Authentic Mexican Food in Finland

Posted on 19.9.2020 by Emilia

Since I came back from Mexico at the end of March, I’ve been missing Mexican food almost every day. The first couple of months were the hardest though. Luckily my host family in Mexico taught me how to make some delicious Mexican food, so I have been able to make it at home in Finland too. Even though, it doesn’t taste the exact same as in Mexico. In the beginning, I even refused to eat bread for breakfast and made chilaquiles instead. I made corn tortillas and tacos by myself for my family, made fajitas and quesadillas, bought jalapenos, and tried to have the taste of Mexican food at home in Finland. I was really missing the Mexican food as you can tell 😀

After 6 months of being back in Finland, I got to eat some authentic Mexican food, and oh how happy I was! I spent one week in Tampere, which is a city in western Finland. I know a friend from Mexico who lives there and I was asking him if there are any real Mexican restaurants in Tampere. He suggested to me a couple and I knew right away that I have to go and try them out.

The first one I went to was called Tacos ‘n’ Tequila, a very creative name for a Mexican restaurant, right? 😀 In their menu, they had tacos, burritos, and quesadillas. The vegetarian option they had for all of them was nopal (cactus) and cauliflower, so I went for the vegetarian tacos. The tacos were very good and I was so happy to eat nopal again, haven’t had that since Mexico. But to be honest, the tacos were missing some spiciness, they weren’t served with a hot sauce like in Mexico. Apart from that though, the taste was very good. My tacos were served with nachos and guacamole. The nachos had the same composition as in Mexico and were really delicious with some guacamole.

The chef in the restaurant was Mexican and he was super friendly. I told him that I’m writing my thesis about Mexican food culture and wanted to ask him some questions. He wrote his name on the paper and said that I can find him on Facebook and Instagram and he would be more than happy to answer any of my questions. That was just super nice of him. Such a nice restaurant with friendly customer service.

The other Mexican place was a street food stand at the market place (located in Tammelantori). The stand was super cute and the owner so friendly. I went to eat there with my Mexican friend and I felt like I was back in Mexico. My friend and the owner started gossiping and catching up right away we got there, it really felt like back in Mexico. It was so nice to listen to people to speak Spanish again, I just love the sound of the language, so beautiful. But back to the food… I ordered two tacos with nopalitos (cactus) and the tacos tasted AMAZING! Exactly like in Mexico!! They were served with either green or red sauce, I took the spicier as the red sauce and I got the spiciness I was missing in the other restaurant. Just. So. Good.

After we finished eating we talked a bit more with the owner. I was curious where she gets all the Mexican ingredients for the food such as nopal and corn tortillas. She told me that she mostly has her own contacts and providers from Mexico but the nopal she can get from wholesalers here in Finland. She also told me about the culture in Mexico and how the food is so important for the people and for the whole culture in Mexico. It connects and brings people together.

I can 100% recommend this place for anyone that either lives or is visiting Tampere. If you would like to taste what authentic Mexican food tastes like, go to have some tacos, quesadillas, or gorditas at La Negrita at Tammelantori. I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did! Let me know in the comments if you are planning to go there or if you know some other places where to get real Mexican food, either in Finland or in other countries. I’d love to hear where other good Mexican restaurants are located and to go to try them out.

Love, Emilia

Typical Mexican breakfast recipe: Molletes

Posted on 26.5.2020 by Emilia

Molletes is a typical breakfast meal in Mexico, especially along students because it’s very cheap, quick and easy to make. Normally molletes are made of bolillo rolls (white Mexican bread rolls), refried beans, cheese, and pico de gallo. Additionally chorizo or bacon can be added on the top. Among students, it’s more common to stick on the original molletes recipe. But, if you feel like you’re craving some meat and want to add some chorizo or bacon on the top, feel free to do so. I’m going to share with you the recipe of molletes like they are originally made. So, let’s begin!

Molletes (makes 8 molletes):
4 bolillo rolls (or similar)
1 can of refried beans (or can of black beans)
Cheese
1 tbsp oil
Pico de gallo

Pico de gallo:
1 half of an onion
1 green chili pepper
1 tomato
Fresh coriander
1 lime
pinch of salt
pinch of pepper
few drops of olive oil

How to prepare Molletes:

Start with preheating the oven to 200C. Prepare an oven tray with baking paper.
Put 1tbsp of oil on the pan (to prevent burning the beans) and add the refried beans into it. If you’re using canned black beans, smash the beans before adding them into the pan. Heat it up.
Cut the bolillo rolls (or similar) in half.
Spread some of the heated beans on the halves of the bread rolls.
Cut some cheese and add on top of the beans on the bread.
Put the filled bread rolls in the oven and let them cook until the cheese is melted and the bread is crispy, around 10-15 minutes.
Serve with pico de gallo.

How to prepare pico de gallo:

Cut the half of an onion, green chili pepper and tomato into small cubes. Put them into a bowl.
Cut the fresh coriander into smaller pieces. Add them into the bowl and mix.
Squeeze some lime juice in the mixture.
Add salt, pepper and few drops of olive oil. Mix all together.
Put the pico de gallo on top of the crispy molletes breads.
Enjoy!

The ingredients in pico de gallo have the colors of the Mexican flag

Enjoy the molletes, they are best to eat warm with the fresh pico de gallo on the top.

I hope you enjoyed this recipe and want to try it yourself. I wanted to share with you a recipe that is a bit different from the normal Mexican food when corn is the main ingredient but is still very commonly eaten in Mexico. Molletes are also easy to make in other countries as you just need white bread rolls, beans, cheese, and the ingredients to make pico de gallo as onion, tomato, green chili pepper, coriander, and lime. Simple ingredients that can be found in every country.

Let me know in the comment box if you decide to try this recipe. And how you like it! I always love reading your comments so if you have any questions, thoughts, or any feedback, just write me. 🙂

Love, Emilia

Specialties in Mexican grocery stores

Posted on 15.5.2020 by Emilia

I find it interesting to walk around in grocery stores in different countries and see the different products and specialties each country has. I think with just going into a grocery store abroad you can already see what the food culture is like in that country. It’s also fun to try to think and guess which ingredients are used in each dish that is special to that country. In this post, I want to point out a few of the common things you can find in a Mexican grocery store but are not as common in my home country, Finland.

CHILI

In Mexico, one of the most used ingredients is chili. You can buy it in many different ways as fresh, dried, powder… and it’s used in many different products. Even though before going to Mexico, I knew that the food is going to be spicy and chili will be a common ingredient, but I had no idea how much and which all products have chili. The products that most surprised me were candies and ice cream. Most of the candies in Mexico are spicy and they are made with chili. The first time I tried a special Mexican candy, I didn’t like it at all. I thought I was eating some kind of spicy sauce, not a candy. It wasn’t sweet at all, more like spicy and a bit sour I’d say. After telling my candy tasting experience to my host sister, she got upset because she loves the Mexican candies.

Ice cream topped with chili flakes… yes, when I said they put chili everywhere, I meant it 😀

I also brought some Mexican candies as a souvenir to my family back in Finland to taste but they weren’t big fans either. The candy they liked the least was a candy made with tamarindo (very commonly used in Mexican candies) and chili. They said it was too spicy with a very strange taste. The other candies I brought them were candies with milk, they were a lot better. But a strange thing about one of those candies was that the caramel filling was inside of “church bread” or at least it tasted exactly the same as the one you get in church and gets stuck in your mouth. So, I have to say that the Mexican candies are a bit strange.

Mexican candies; made with fruits or tamarindo, chili and salt

Tamarindo candy with chili and salt. This is the one I mentioned earlier, that my family didn’t like. It has a strange taste – something between sour, sweet and spicy, but I like it.

Traditional Mexican milk candy selection. These are the other ones I brought to my family. The one which says “San Pablo” is the one that tastes like the “church bread”.

NOPAL

Cactus, as in Mexico more commonly known nopal, is often used in Mexican cooking. Before going to Mexico I didn’t know that cactus can be eatable. When I arrived in Mexico and sat on the bus for 3 and a half hours from Mexico City to Querétaro, I saw many cactus plantations. In the countryside, cactus was growing everywhere. First I thought, that it is just a common plant that adjusts well in the hot climate, but later on, I learned that it’s eatable. In the Mexican grocery store, you can find fresh, flat nopal pads. The nopal pads can be used for example to make a delicious cactus salad.

Cactus trees are huge. In this picture you can compare the size of the tree with me standing in front of the tree.

TOMATILLO

Tomatillos look like green tomatoes covered in a husk, but they are more closely related to gooseberries than they are to tomatoes. In Mexican cooking tomatillos are often used in salsa verde, giving the beautiful green color to the green sauces. The price of tomatillos is around 40 pesos for a kilo, which equals to ~2 euros per kilo.

CHICHARRONES

Chicharrones are crunchy, fluffy pork rinds. Mexicans eat chicharrones as a snack. They can be bought in a bag of one kilo which cost around 142 pesos, which equals to 6,5 euros. In grocery stores they are also sold in smaller bags with different flavors, for example, chicharrones with a taste of chili and lime (very Mexican combination).

LIME

In the grocery store in Mexico, there can be found large shelves of limes. Lime is a very common ingredient in Mexican dishes. It is usually squeezed on top of the dish, for example on tacos but also on many other dishes. In restaurants, limes are often ready on the table, so they can be squeezed on the food you eat. Another common way to use lime is to make lime water. For that, you only need water and lime (squeezed in the water) and if you want the lime water less sour, sugar can be added.

These were some of the products and ingredients that mostly took my attention while walking in a grocery store in Mexico. I would like to know if you have these ingredients in your home countries or were these new to you too? Also, what are your country’s special products? Please write your thoughts down on the comment box, I cannot wait to hear them!

Love, Emilia

Recipe: Chilaquiles

Posted on 16.4.2020 by Emilia

Chilaquiles is a traditional Mexican breakfast dish. It’s made with corn tortillas that are cut into triangles and lightly fried. Chilaquiles can be made either with a green or red sauce that is poured on top of the crispy tortilla triangles. In Mexico it’s very common to eat chilaquiles for breakfast or brunch, either made by yourself or ordered in a restaurant. Chilaquiles are commonly garnished with cream cheese, grated cheese, onion rings, jalapeño and avocado slices. It can be served with eggs (scrambled or fried), pulled chicken or beef.

Chilaquiles is my favorite Mexican breakfast. When going out for breakfast, I mainly order chilaquiles. It’s a very filling and tasty dish. I thought chilaquiles would be difficult to make but when my host family showed me how to make it, I was surprised that it’s very quick and easy. When making the chilaquiles by yourself, you can skip one step by buying ready crisp corn chips from the store, instead of cutting the corn tortillas into triangles and frying them. That saves a lot of time and makes the preparation much quicker. The recipe I’m sharing with you, is chilaquiles with the red sauce. I made a very simple version of the dish so you can add the toppings of your choice.

Recipe (serves 2 persons)

2 tbls olive oil
1/2 onion
1 can of tomato paste (or half can of tomato paste with chili and half can of normal tomato paste, if you want it spicier)
100 ml cream
half a bag of corn chips (or as much as you can fit on your pan)
salt
pepper

Toppings of your choice
(e.g. scrambled or fried eggs, pulled chicken or beef, cream cheese, grated cheese, onion rings, jalapeño and/or avocado)

2. Cut the onion into little pieces and add them on the pan. Fry the onions a little bit.

3. Add the tomato sauce to the pan. Let it boil.

4. Add the cream and mix all together. Season the sauce with salt and pepper.

5. When the sauce is ready, add the corn chips into the sauce.

6. Mix the sauce with the corn chips so that all the chips are covered in the sauce.

7. Add the toppings you want . I put scrambled eggs, grated cheese, cream cheese, jalapeños and onion rings.

Enjoy this easy and delicious breakfast! Which one do you prefer, chilaquiles rojos (red) or chilaquiles verdes (green)? If you never tried chilaquiles before, let me know if you are interested to try it with this recipe. If you have any questions about the recipe, let me know! I hope you have a wonderful time making chilaquiles!

Love, Emilia

Food markets

Posted on 12.4.2020 by Emilia

Markets in Mexico have a huge impact on the Mexican food culture. That’s the place where local farmers sell their products and earn their income. For Mexicans, a popular thing to do on Sundays is to go to a market. Sunday is a family day for most families. They go to a market, buy fresh veggies, fruits and meat from the local farmers for the whole week. Depending on the time of the day the families go to the market, they’ll often have either breakfast or lunch there after buying the food. This is a way for them to enjoy some family time together.

Usually, the food markets have two different areas; outside area and inside area. The inside area is like a big hall full of little stands where they sell veggies, fruits and meat. Also often in the indoor halls, piñatas are hanging from the roof. So while walking inside the market hall and looking up, you will see many different colorful creatures hanging down on the roof. In the Mexican culture, piñatas are a tradition for kids’ birthday parties. During a birthday party, piñata full of candies will be hung on a tree outside in the garden, or inside the house on the roof and the birthday boy/girl will be smashing the piñata blindfolded. After the piñata breaks, all the candies will fall on the ground and the kids will race each other to get the most candies to themselves.

In the outside area, there are many food stands. For example, you can buy gorditas at the market. Gorditas are small thick tortillas, which are cut and filled inside. They are delicious, so be sure to try them out when visiting a food market in Mexico.

One thing that really jumped into my mind about the markets, is hygiene. Being used to the hygienic standards in my home country, Finland, Mexico is not even close to them. All the food are prepared openly. The market I visited in Guanajuato, was in two floors; the main floor downstairs with all the food stands and a second floor with souvenir stands “around the food stands”. But as the second floor was around the food stands, and the food stands were without any roof on top of them, anyone could throw or drop something from upstairs to the food. Even though people are probably not doing so (at least I hope), it still made me feel a bit uncomfortable eating there. I felt like I wanted to eat something “safe” and I found a food stand that had some cover on top of the food, so I ended up eating there and having a torta. I’m also not sure how they take care of their hand hygiene, as the stands don’t seem to have water taps where they could wash their hands. If there are any Mexican readers, lighten me up in the comment box, please.

*Torta* filled with onions, lettuce, avocado and tomatoes

I’ve only visited few food markets in Querétaro and Guanajuato which are probably nothing compared to the ones in e.g. Mexico City. But the ones I visited were all a bit different from each other. And by that I mean, the one in Querétaro had the piñatas hanging on the top and the other one in Querétaro didn’t and was more of a “Sunday market” type. The streets close to the main market hall were also full of people selling fruits and veggies but also other things, like dishes, plants and street food. The market in Guanajuato (the big, open hall in the photos) was more full of street food stands than fruit and veggies, but also had a few stands of selling those.

In my opinion, it’s very interesting to see food markets in different cities or areas. Markets in different parts of the country have different food specialties. Gorditas are the speciality in Querétaro region. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to explore more this time, because of the whole situation in the world. But I hope to visit many more food markets in Mexico soon. I’m eager to learn more about the culture around it and taste the different specialties.

Let me know in the comments what are your thought about Mexican food markets, and what you found interesting in this article.

Love, Emilia

Introduction to Mexican food culture

Posted on 9.3.2020 by Emilia

When thinking about Mexican food often the first things to come in mind are tortillas, tacos and burritos, right? Well it’s true, because those ones are the most commonly known outside of Mexico. But the thing that people usually don’t know, is that Mexican food in Mexico taste and looks totally different than from the ones you get e.g. in Europe.

When I first came to Mexico and tasted the Mexican tacos, for me it looked like I am eating a mini tortilla. As in Europe, or at least in Finland where I come from, tacos are the ones made of corn with a hard cover. But in Mexico the cover is soft and looks and tastes like tortilla, it is just a smaller version of it. I have learned that the plane corn “pancake” is called tortilla and it’s used in different ways in different dishes. Tortillas that are filled are called tacos, tortillas with sauce on top are called enchiladas and tortillas which are filled and rolled are called burritos. So in Mexico, tortilla is the base of most of the dishes. Also, nachos are made of tortillas that are cut in triangles and fried or cooked in the oven to make it hard and crispy.

When I read books and studied about Mexican food culture, it was said that corn is the most important and appreciated ingredient in Mexican kitchen. But it’s accurate as tortillas are made of corn and like I said earlier, tortillas are the base of almost all of the Mexican dishes. Other common ingredients used in Mexican cuisine are chili, tomatoes, tomatillos (green tomatoes), squash, avocado, mango, papaya and nopales (cactus). Also meat as pork and chicken are used in most of the dishes, so for vegetarians it’s fairly hard to find food especially when eating out in restaurants. And now I should probably mention that I’m vegetarian or vegan always as possible (not often possible when dining out) so you’re going to see mostly the vegetarian way of eating in Mexico. Sometimes I try to include some meat dishes (if my friends order them for themselves), especially when dining out so you get a better picture of all the foods.

In the upcoming posts I’ll be deepening my knowledge in different topics about Mexican food, for example writing about grocery stores, markets, eating out, street food, festive food, drinking culture, giving some recipes etc. I would also love to hear about what kind of topics you’d like to read in this blog. So, please comment below your ideas! Also, I would like to know what’s your favorite Mexican food, so please write that below too. I’m looking forward to continuing the discussion in the comment box.

Love, Emilia

A Taste of Mexico

Food culture in Mexico

Tag Archives: mexican food

Authentic Mexican Food in Finland

Typical Mexican breakfast recipe: Molletes

Specialties in Mexican grocery stores

Recipe: Chilaquiles

Food markets

Introduction to Mexican food culture