Reader Scott writes: Use number n + 1 for your sous vide machine: maize nixtamalization. Add calcium hydroxide and protease enzymes and set the sous vide to mid 50’s C for efficient proteolytic activity! Holy cow, I had no idea this thing was so versatile! Hear that, honey? Your husband just bought us a miracle […]
READ ONThe functional advantages of nixtamalization are just the beginning of what the process brought to the ancient Mesoamericans. For in the process of making their corn easier to handle and eat, Mesoamerican cooks accidentally unleashed a torrent of nutrients that would otherwise have been unavailable to them. For nixtamalization, it turns out, vastly increases the […]
READ ONReader Mary Sue writes: My abuelita began making her white flour tortillas with cooking oil instead of shortening after my abuelito’s third heart attack. She uses about 1/3rd of a cup of oil, these days canola or sunflower. Of course, it being a grandmother recipe, she’s been eyeballing it for decades and there’s no actual […]
READ ONIt’s a good question, because on an intuitive level one would think that if a corn tortilla is a simple pancake made of ground corn, there really shouldn’t be that much difference between finely ground corn meal and masa harina (literally “dough flour”). In reality there’s a huge difference, which can be summed up in […]
READ ONReader Veggie asks if it’s possible to substitute butter for shortening in flour tortillas. The answer is yes, and I expect butter would give flour tortillas a very nice warm and toasty flavor, though it won’t be anything like what most people are accustomed to. A down side to using butter is that it’s 17% […]
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