Customer Reviews

Authentic Mexican: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico

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I am of Mexican descent. I have avoided Restaurants and cookbooks that try to pass themselves off as "Mexican", for years. The recipes in this Tome so remind me of my childhood, that the book is falling apart. Rick truly knows his subject. Any one seriously interested in the cuisine must seek out this book.

`Authentic Mexican' by notable Chicago chef and Mexican cuisine expert, Rick Bayless and wife Deann Groen Bayless is easily one of the very best books on basic Mexican cuisine. For a subject which is so big that Bayless has devoted at least three other books to it, not to mention the five thick volumes from fellow Mexico culinarian Diana Kennedy, it is hard to describe this as a comprehensive treatment of Mexican cuisine, as it weights in at only 380 pages, compared to the over 450 pages Penelope Casas devotes to much smaller Spain and 480 pages Diana Kochilas devotes to even smaller Greece. But don't let any of this put you off. This is, I am certain, one of the very best sources of information on true Mexican food for us gringos. I am almost certain that Bayless' coverage of Mexico is much better for the state of Oaxaca than for many other regions. I see this name pop up far more than any others and I have read that this is one of his favorite parts of Mexico.

The stated impetus to Bayless' writing this book lies in the fact that in spite of the close contact between Mexico and the United States, Mexican food in the US has undergone the same kind of metamorphosis as we find in Italian-American food.

It is an interesting exercise to highlight what is distinctive about Mexican cooking to cite the differences between Mexican and Spanish cuisines.

While Spanish cuisine is all about olives and grapes, neither of these two products transplanted well to Mexico. Thus, Mexico did not acquire any taste for many of the things you can do with olive oil and vinegar. For these key tastes, they had animal fat and citrus juice. While Spain took to the tomato and the potato, they did not take to corn (maize). And, oddly, while Spain adopted sweet peppers like they were long lost sons, they did not take to the very picante hot chiles. And, while chocolate became very popular as a drink, it never pervaded Spanish dishes the way it runs through Mexican dishes.

Many cookbooks of this type include the seemingly obligatory chapters on ingredients, techniques, and equipment. And, many times these sections are a waste of time in that they are incomplete, and someone not familiar with the subject will not know they are incomplete. None of this is true of Bayless' appendices on ingredients and tools. The depth of Bayless' treatment of important subjects such as chilis is just short of magnificent.

Like every good cookbook on an ethnic cuisine, Bayless gives both the English and Spanish names for all dishes, and some naming contains little surprises. The very first recipe for `Salsa Mexicana' looks very familiar, yet I have never seen a recipe with that name before. It turns out that this is the authentic version of what we gringos call the `pico de gallo'.

Practically every recipe contains several important cooks' notes on techniques, ingredients, and planning ahead.

The book contains a chapter on practically every major subject in Mexican cuisine, including special chapters on Tortillas, Masa, Tacos, Turnovers and their Fillings, Enchiladas, Moles, and Drinks. The level of detail in the explanation of the recipes would make Julia Child proud. The one major subject on which Bayless does not seem to touch is bread baking. The easiest way to supplement this book with material on Mexican baking is to get Diana Kennedy's book `In My Mexican Kitchen'.

One odd aspect of this book for which I blame publisher Morrow's editors is the less than fluid prose. Bayless is much too good with his facts to state any errors of fact or even judgment, but his sentences have this vague feeling of clumsiness about them, as if he is using just a few too many words and he is trying to achieve an effect with an odd choice of words which doesn't work. As Senor Bayless is a masterful cook and interpreter of a major world cuisine, I write this off as the result of the author's first book being edited on a budget.

I live in Southern California surrounded by countless Mexican Restaurants of all levels of quality. Sadly most are sub par greasy cheese and dry rice joints. The recipes I have prepared in this book make the countless combo-number-whatever's pale in comparison. The author explains the reasons for this in the books beginning introduction.

What consistently jumps at me in this book is the author's passion for Mexican cuisine. He hits at the heart of the real Mexican food culture and makes a clear distinction between Mexican "street food" (the informal more popular dishes prevalent across the US) and the traditional, authentic dishes of various regions in Mexico. There is a reason why the latter is not as popular in the US... it takes a lot of time and energy to create the elaborate authentic dishes. You need to find a restaurant that cares about quality dishes AND can pull it off in mass quantity... or you can make it yourself with some help from this book.

The author also puts the real star ingredient at the forefront of these traditional delights - Chiles. Chiles of all shapes, sizes and levels of spiciness can be found in many of the recipes. These different dried and fresh chilies complete the complexity of the recipes and should not be substituted... if they aren't available where you live and you want to do it right then find a way... order it online!

My favorite section has to be the Moles (pronounced like Mo-lay, not like the small mammal or skin growth). I love the history provided at the beginning of this chapter. I have personally made the Mole Verde and Mole Rojo multiple times. I have made the Mole Poblano only once... it takes about 6 hours... very good and worth it once in a while. If you want a mole that appeals to a wide range of palates then the Mole Verde is the way to go. This book is definitely not a be all end all for authentic Mexican cuisine but it definitely is an essential book for those people who are passionate about good authentic Mexican dishes... or simply food in general.

I am a third and final year culinary student at a college in Columbus, Ohio. I've read a lot of texts and cookbooks in my life. I wanted to take the time and get online to comment on this book. I see and buy a lot of cookbooks that give you the good recipes but very little knowledge of the foods that you are cooking and how they will react to the processes that you will be putting them through. Five stars to this great piece of writing.

This book is an excellent addition to your cook book collection if you like truly authentic Mexican food. The recipes are great, most of them easy to prepare, and so what (as one person complained) if they take a little time--good things are worth waiting for. If you're in a hurry go to Taco Bell. To my mind, what this book shares with all truly great cookbooks is the combination of great recipes with clear instructions and an immensely readable and informative amount of information, instead of just listing recipes. The layout is very user friendly as well. I like a little history, I like to learn things I didn't know about a culture and their cuisine, or about unfamiliar ingredients, etc. Along with Dianne Kennedy's Mexican cookbooks I'd say these are the best books out there on this subject.

If your idea of Mexican food is tortillas covered in red glop and yellow cheese then you are in for a surprise. This is one of the most impressived and authentic cookbooks on Mexican food I have ever seen. You get the feel for Bayless's love of Mexican food and flavors as well as the culture. This is the type of food my Mom and my grandmothers make...

As a Mexican, I was actually a bit skeptical about this book - I mean a white guy writing about Mexican cooking? Come on! I am very happy to say that Rick Bayless proved me wrong. He knows his stuff. I've tried several of his recipes, including the green and poblano moles, the corn-husk wrapped fish in adobo [slightly spicy barbeque-ish seasoning paste], pozole [pork and hominy soup], and a few side dishes. None of the dishes have disappointed. Quite the opposite, the result is always quite good. The flavors are authentic and remind me of the dishes prepared by my mom, aunts and grandmothers. Yes, some of the dishes - the poblano mole in particular - are a bit time consuming, but well worth the effort, and even better than my mom's [sorry, mom!]. Not all the recipes are high maintenance though, and there are some wonderful dishes that can be prepared with minimal effort. This book is not for those looking to make a ground beef burrito, but if you love the taste of authentic Mexican food and are willing to invest a little bit of time, you are in for a treat. Mr. Bayless starts out with salsas and basic seasoning sauces and pastes, then moves on to heartier dishes, some of them involving those same salsas, sauces and pastes, so there is some cross-referencing between recipes. I previously read reviews where some people thought that was too much work, but I didn't mind flipping back to a previous page for a home-made sauce that was part of another recipe. He has side notes and tips on a lot of the recipes that help the person making the dish stay on track to a tasty end result, and in some cases with hard to find ingredients, he offers alternatives that are just as good. He has a comprehensive index of Mexican ingredients used for the dishes in the book, with brief history and descriptions of the ingredients. One drawback though, is that there are no color pictures of these ingredients. Color pictures, not the pencil drawings, would be a great help, because if you are not familiar with the ingredients it can be a bit frustrating trying to get a handle on the foods by description alone.

Overall though, the book is excellent. I am quite pleased with it and find myself browsing through it, reading the recipes, my mouth watering at the thought of how dish I want to make is going to smell, look, and taste. I enjoy cooking but by no means am a chef, however I can fool my family and friends into thinking I am with help from Rick Bayless.

I downloaded this cookbook to my Kindle last week, wanting to love it as much as the rest of the reviewers here. I'm sure in paper format it's a wonderful cookbook. I have one of Mr. Bayless's cookbooks and it does have terrific and accessible Mexican recipes. However, this is a review of the e-book version. Sadly, it proved to be rather useless to me in e-book format. Mostly because of its lack of practical formatting. The publisher apparently did not think it necessary to include a complete inventory of recipes, chapter by chapter, that are linked to their location in the book. The only links are to the chapter headings. But once you get there, you need to page through it, like a novel, to find out what specific recipes are included in each chapter. I found myself equally frustrated when I did find a recipe I liked that included a separately made sauce for which there was no link to the sauce recipe. How are you supposed to find this sauce recipe? The so-called "searchable index of terms" has no links to those terms, simply the page numbers from the original DTB version. When I typed some of the recipe names into the search window, I got plenty of hits, but none of them were to the actual recipe.

Considering that the publisher has the nerve to charge $15.99 for the e-book version, this lack of attention to detail is appalling. I would like to contrast this cookbook to the other one I also downloaded last week: Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. That e-cookbook is a joy to use. There is a complete list of recipes by chapter with links to the recipes themselves. There are also internal links throughout the book to master recipes, to suggested side dish recipes, to sidebars with discussions of ingredients or techniques. The Bittman book is fully worth the $19.99 the publisher charges for it. Because you can actually USE it. Not so the Bayless e-book, which is, sadly, worthless.

Excellent cookbook. The recipes are the best I've ever found on true Mexican cooking. There is a restaurant in Chicago owed and operated by the authors of this book. You must check it out if you're ever in Chicago. The cookbook itself is extremely easy to follow. It provides very useful sidebar comments on practical tips and regional variations. This helps make this cookbook a dream! If you're looking for a Mexican cookbook, there's no better one to be found

While I was born and raised in the Southern US on grits and fried catfish, my husband was raised in Mexico City on pozole and pombazos and anything picosa.

We've been together for almost six years, and he hasn't been back home at all in that time, not even for a quick visit. We still live in the south, so our choices as far as authentic Mexican are quite slim. There are some taquerias around that cater to the local Mexican community, but they're usually overpriced and carry only the most basic dishes (tacos, tortas, huevos, etc). So when my sister gave me this book for Christmas, I couldn't wait to try it.

I've been cooking "Mexican-style" for a while. That involved adding a lot of salsa to things, or making things like tostadas or tortas or mole (out of the can! for shame!) or milanesa. And I'm no stranger to most of the ingredients in the book, but I just haven't ever had anyone to show me how to cook actual dishes that aren't considered Mexican take out.

The first dish I made was Chilaquiles Verdes and the salsa I made for it, according to my husband, was as good as his own sainted mother's salsa--which, if you can imagine, is quite the compliment.

For me, this book has allowed me to bring a little of Mexico to our table and to help my husband a little bit in his homesickness. He's also very proud of the fact that his gabacha wife can cook authentic mexican food.

As for those who wonder about the availability of the ingredients, most of them are available in your local grocery store. I live in a medium sized college town, and I can obtain Chiles Guajillos dried in bags at Walmart, as well as a plethora of fresh chiles (poblanos, verdes, jalapenos, serranos, etc). I would say if you have a noticeable Mexican immigrant population, the ingredients can be found in your area--try different grocery stores and the local tiendas (Mexican grocery stores).

Provecho!