Untitled Document

Return to top

Felix,
The pineapple salsa sounds great, can't wait to try it. I use a variation on big scallops brushed with hazelnut oil, then barbecued. Mine uses jalapenos instead of the chipotles. The chipotles may be good adding the smoky flavor. My wife and I ate twice in your restaurant last spring in one week. It was terrific, especially the salsa bar.
Brian B.

Brian,
Try those scallops on a spit - wrapped in bacon and alternating pieces of pineapple, onion and thin slices of water chestnuts - not exactly traditional Mexican but it's really good. I partially cook the bacon first and make a sorta sweet and sour sauce with some of the bacon drippings, chopped pineapple, some garlic, a little pinepple juice some sugar, chopped green onion and a little vinegar - no, you don't need to use any $60 vinegar.
sss

_________

Spencer
My husband and I just had the pleasure of returning from Cabo San Lucas. We wanted to let you know that we totally enjoyed our breakfast at Mama's! And we had the opportunity to meet your son and that's how we ended up on your mailing list! We didn't have a chance to visit Felix' though. The evening we planned to visit we had gone fishing that day and caught alot of fish and shared it with the great couple we were staying with at the Cabo San Lucas Inn. I am not a salsa eater and don't drink Margaritas, but hey! Didn't touch Mexican food 'til a couple of years ago either! My hubby says there is hope for me yet! But I do love preparing it for him and look forward to your newsletters and visiting Cabo again!!
Sincerely,
Bonita & Fred Bifulco
Lynchburg, VA

Bonita,
Don't be afraid of the salsas - they don't have to be hot. I suggest you start with the salsa Mexicana and leave the chiles completely out. Also the Pineapple Salsa and the Salsa Asada are good to start with..... just use fewer or no chiles. Try it - You'll like it. I look forward to seeing you next time around.
sss

_________

Dear Spencer,
We are good friends of Sam & Darlene Bass and have frequented your resteraunts!!! Last trip, after the Hurricane, we were greeted by young Spencer in the early evening, (Felix's by night) and had a terrific meal, Thank you. I LOVED the coconut shrimp!! Great salsa's too, each one just a little different and unique. You ought to bottle the stuff! My favorite though, is still the breakfasts. Glad to hear that Sam won some t-shirts..... too funny, he's quite the networker. Please keep me in mind for your updates and mailing list. We'll see you again soon.
Thanks,
KIMBERLEE

Thanks, Kimberlee, I'm getting a lot of pressure to bottle the salsas and probably will. It's a hard decision for me to make because I've spent my life telling people just how easy they are to make. No matter how good I make a bottled salsa you can make it better fresh. That's one reason I've avoided bottling them. On the other hand, I know my bottled salsas will be better than anyone else's. So when I do them I will include the recipe (simple) to make them at home and I will also include some instructions for adding a fresh thing or two to make them almost as good as homemade.
sss

_________

Hi Spencer:
It was a pleasure meeting you and your staff last week. Thank you for welcoming us into your restaurant and sharing your secrets behind making some of Mexico's best salsas. The Baja episode of "Keith Famie's Adventures" is scheduled to air on Monday, February 25th at 10:30pm. I will be sure to send you a copy of the finished show once it is edited. I received the release form that you signed but unfortunately I also need you to sign a different release form for your salsa recipes. This is so that we can publish them in Keith's new book, "You really haven't been there until you've eaten the food". You will have name recognition in the recipe. This is also so that Food Network may post your recipe on their website (www.foodtv.com). Thank you for all of your help during our shoot in Baja. I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Kind regards,
Vanessa Poma
Associate Producer
Visionalist Entertainment Productions

Vanessa,
It was a pleasure meeting you and the crew as well. I look forward to seeing the show.
sssss

_________

Spencer,
Felicitations and seasonal greetings! Reading the hint regarding oil put me in mind of something my Italian mate had said about preserving chilies in oil. His take on the deal is that you always use canola because it's light and short on interference flavour.
Cheers mate,
Ross

Thanks, Ross, nice hearing from you. How are things down under? Hey, do you refer to us as living 'up over'? I'll pass the tip along. ssss

_________

Just book-marked your website..... thanks!!! We've been to your restaurant many times over the past 8 years and love it.
See you in Sept.
jimgin44@earthlink.net

Seeya!
ssss


	Salsa Newsletter for January, 2002 Issue 9 Today's Salsas Salsa Verde (green table salsa) Well, buckeroos and buckerettes, it's salsa time again. I was actually planning to get into some real food recipes this issue but..... after re-reading the past issues I realized I hadn't yet given any recipes for Green Salsas. Shame on me! No Mexican table is complete without a Green Salsa or two. They are just as easy to make as any of the others but they seem to carry a little mystery with them. So when you serve a home-made Salsa Verde (Green Salsa) your guests and friends will probably think that you really had to work hard. Nothing could be further from the truth. Like I tell you most every issue.......... "Cooking is easy and cooking is fun, if it was difficult or took any brains at all - the human race would have died out a long time ago.......... .and I would have chosen a different field of endeavor" For those of you who don't know who I am, my name is Spencer Moore and with my son - also Spencer - I'm the chef owner of a couple of restaurants in Cabo San Lucas, Baja, Mexico. Mama's Royal Cafe is an upscale breakfast restaurant thought by many, myself included, to be the best breakfast place in the whole country. My other restaurant is Felix' - a dinner place specializing in original recipes and regional specialties not often found in restaurants. We also claim to have the world's largest salsa bar, with between 25 and 40 salsas on any given day. You can check out the menus at the web sites (www.mamascabosanlucas.com and www.felixcabosanlucas.com). I have some good news for any of you who have missed some of the earlier newsletters and are just dying to see what I had to offer. All the back newsletters are now available on line. Just go to the Felix' web site and click on newsletter archives. This is probably not going to come as a surprise to any of you who have been reading along but I'm not a big fan of celebrity chefs. They complicate the process - they obfuscate and mystify the process. They think that if they can make it difficult enough you will think that they are really special. Nothing could be further from the truth. These folks who pose as leaders are merely following what you do. That's right - you are the leaders. You make the decisions, you start the parade and they merely jump out front waving a whisk, a basket full of shittake mushrooms and a $200 bottle of balsamic vinegar (aged for 27 years in white oak casks from the caves of Louis the 14th and decanted by an aging Druid priest in the light of the full moon) and claim to be leading the parade. Bullshit! When I was just starting out as a cook if you didn't know the ins and outs of 'Classical' French Cuisine you were considered a leper and an upstart know-nothing who really had no right to be in the kitchen. The celebrity chefs were claiming there was no such thing as Mexican 'Cuisine'. Those of you who are old enough will remember when the only cooking shows on the tube were all about Fancy French stuff. You couldn't find a Mexican Recipe, Chinese Food was considered junk and Pizza was for children and low-lifes. The bible of all the "Great Chefs" the LaRousse Gastronomique so called 'THE Encyclopedia of Food, Wine and Cookery' had no listing for or recipes using chiles(of any type), tomatillos, Chiles Rellenos, Enchiladas, Chiles en Nogada, Pozole, Cilantro, Pizza, Calzone, Pasta, Szechuan Cookery, Mandarin, Thai, Indian..... and nothing at all about salsas. Oh, they had sauces - all the way from aigre-deux and aigrelette with verjuice through bonnefoy and banquiere, Laguipierre, Saint-Menehoulde all the way through the alphabet to Waterfisch, Yorkshire and zingara. Great, I'm having a few friends over - think I'll float a loan, take a couple of days off work and whip up a tasty batch of Saint-Menehoulde. Well you guys (the American public) rejected all this for the nonsense it was and kept eating Italian and Mexican and Chinese because it tasted good. Then, as a new wave of immigrants introduced us to Thai and Cuban and Central/South American and Japanese and Indian and even Etheopian dishes, we adopted them because they tasted good. The celebrity chefs stood in the doorway fighting us tooth and $400 food processor until the TV ratings started falling and those glossy expensive cook books stopped selling and started gathering dust in the bins at the used book store. Then all of a sudden all these self proclaimed food gurus start telling us to eat healthier, eat lighter and eat simpler, fresher ingredients - cook less time consuming recipes. Hello? We were already doing that and they jumped on our band wagon and tried to take credit for it. They can kiss my old hippy ass! I admit it - I watch the stupid shows, hoping (mostly in vain) for an original idea that I can steal and put to good use. Hey, it's my job. I've noticed that over the last few months virtually every single celebrity Chef is featuring Mexican dishes on a regular basis. Yesterday even the Asian guy was in Mexico (I guess that would be East Meets Mexican). They just don't have a clue. They aren't happy with screwing up all the other cuisines now they are out to complicate my neighborhood. To hell with them! Pay them no mind. Mexican food is simple. It's easy and tasty and beautiful and you do not need all the expensive ingredients and complicated equipment. I saw some famous TV jerk making 'Enchiladas' of organic, range free, organically grown breast of Sonoma County baby duckling with White Truffle Oil and a glaze of Mandarin Orange/ Blueberry Puree served with a Black Bean Vinaigrette and goat cheese. Well he can kiss my old hippy ass too! I guess I'd better quit now - before I spray. I'll have some more choice words for these swine when I get into some real recipes - maybe next issue. In the meantime..... onward!



Return to top Felix, The pineapple salsa sounds great, can't wait to try it. I use a variation on big scallops brushed with hazelnut oil, then barbecued. Mine uses jalapenos instead of the chipotles. The chipotles may be good adding the smoky flavor. My wife and I ate twice in your restaurant last spring in one week. It was terrific, especially the salsa bar. Brian B. Brian, Try those scallops on a spit - wrapped in bacon and alternating pieces of pineapple, onion and thin slices of water chestnuts - not exactly traditional Mexican but it's really good. I partially cook the bacon first and make a sorta sweet and sour sauce with some of the bacon drippings, chopped pineapple, some garlic, a little pinepple juice some sugar, chopped green onion and a little vinegar - no, you don't need to use any $60 vinegar. sss _________ Spencer My husband and I just had the pleasure of returning from Cabo San Lucas. We wanted to let you know that we totally enjoyed our breakfast at Mama's! And we had the opportunity to meet your son and that's how we ended up on your mailing list! We didn't have a chance to visit Felix' though. The evening we planned to visit we had gone fishing that day and caught alot of fish and shared it with the great couple we were staying with at the Cabo San Lucas Inn. I am not a salsa eater and don't drink Margaritas, but hey! Didn't touch Mexican food 'til a couple of years ago either! My hubby says there is hope for me yet! But I do love preparing it for him and look forward to your newsletters and visiting Cabo again!! Sincerely, Bonita & Fred Bifulco Lynchburg, VA Bonita, Don't be afraid of the salsas - they don't have to be hot. I suggest you start with the salsa Mexicana and leave the chiles completely out. Also the Pineapple Salsa and the Salsa Asada are good to start with..... just use fewer or no chiles. Try it - You'll like it. I look forward to seeing you next time around. sss _________ Dear Spencer, We are good friends of Sam & Darlene Bass and have frequented your resteraunts!!! Last trip, after the Hurricane, we were greeted by young Spencer in the early evening, (Felix's by night) and had a terrific meal, Thank you. I LOVED the coconut shrimp!! Great salsa's too, each one just a little different and unique. You ought to bottle the stuff! My favorite though, is still the breakfasts. Glad to hear that Sam won some t-shirts..... too funny, he's quite the networker. Please keep me in mind for your updates and mailing list. We'll see you again soon. Thanks, KIMBERLEE Thanks, Kimberlee, I'm getting a lot of pressure to bottle the salsas and probably will. It's a hard decision for me to make because I've spent my life telling people just how easy they are to make. No matter how good I make a bottled salsa you can make it better fresh. That's one reason I've avoided bottling them. On the other hand, I know my bottled salsas will be better than anyone else's. So when I do them I will include the recipe (simple) to make them at home and I will also include some instructions for adding a fresh thing or two to make them almost as good as homemade. sss _________ Hi Spencer: It was a pleasure meeting you and your staff last week. Thank you for welcoming us into your restaurant and sharing your secrets behind making some of Mexico's best salsas. The Baja episode of "Keith Famie's Adventures" is scheduled to air on Monday, February 25th at 10:30pm. I will be sure to send you a copy of the finished show once it is edited. I received the release form that you signed but unfortunately I also need you to sign a different release form for your salsa recipes. This is so that we can publish them in Keith's new book, "You really haven't been there until you've eaten the food". You will have name recognition in the recipe. This is also so that Food Network may post your recipe on their website (www.foodtv.com). Thank you for all of your help during our shoot in Baja. I look forward to hearing from you soon. Kind regards, Vanessa Poma Associate Producer Visionalist Entertainment Productions Vanessa, It was a pleasure meeting you and the crew as well. I look forward to seeing the show. sssss _________ Spencer, Felicitations and seasonal greetings! Reading the hint regarding oil put me in mind of something my Italian mate had said about preserving chilies in oil. His take on the deal is that you always use canola because it's light and short on interference flavour. Cheers mate, Ross Thanks, Ross, nice hearing from you. How are things down under? Hey, do you refer to us as living 'up over'? I'll pass the tip along. ssss _________ Just book-marked your website..... thanks!!! We've been to your restaurant many times over the past 8 years and love it. See you in Sept. jimgin44@earthlink.net Seeya! ssss
*Return to Top* I can't believe I went this long without giving you any recipes for Green Salsas - we have at least a dozen in regular rotation at the Restaurant. This particular salsa is probably the 2nd most widely served salsa in the country (right behind Salsa Mexican) and is certainly one of the most popular at my place. It's real easy to make - virtually impossible to screw up. So let's make some salsa!! 12 or so tomatillos Remove the husks and rinse them. Now, some of these self-proclaimed geniuses will tell you to use only the most yellow of the tomatillos - others say only use the brightest green ones - pay them no mind. It makes no difference! I use the hardest, brightest green to purple ones because I like the lemony tartness. Others like a mellower sauce and use the yellowish ones. Either way you're gonna have a great salsa. 1 medium onion Peel and cut into small pieces. Once again some of these foodies will insist you use no more than 1 teaspoon of finally chopped Maui onion - pay them no mind. You can use less onion or more onion or red, yellow, white or purple onions for all I care. 2 cloves of garlic Or 1 or 17 or none - it don't matter. Hell, you know how much Garlic you like. fresh chiles I like to use Jalapeno chiles because I like the taste..... but the damn Jalapenos have been running really mild. So you might want to substitute Serranos. I'd use 2 Jalapenos or 4 Serranos for a medium Salsa..... more if you like it hot. Take the stems off the Chiles and cut them up - we do this because the whole chiles take a lot longer to cook than do the Tomatillos. cilantro Once again you're on your own. I don't know if you like cilantro of not. I use about a half a bunch. The cilantro flavor will not be real strong because you are going to cook it..... and since it's gonna be blended as well, you can use the stems and all. Let's do it!!! The easiest way to make this Salsa is not the best way but you still come up with a Salsa that is way better than any of that bottled junk. Most Mexicans will just throw everything in a pan - cover it with water and boil the shit out of it. The trouble with this is that you wind up with a lot of really tasty water that you're not going to use. A much better way is to dump all the stuff in a pot - add as little water (maybe a half an inch) as possible and bring it to a boil. Then put a lid on it and turn the heat way down. Check it in about five minutes. It's done as soon as the chiles have turned to that drab olive green color. Let it cool a bit and then put all the solid stuff in a blender and give it a spin. You'll probably have to add some of the cooking water to get the consistency you like. This is a great table salsa and is found on most every table in Mexico. It goes with virtually everything, but is especially good on Chicken and Pork. When it's cooled you might want to add some freshly chopped Cilantro leaves. This Salsa holds pretty well in the fridge but if you make a big batch only add the Fresh Cilantro to what you will be using right away - the Cilantro tends to get a little ugly in the fridge. Let me know how it turns out and if you have any questions about Salsa, Mexican food in general or that horrible mess in Washington - let me know.