Annoying food blogger bit – just 5 sentences I promise!
Tinga originated in Puebla, a state in central Mexico, not too far from Mexico City. Puebla is one of my favourite places in Mexico – I can’t even be angry at it after I ate some dodgy street food and shredded my asshole in the process. I would love to go back and see if it’s still there and apologise to the people who worked in the hotel where I stayed. (I left a generous tip at the time).
Now that I’ve worked up your appetite with those excellent visuals, tinga is a stew made from tomatoes, chipotle chiles and onion. It is usually made with shredded chicken, but I decided to give it a try with shredded carrot instead.
People of Sonora, put down the torches and hear me out
I know you’re a meat town. I get it that vegetarian means chicken and vegan means fish, but I assure you it’s good! It’s healthy, cheap, gluten free and salt free (I realise that’s not helping). I challenge you to just make it once and if we ever make it out of this quarantine, I’ll make you all a taco.
The recipe!
So the self indulgent food blogger waffling is kind of addictive, I could have kept going, but I promised myself I wouldn’t. Here’s the recipe!
Ingredients
(makes about 12 tacos)
4 medium carrots
1/2 an onion
2 large tomatoes
1 stock cube dissolved in a cup of water
3 chipotle chiles in a adobo (this is not very spicy)
1 avocado
Salsa (I’ll post my recipe soon)
Cumin and smoky paprika
1 lime
3 cloves of garlic
Fresh coriander
Oil to saute
Corn tortillas
Method
- Peel and grate the carrot.
- Add the garlic, onion, chipotle, tomatoes and stock to a blender. Blend until smooth.
- In a large frypan, heat the oil and add the carrots. Saute for about 5 mins on a medium heat, until carrot starts to cook a little.
- Add tomato mixture and stir through. Cook on a medium heat for about 10-15 minutes until tomato mixture starts to reduce (think about how it will sit in the taco – you don’t want too much sauce running everywhere, but you want some).
- Finely chop a few slices of onion and sprigs of coriander.
- Cut the avocado into slices or make a guacamole.
- Heat the corn tortillas in a pan or straight over the flame until warm.
- Top with salsa.
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