For folks who have one and haven’t used it, or who are thinking about it.
The tool comes with a little booklet that includes some simple recipes. I think that the simplicity of the recipe highlights the difference the tool makes.
Note that this recipe has a mistake: nowhere does it say to add the peppers. I’ll get to that. I couldn’t find pepitza. Most of the Hispanic population in NEPA is Central American and Caribbean/Puerto Rican, and grocerias have to make choices. (Spoiler: it is really freakin’ good with cilantro.)
I did the tomatoes, garlic, and peppers under the broiler. I’d have done them out on the grill, except it was 22° at 7AM here.
The general idea is to start with aromatics and flavors. The molcajete is used to prompt maximum flavor from those, beyond what even a garlic press will bring. I mashed the cilantro and garlic with the salt to create a paste.
Then the peppers. It just made logical sense to do these first, before the tomatoes added volume. The tejolote (pestle) does a good job of separating and grinding the charred skin, trapping it between the rough stones. You basically roll and twist at the same time, it’s all in the wrist and shoulder.
At this point, the whole thing looks like a mess that will stay stuck in the bowl and you’ll recover about 80% of it and waste what can’t be scraped out. But watch.
I added the tomatoes one at a time, and rolled/twisted each one: Aquí está!
This is one damn delicious salsa. The closest analog would be Marcella Hazen’s marinara. Where you think, “I’ve been adding all this stuff, when I should have been subtracting stuff!”
Now for the important part. How does this clean up? And, “Sure, it’s good, but is it easy enough, too?”
Here is the molcajete after transferring the salsa into the bowl, using a silicone spatula with normal pressure (no hard scraping):
I washed it in the sink with a medium bristle brush, no soap. I have one of those natural bristle brushes that come from Crisbee, for use on cast iron, but I can’t find it.
It looks fine to me.
Oh: scrambled egg breakfast tacos, with salsa molcajeteada and queso fresco. No se diga más!
So: is this easy? I’ll respond by asking a question right back: is it easier than the alternative, which is either a blender or a food processor?
They’re about the same. For me, getting out the food processor is a royal pain, so much so that I chop a lot of stuff by hand, only using the food processor when I need a fine texture (ham salad). The blender is less so, but it is still something of a project. I have to really want whatever it is that I’m going to blend, otherwise I’ll just make something else.
The big downside to the molcajete is that it is heavy as hell, like the KitchenAid mixer, and clumsy to handle. And I imagine that I shouldn’t drop it onto that quartz countertop; that would be a multi thousand dollar mistake that probably wouldn’t be covered by homeowner’s insurance.
Otherwise, it’s just a big piece of stone that you grind stuff on, and couldn’t be simpler: it’s literally a Stone Age tool in a digital, cyber, AI world.
The tool comes with a little booklet that includes some simple recipes. I think that the simplicity of the recipe highlights the difference the tool makes.
Note that this recipe has a mistake: nowhere does it say to add the peppers. I’ll get to that. I couldn’t find pepitza. Most of the Hispanic population in NEPA is Central American and Caribbean/Puerto Rican, and grocerias have to make choices. (Spoiler: it is really freakin’ good with cilantro.)
I did the tomatoes, garlic, and peppers under the broiler. I’d have done them out on the grill, except it was 22° at 7AM here.
The general idea is to start with aromatics and flavors. The molcajete is used to prompt maximum flavor from those, beyond what even a garlic press will bring. I mashed the cilantro and garlic with the salt to create a paste.
Then the peppers. It just made logical sense to do these first, before the tomatoes added volume. The tejolote (pestle) does a good job of separating and grinding the charred skin, trapping it between the rough stones. You basically roll and twist at the same time, it’s all in the wrist and shoulder.
At this point, the whole thing looks like a mess that will stay stuck in the bowl and you’ll recover about 80% of it and waste what can’t be scraped out. But watch.
I added the tomatoes one at a time, and rolled/twisted each one: Aquí está!
This is one damn delicious salsa. The closest analog would be Marcella Hazen’s marinara. Where you think, “I’ve been adding all this stuff, when I should have been subtracting stuff!”
Now for the important part. How does this clean up? And, “Sure, it’s good, but is it easy enough, too?”
Here is the molcajete after transferring the salsa into the bowl, using a silicone spatula with normal pressure (no hard scraping):
I washed it in the sink with a medium bristle brush, no soap. I have one of those natural bristle brushes that come from Crisbee, for use on cast iron, but I can’t find it.
It looks fine to me.
Oh: scrambled egg breakfast tacos, with salsa molcajeteada and queso fresco. No se diga más!
So: is this easy? I’ll respond by asking a question right back: is it easier than the alternative, which is either a blender or a food processor?
They’re about the same. For me, getting out the food processor is a royal pain, so much so that I chop a lot of stuff by hand, only using the food processor when I need a fine texture (ham salad). The blender is less so, but it is still something of a project. I have to really want whatever it is that I’m going to blend, otherwise I’ll just make something else.
The big downside to the molcajete is that it is heavy as hell, like the KitchenAid mixer, and clumsy to handle. And I imagine that I shouldn’t drop it onto that quartz countertop; that would be a multi thousand dollar mistake that probably wouldn’t be covered by homeowner’s insurance.
Otherwise, it’s just a big piece of stone that you grind stuff on, and couldn’t be simpler: it’s literally a Stone Age tool in a digital, cyber, AI world.
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