Apparently I haven’t conquered the fear of failure. I also do not want to waste food, or disappoint my kids when they expect the reliable, usual flavors of the Tostada Salad they know and love.

But I bought the roast. Went into the store for a few items and spent/got much more than I anticipated (this happens to me every time), so I may as well give this a shot. Making the Masters Family Tostada Salad more authentic, giving it a new spin, using the ingredients avialable now that weren’t avialable in Van Nuys circa 1950 when my family first tasted it at a neighborhood restaurant.

First things first, here is the original recipe. I will be honest, it is totally gringo/gringa Mexican food. My family is Welsh and English. I’ve heard we have Sioux blood running through our veins, but I am so white that I am pink, have brown hair that turns red in the summer (when I dare go into the hot sun), and blue, blue eyes. But bangers and mash, fish and chips with malt vinegar, and kidney pie leave me  - and my family members who live in So Cal - wanting something more exotic. So the lure of chili peppers, fresh corn tortillas and tostadas, refried beans and spiced up tomato based Mexican dishes has been satisfying our appetites for almost six decades now. I’m a third-generation Californian, a foodie, and known on occasion to be perseverant, especially when recipe tinkering.

I’m gonna do this, or hide my head in shame at a Long John Silver’s like I deserve.

TOSTADA SALAD (MY DADDY’S VERSION)
3 heads iceberg lettuce, chopped
tomatoes, chopped
1 4 oz. canned sliced black olives, drained
1 8 oz. package Mexican blend shredded cheese
3 12.5 oz. cans roasted bef in gravy, strained
1 cup Best Foods mayo
2 tbsp. Catalina or Bernstein’s Italian dressing
refried beans, cooked to manufacturer’s instructions
tortillas
tortilla chips

Combine mayo and dressing.
Add roast beef, shred or pull apart by mashing with fork.
Add lettuce, tomatoes, olives, and cheese.
Stir well.

Serve like this, on plate, in this order!:
1) tortilla chips
2) refried beans
3) salad

Alternatively, you could wrap salad up in a tortilla.

I am slow cooking a roast, as aforementioned, not buying it canned. Also, I will be making a adobo/pickled jalapeno/vinegar sauce rather than using Catalina dressing. I will not deviate from mayo because it will cool this dish down (hello, I’m a gringa) but I plan to integrate Crema Mexicana instead of using only mayo. Furthermore, I bought real tostadas caseras rather than Tostitos, and will be using El Guapo Chile California in the slow cooker with the roast. Lastly, I’ll be using Romaine instead of iceberg lettuce. It holds up just as well, same crunch appeal.

Wish me luck and check back in for the new version…

I got a comment asking for clarification on my carne asada recipe. Firstly, please forgive me for any confusion. I think I was just so excited over the success of making my own carne asada that I went too fast! Timeless recipes do that to me. The correction/clarification is in all caps below.

Here we go…my version of a Mexi-Cal classic;

CARNE ASADA
for marinade:
juice of one orange
juice of one lime
juice of one lemon
1/2 cup soy sauce
1-2 tbsp. cumin
1 tbsp. ground coriander
* 2 TBSP. CHILI POWDER *
2 tbsp. dried Mexican oregano
one bunch chopped fresh cilantro
one chopped yellow onion
1/2 cup honey
what I will add next time: tomato paste

2 lbs. flap steak

Let steak marinade overnight, rotate the meat within the marinade a few times to make sure flavor gets integrated. Grill about five minutes per side.
####

The reader who asked me to clarify on the chili pepper/chili powder ingredient is from behind what they called the “Redwood Curtain.” I am guessing this means Northern California (NorCal). Thank you for reading, for sharing your Roberto’s story with me, and for giving me the answer to this weekend’s Sunday afternoon riddle (what to cook?). I had been wondering about that. And if it is NorCal I’m thinking, I want you to know I envy your location as well. Nine years ago I drove out of the Redwoods and saw/smelled the ocean intermingling with the forest, and it was an experience I will live my whole life and never forget. That and seeing wild blackberry bushes and wildflowers thriving along the two-lane highway, or finding sea glass aplenty on a beach in Mendocino.

Those provocations towards the senses make life worthwhile.

And tomorrow (if my husband weren’t making me go to sleep now, you know, “normal” life resumes tomorrow at 6 a.m.) I am posting a family Mexi-Cal recipe re-done…Tostada Salad. My cousins, aunts and uncles will be the ones posting comments then and I sure hope no one gets mad at me.

So check back soon. I’m about to be alienated from my kin over food.

Today, New Year’s Day, I kicked the bottoms of my cabinets with my well-worn pink Ugg boots in protest of unnamed circumstances, thanked the Divine for the health of my family, gritted my teeth at the things I want but don’t have my hands on, and looked into the sable eyes of a man I think loves me way too much, more than I deserve.

A withdrawn, long and disastrous, but happily-ending game of duality…I do this to myself, by myself, and really, only for myself. Then I get over it and cook something.

January 1st calls for Black-Eyed Peas. Grandpa was southern. About the time I fell in love with southern food, Grandpa was aging and I spent the rest of borrowed time each January making him black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day. I think this year I finally have a recipe that would make him proud, and that I really like.

Today when the dishes were done, bellies were full, and the bowl games were even less appealing than I thought (when does spring training start?), it was time to get out of the house.

We went to Borders. My brother-in-law always, every year at Christmas, buys me the same Jamie Oliver cookbook. It wouldn’t be Christmas if he didn’t. Leo, brother-in-law, chef and foodie knows Jamie Oliver is one of my top three (Ming Tsai and Nigella Lawson the other two) favorite chefs, and buys me a new cookbook each holiday season. Which is so sweet of him. Trouble is, Leo always forgets which one he bought me last year and keeps buying the same cookbook for me, ending up being a return to Borders or Barnes & Noble come early January. I love this about Leo. I hope it never changes.
 
At Borders I got four new books: The Culinary Institue of America’s Book of Breakfast and Brunches (I’m loving breakfast right now), I Never Met a Metaphor I Didn’t Like, Ann Lamott’s Joe Jones, and About.com’s Southern Food Guide. I have an addiction to southern cookbooks, but I am pleased with the etiology and stronghold of said addiction.

I think I’ll take on grits next. It’s one of those foods I remember Granpda eating with tons of Tabasco.

Whatever my mood (swing), there is always a food to accomodate it. And thank the Divine for that. Thank the Divine for so many things…happy faces, piquant flavors, bitter aftertastes, and the moon. Thank the Divine that I have history to cook from, food to cook, and people to cook for, especially on New Year’s Day, when I can hand over black-eyed peas and rather than saying difficult expressions, I can communicate in my own way, I Luck You. I hope this brings you good fortune, but really, keeps you loving me.

I’m going to bed tonight with satisfied cravings…and leaving a bowlful of black-eyed peas on the counter for Grandpa. Which is strange when I think about it, because two hours ago, my youngest daughter told me, “Momma, I see a ghost in the living room.”

You don’t say.

That’s just some of the luck floating around here.

NEW YEAR’S DAY BLACK-EYED PEAS
1 onion, diced
4 garlic cloves, minced
2 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
2 lbs. black eyed peas, soaked overnight and strained
1 ham hock
32 oz. chicken broth
2 tbsp. yellow mustard
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 tbsp. Liquid Smoke
1 28 oz. can pureed tomatoes
1 small can tomato paste
red pepper flakes, to taste (I use 1/2 tsp. or so)
Tabasco
3 Bay leaves
coarse grain salt
black pepper

Sautee onion and garlic in olive oil over medium heat.
Add peas and the remaining ingredients and bring to a boil.
Reduce to simmer for three hours, approximatelty, until peas reach desired doneness.

Serve with rice or however tradition dictates in your family.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!! May the Divine bless you in 2009.