Day Two: Food from around the world: Mexico

Ours second dinner challenge we decided on Mexico, which was fun as some of the flavors (such as the dessert) were similar from Spain where I had just come from. We decided to go all out, with main, dessert and a traditional drink - we made our own mojitos! They took a bit of tweaking (lots more lime and mint than the recipe called for) but ended up deliciously cold and refreshing, we also left out the sugar that the recipe asked for, so they were nice and tart.

We decided to go for soft tacos, and had a plethora of lovely fresh ingredients. We cooked our chicken in spice for a kick, then layered on tomato, capsicum, cucumber and salad. Joy had made her own guacamole (which I'm sure was very nice but I wouldn't touch with a barge pole) and also a delicious salsa which was lovely and lemony and had a bit of a hit to it also so my mouth was burning! However we also had feta and sour cream to combat the spice, and it made a delicious combination.

Soft taco all made up and ready to go!

Our dessert decision was rather daring in my opinion, we decided to do homemade churros. These are something that are very popular in Spain, so I had them a few times which was an advantage as I knew what they were meant to be like. A savory batter which is then piped in small strips into boiling oil and deep fried (Like donuts I suppose) until brown and crispy, then chucked on a tray of cinnamon and sugar until coated, and then dipped into homemade chocolate sauce comprising of dark chocolate, honey and cream. The terrifying part is piping them not too long, then cutting them over the oil but not too high above otherwise the boiling oil would splash. I was sure it would be a disaster, but with two people (I was the scissor wielder) it worked quite well! Of course cleaning the dough out of the piping back afterwards was another story...

                                     

The end result, we were a little too paranoid of them overcooking and took them out a little too early, so they weren't as crispy on the outside as we would of liked, but the color and the taste was there, and overall I thought we did a pretty good job for our first time! The chocolate sauce was pretty awesome too.