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Day of the Dead celebration with Gran Luchito & Mezcal tasting

November 3, 2013 by manjirichitnis 2 Comments

el Dia de Muertos or the event Day of the Dead is a Mexican version of  Halloween celebrations. It’s also when Gran Luchito was launched last year so this year on their first birthday Gran Luchito decided to throw a party in association with Amathus Drinks and Oaxaca Cheese, on 30th Oct at Amathus Soho with a great spread of Mexican eats and the amazing Mezcal!

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Image Courtesy: Wiki Images

30th Oct'13 Gran Luchito event1

Gran Luchito’s owner, Fergus Chamberlain, explains: “I am on a mission to bring authentic and rural Mexican flavours to our kitchens, making them accessible and contemporary. Gran Luchito’s products are made to enhance the flavour of any food”.He discovered the rare pasilla Oaxaca chilli on a trip to Mexico and he now works with local farmers to create the smoky, rich Gran Luchito paste. (Oaxaca pronounced as Wahaca) There are 56 varieties in Mexico and Gran Luchito is made from artisan smoked Mexican chillies – the pasilla Oaxaca, agave (agave is the plant from which mezcal and tequila are made!) and garlic amongst other ingredients. It is a very versatile paste. I love using it as a meat marinade and with some poached eggs. Actually, the applications can be as vivid as your imagination.

The farmers who grow the Pasilla Oaxaca chilli live in the Mixes Hills that surround Oaxaca. Their existence is a really tough one, with long dry summers and heavy monsoons. The rare Pasilla Oaxaca chillies are smoked over the oak fire when perfectly ripe in handmade clay ovens, to prevent insects from eating them, or torrential rains from rotting them. The deep rich and smoky flavours are an aftertaste after the initial heat. Making a chilli paste is a traditional way of using chilli in Mexico. They make it using a stone grinder called a metate.

Listening to a presentation sitting surrounded by exotic spirits lining shelves from floor to ceiling was distracting enough and to add to that a table full of delicious Mexican snacks was at our table. There were Tostadas de frijoles or beans tostadas with sour cream blended with Gran Luchito paste, Ensalada de nopales, or a cactus salad made with cactus available at Mexgrocer, Ensalada de Pollo or a chicken salad along with some other small eats. I loved the prawns topped with marmalade made with caramelised onion with Gran Luchito Paste.

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We also tried 5 different types of Mezcal which is a very tasty and sharp alcoholic drink made from plant agave. Agave is also used to make Tequila but unlike tequila Mezcal is to be sipped slowly ideally balanced by popping loads of Mexican cheese between sips. I feasted on 2 types of artisan Oaxaca Cheese ,one like a crumbly feta but much less salty and another a chewy string cheese which is absolutely amazing, very morish! Both made in Mexican cheese makers here in the U.K using milk from local farms by Oaxaca Taste.

Mezcal is made mainly in Oaxaca in Mexico and it is a long and laborious process and everything is done by the local folks by hand including harvesting , roasting,grinding and leaving to ferment using traditional artisan methods.There is a saying attributed to Oaxaca regarding the drink: “para todo mal, mezcal, y para todo bien también” (“for all bad, mezcal, for all good, as well”) I couldn’t agree more , because this fine drink didn’t get me tipsy inspite of 5 different very potent varieties of Mezcal called Vida ,Minero,San Luis del Rio Azul,C and Alipus San Anders,ranging in alcoholic content from 45% to 49% !

Mezcal is a drink that has come of age and deserves its rightfull place amongst other fine spirits.Because it has been such a closely guarded secret amongst the Mexican Hills for years and has only being sold outside of Mexico in the past decade or so , it is best introduced along with a peek into the rich Oaxacan culture that surrounds this drink.

I know one thing for sure when I plan a pre christmas dinner party I am going to make a cactus salad, use generous dollops of Gran Luchito honey on my crackers , serve some Oxacan stringy cheese( most of which I greedily plan to wolf down) and stock up on Arroqueno , the smooth and smoky taste is addictive without being overpowering.Oh yes and it made me feel so warm inside like an internal thermostat set to warm and toasty, didn’t need my coat on the way back …hummmm better than sake I say !

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Image Courtesy: Gran Luchito

*With thanks to Gran Luchito for the invite. All opinions expressed and photographs used are, as always, my own, unless otherwise mentioned. No monetary compensation was provided.

Filed Under: Events, Food Tagged With: Alipus San Anders, Amathus drinks, artisan Oaxaca Cheese, beans tostadas, C, cactus salad, Day of the Dead, el Dia de Muertos, Ensalada de nopales, Ensalada de pollo, Gran Luchito, Gran Luchito smoked chilli paste, Halloween, hicken salad, Mexgrocer.co.uk, Mexico, Mezcal, Minero, oaxaca, Oaxaca Taste, pasilla oaxaca chilli, San Luis del Rio Azul, tequila, Tostadas de frijoles, Vida, wahaca

Spicy Mexican Chicken Wings

August 16, 2013 by manjirichitnis 4 Comments

I was sent this amazing new product from the Gran Luchito Kitchen – their new Salsa sauce and ever since I laid my eyes on it all I wanted to do was make some spicy chicken wings and enjoy them on a summer evening with some chilled beer.

IMG_4260 (Copy)

What I most love about this new HOT sauce from Gran Luchito is that it makes life so easy so if you want to make a quick ,tasty and easy starter dish and really impress your guests or you suddenly decide to take home the entire hungry gang you went for drinks with on a Friday evening(Egad!) this bottle of goodness is a going to be your life saver. It’s very versatile because I can think of so many ways to use this sauce. It’s also a great dip for that bag of tortilla chips which can do the rounds with some chilled beer or wine for your guests, or a lazy brunch on Sunday just make lots of wings to gr around for the family!It’s definitely my new spicy ketchup and will be a perfect pairing with a zillion foods!

Ok, so here’s a quick recipe for the Spicy Mexican Chicken Wings:

Serves: 2 – 3

Cooking Time: 15 minutes marination, on pan 10 – 15 minutes,chopping time 5 minutes.

Ingredients:

  1. Grand Luchito’s HOT Sauce – 5 heaped tbsp
  2. 8 chicken wings
  3. 1/2 medium sized red onion sliced lenghtwise
  4. Half a lemon
  5. Smoked sea salt
  6. 2 large tbsp oil (I used refined sunflower)
  7. Smoked Sea salt
  8. Cumin powder 1 tbsp
  9. An entire garlic with all its pods sliced through.

Method:

If you ask me this is one for the barbecue but since I have no access to one and work off a tiny urban kitchen which is literally a single small platform I love using my pan with grids to get those grid lines on my meat and pretend am in the garden with a nice barbecue going,sighhh, oh yes and my smoked sea salt is my best ally , giving my food that wonderfully smokey aroma -oak smoked it is !

  • Wash the chicken wings and in a bowl and pour about 1/2 a tbsp oil on them,add the smoked sea salt,cumin powder and 2 tbsp of Gran Luchito HOT sauce.Rub well and cover and set aside for about 15 minutes

Marinating the wings in Gran Luchito's HOT sauce

  • On a pan with grids add the oil and allow it to heat till it starts to bubble slightly, add the chopped red onion and saute till it just begins to change colour,carefull to not brown them too much.
  • Now saute two heaped tbsps of the Gran Luchito HOT sauce on the pan.Stir for about a minute and then add the marinated chicken.Place the garlic face down allowing it to turn a delicious brown and release it’s magic kick into the onion and sauce mix and boost the flavour of the chicken.
  • Use tongs to turn when one side is properly browned and juicy but stir the sauce and onion sautee mixture which the chicken is sitting on not allowing it to stick to the pan or burn!
  • It should take about 10 -15 minutes to get to the right crispy and juicy stage for the chicken wings on a medium flame with this pan.(In case you need to do a large batch of chicken wings, scale up the ingredients proportionately and blanch the chicken wings in hot water for 5 – 7 minutes before marinating so that they are semi cooked , this way you can get them in batches on the pan and ready to serve, keep them warm by placing in a baking tray covered in foil – you could even keep bigger batches warm in a pre-heated oven if need be!)

The unique smoky taste of Gran Luchito with the sweetness of pineapple

I hope this product hits the shelves soon!To do this as quickly as possible Gran Luchito has  partnered with Crowd Funding Network We Are The Million to raise some investment and create jobs too.Help Spread the word by reading more about the campaign here.

Spicy Chicken Wings

*Thanks to Gran Luchito for sending me some of their test sauce as a sample to review. As usual, all opinions are my own. No monetary compensation was provided for this post and I was not expected to write a positive review.

Filed Under: Food, Product Reviews Tagged With: @Luchito_Mexico, Barbecue, crowd funding, cumin powder, delicious, drink, easy recipes for spicy chicken wings, easy starter recipes, eat, finely chopped, garlic, good cause, Gran Luchito, Hot Sauce, Mexican food, Mexican Ketchup, nomnom, pan with grids, quick and easy starter, red onion, smoked sea salt, Spicy Chicken Wings, sunflower oil, tasty, tongs, We are the Million, yummy

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