Chipolte Honey Lime – chipolte, honey and lime juice with lime zest

   2. Mole – mole sauce slightly diluted with chicken broth

   3. Sweet Prickly Pear – prickly pear, lime sweetened with sugar 
 
Mini Tostadas – refried bean, guacamole, lettuce, cheese

 Mini Chimichangas – Shredded pork,beef or chicken, onions and shredded cabbage in egg roll skins

 Small stuffed Peppers – piquillo peppers stufed with chorizo and cheese, a play on a chile rellano

 Mexican Bruschetta – small rounds of grilled bread, topped with pico de gallo

 Lettuce cups – filled with ceviche

 Open face mini tamale – small circle of fried masa with pork  topping with salsa verde

 Mexican rice balls – mexican spiced risotto cooled, stuffed with cheese, formed into balls, breaded and deep  fried

Shrimp and spiced polenta skewer – spiced shrimp and chile dusted polenta squares

My first attempt was to tackle the chicken wings and I decided to combine the chipolte honey lime with the sweet prickly pear because I felt after tasting the prickly pear, it needed a little spice to balance the sweet citrus taste. I normally like to prepare everything from scratch but due to time constraints I used a bottled mole sauce from my local Mexican market and added some embelishments to achieve the taste i wanted. I promise to add my mole recipe later for another dish.

Chicken Wings

3 to 4 pounds chicken wings

brine - 1 quart water, 2 Tbsp. salt, 2 Tbsp. sugar, 2 Tbsp. favorite hot sauce

1/2 cup corn starch

olive oil

1 tsp. each salt and pepper

 Cut off the chicken wing tip (reserve for stock) and separate at the joint into 2 pieces. Prepare the brine and brine overnight. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Drain well and dry the wings with paper towels, dust with the corn starch shaking off any extra. Season with the salt and pepper and place on a rack on a baking sheet. Brush with the olive oil and cook until browned on the top (about 15 to 20 minutes), turn over and brush with more olive oil and return to the oven until browned on the second side (10 to 15 minutes). Reserve warm until ready to sauce.

Prickly Pear  Honey Chile Sauce

Four or five prickly pear fruits

1/4 cup honey

Four or five limes

1 Tbsp. light chili pepper powder

1 Tbsp. chipotle chili pepper powder
 
1/4 cup water

1/4 tsp. Salt

Cut off the tops and bottoms of each of the fruits and cut the rind or skin off. Cut into medium pieces and put into a blender. Zest the limes and reserve. Juice the limes and add to the blender. Add the honey water and salt to the blender and blend into a puree. Strain into a sauce pan and reduce a third. The mixture should just start to thicken. Add the chile powders to your taste. Reserve warm until the wings are ready. When the wings are ready, add the sauce to a metal bowl then the wings and toss to coat then serve.


Mole Wing Sauce

1/2 Cup of your favorite mole sauce

1/2 Cup chicken broth

Dark chocolate (at least 70 percent) to taste

Cinnamon to taste

Hot Sauce to taste

Prepare the mole sauce as directed then add to a sauce pan. Thin with the chicken broth, taste and add chocolate, cinnamon and hot sauce to taste. Reserve warm until the wings are ready. When the wings are ready, add the sauce to a metal bowl then the wings and toss to coat then serve.

 

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