December 20, 2024 • 27 mins
Listen to Hungry for History from the beginning! Enjoy this rewind episode from Season One.
Eva and Maite kick off the series with the tortilla, a staple in Mexican cuisine and the source of a centuries-long conundrum... corn or wheat? The women taste test Eva’s homemade flour tortillas and try some from Sonoratown, a casual destination for Northern Mexican-style tacos in Los Angeles. Maite visits Acapulco Mexicatessen in East LA to experience the nixtamalization process. Plus, Jorge Gaviria, founder of Masienda, shares his thoughts on the corn vs flour debate.
Check out Jorge Gaviria’s new book! MASA – Techniques, Recipes and Reflections on a Timeless Staple
Learn more about Sonoratown here.
Find out all about Acapulco Mexicatessen here.
Eva’s Flour Tortillas aka HEB - Mother's Flour Tortillas
Ingredients:
- Recipe makes 12 Servings
- 2 cup(s) All Purpose Flour
- 1 Tsp Baking Powder
- 1 Tsp Iodized Salt
- 1/2 cup(s) Crisco All Vegetable Shortening
- 2/3 cup(s) water, warm
Instructions:
- Mix flour, baking powder, salt and shortening in bowl.
- Add warm water, knead with one hand until dough is well mixed.
- Form into medium size balls.
- Roll out each ball into a thin circle.
- Place on hot griddle, cook one side for about 1 minute, then turn and cook the other side completely until well done.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Today's episode is all about the corn and flour dirtilla.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
My name is Evil Longoria and I am Myra and
welcome to Hungry for History, a podcast that explores our
past and present through food.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
On every episode, we'll talk about the history of some
of our favorite dishes, ingredients, and beverages.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
So make yourself at home. When Rachel.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
So excited, here we.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Are, here, we are.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Our first episode needed a really strong topic THIRTI yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
This is like how much better can it get? Talking
about tortillas.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
That's everything. It's the soul of Mexican food. It's either
a tack or it's eaten with a thirty yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
Right, everything.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I mean, it's the center of our universe. It's the
center of the dinner table, lunch table, breakfast table.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
It's I always yeah, I always have thirty yes in
refrigerator and then also in my freezer just because I
can never run out.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Yeah, there's so much history to this that we're going
to unpack.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Yes, it's like, okay, who made the first or they
who made the first. It's impossible to give it a
time and a place. But corn is every like in Mexico,
corn is life like humans. According to the Mayan Book
of Creation. Right, humans were molded from Massa and you
know that Malie of course, and we're definitely gonna do
it that Mala episode. But it's this whole idea of
(01:25):
just humans were molded from Massa and corn was was life.
Then of course comes the conquest, and one of the
first things that was introduced was wheat, and it was
sort of corn was associated with God's wheat was the
eucharistic waferst So it's like, okay, no, this, we're converting
everybody to Christianity. We need flour, like we need to
(01:48):
supplant corn with flour. The initial argument, right, the initial
conundrum wasn't cornterilla versus flower. It was a corndrvia versus bread.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
The other legends of where the tortilla comes from is
Jewish unlovend bread. And to hide the Jewishness of families,
they didn't eat the corn, you know, so they brought
their unlovend bread with them that they made it flatter,
and hence, hence that flower tortilla was born.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
And you'll see in the map of the.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Spanish Inquisition where Jews landed was not in Veracruz.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
It wasn't the main port.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
It was further north because if they knew if they
would be identified in the port of New Spain, they
could be arrested, so they entered more northern. Hence why
Northanolsi flower tortillas is because there was a huge Sephardic
hidden Jewish population that landed there and used their loved bread.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
I find that's so fascinating because it's a big part
of the culture in Mexico that we don't really talk about.
The crypto Jews right then, they were crypto juice. They
were worshiping in price it eating the flower derthias, right
instead of their matsa like making flower derthias. Granted corn
would have worked as well, but you know, making the
flower and the religious orders, the Jesuits and the Franciscans,
(03:12):
they also were planting them to make the eucharistic wafer.
So one thing sort of morphed into the other, which
is so interesting. And then also a lot of the
Jewish population were hired to work in bakeries. They were
introducing like orange blossom water and sesame seeds and these
you know, flavors that was very similar to what they
(03:34):
were used to, you know back home in Europe. The
flower thertilla has a ton of tons of history.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Because if you follow the food, you follow the history
of a country in a nation.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Of all of the products that was that were introduced
from Europe to Mexico, the one the best symbolized European
culture was wheat.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
I was just in Wahaka where the earliest evidence of
corn as a food is there. It's in the caves
of Wahaka, and we went. It was beautiful, Like you're like,
oh my gosh. The earliest tools and like it's not
a moltke hit, the what do you call them, were
in these caves and it predates anything else. So that's
how they know corn has been such an essential part
(04:26):
of their life for thousands of years. But like you
said that, the original inhabitants of this land still to
this day know how sacred corn is and how they
want to preserve the seeds of it and how there's
so many varieties.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
And that's the thing that's so important about with weed,
just like there are in.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Wahaka with corns. Like, let's protect.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
These lands and let's just make sure that this history
doesn't go away, because this is our soul, right, this
is our history.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
The United States is obviously the largest consumer of most things,
but specifically corn, and they have only ordered white corn,
white corn tortillas, white corn massa. And because there's such
a high demand for just white corn, the other varieties
are dining off because they have no buyers for it,
if you will, except for the local communities.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
You know, the real corn. And I'm sure you saw
this in your travels through Wahaka. The nixstamalization, that process
of nicks tamil, you know. And this is like the
boil the corn kernels with this calcium hydroxide and it
softens the corn and pulls out the necessary nutrients, makes
it easier to grind. And that's like the really good
tortilla that tastes like the earth. This is this nix
(05:42):
stimalization process. And then around you know Nafta, which is
not that long ago. It's like the nineties, right there
is this man Roerto and Saleza known as the King
of Dirty as he created Maseecah.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
So that's a big brand. That's the big brand.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
That's so rather than doing this whole nick stimalization process
that takes too long, let me just take the corn
dehydrate it and make cornflour and this is masseeca. But
you're skipping these rituals, what you experienced when you're in
Mohaka and all of these different corns and the people
knowing that it's sacred.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Forget about that. Let's do this.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
You could make a ton more that doesn't taste like
if you're in Whaka or you get these real you know.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
That's the difference. Is that process.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
That's the process, is everything.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
The ancient process. It's like the.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
French government saying, you know what, we're going to replace
the baguette with sliced white bread.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
That's what happened in Mexico. We're going to replace corn.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
It's completely sacrilegious. Okay, we are at Agabuco.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Mexico, Testen in East La.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
We just arrived and it is this super cool spot
where they make massa from scratch, the Nixtamal wave.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
I've eaten tafias forever.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
I've read about this nextimization process forever, but I've actually
never seen it in action, and it's super cool to
see it on a large scale.
Speaker 3 (07:18):
Basically, it looks like a lab. Everything is stainless steel.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
Everybody's wearing hairnuts, everybody's wearing white lab coats and boots,
and we were with the owner, Gruben Ivara, and the
thirtiero Masero Crosse Samoura, and what.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
He did was amazing.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
It's a cooking tank pretty much.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
It's a cooking than cooking.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Tank, looking a giant cooking sink that he's filling halfway
with very very very hot water. And the next epos
do I'll put the c which is kind of like toxic,
so it's better like back up a little bit because
of calcoes in the air. And now he's getting the gun,
which is a calcium hydroxide that is for the nixt
Samal process.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
So it was just added all.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Of this white gun, which is a white powder to
the hot water. He used this giant metal padal to
swish it all around to make sure all of this
lime was dissolved, and it looked like a giant tub
of hot milk.
Speaker 5 (08:19):
He's about to shoot seven hundred pounds of dried corn
in through a shoot. Because the corn is so loud
when it's shot into the hot water, they have to
wait to do this until after nine o'clock in the morning,
otherwise the neighbors complain that is.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
How loud it is.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
This is the coolest brain ever. And the corn was
a very pale yellow, almost white, and as soon as
it hits the calcium hydroxide, it turned bright yellow. And
he kept swishing it around to make sure that all
of the corn kernels who were covered with this gun.
(09:00):
And then after he finished this process, he lit a
fire underneath the giant sinc And so the nicksta malized
corn was going to lay with this direct flame in
the hot water, but now with direct flame for fifteen minutes.
Then they're going to pass it to another barrel and
then after at rest for about twenty four hours. And
(09:23):
so this is when.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
The magic happens.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
This is when all of the nutrients are pulled out.
This is when the husk becomes really you know soft,
And this is something that's been around four centuries. The
earliest evidence of this has been discovered in Guatemala, dating
to about twenty five hundred BC, which is something that's
(09:48):
I think amazing. For over four thousand years, this process
has been done in Mexico and in Central America, and
this is what brings out all of the necessary nutrients
in the corn, you know, acid, and it also it
softens the corn, making it easier to grind. So in
meso America, even in Mexico today, when it's done this way, theya,
(10:11):
the massa together with beans and vegetables is essentially the
perfect diet. And the pre colonial diet of the Americas
was mainly vegetarian, very very very little animal protein. And
here at Acapulco, Mexicanist they do it this old school way,
which is something that is so amazing. Up next, even
(10:37):
I do a taste test, including the flower dirtia she
makes every day with her son.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
We are here at my house. I make flower dirtias daily.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Corn versus flower is one of the most controversial topics
you didn't talk about.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
It's like the cirtilla conundrum.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
I grew up eating both. I love, but I did.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
You grew up being but I only grew up eating
flower because I'm a Texican.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
You are, but I grew up in Texas. I know,
but I grew up with both.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
And there's certain things that has to be flower, certain
foods that have.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
To be eaten with corante.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
I just pulled out a hot tortilla from my tortilla holder, which, by.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
The way, if you make flower tortillas.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
You know they have to rest in a cloth toilla holder.
You know that it helps them steam and like puff up.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Well, let me just describe this stia that Eva made.
It is perfectly round. Because you were watching me, but
this is it looks like you're pro even I'm pretty
much your prose daily and I eat them with butter.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
My son, my son will we eat bean tacos in
the morning with flower tortillas and my son loves it,
just like this with manthikia butter.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Yeah, they're delicious, but I love them with butter and
a little bit of sugar and cornarthias.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
I love with butter and ariff salt. Oh interesting, mm hmmm,
I'm gonna put sure. It's really good.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
So not only is there the conundrum of flower versus corn,
there's the conundrum of thin flower tortillas more translucent one
which is in the north, like in Monterrey, they like
a thinner flower tortilla, And in Texas we have almost
what looks like pea bread.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
That's how thick it is. It's very very thick.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
And I brought some, yes, just to taste, okay, to compare,
to judge, to compare to the Texas one that are thick.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
I love both, but I have to say I prefer
the thin.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Because I I grew Brilarto and Revelorado where I'm from,
like they have the thin ones. But I do love both,
but yes, the thin are like my favorite. So I
ended up going to Sonora town here in LA that
has it's an amazing pacheta. They just opened one near
my house and they make really thin, tiny tiny These
(12:57):
are really small and they sot their flour from Sonora
and Sona and wheat is supposed to be some of
you know, the original heritage wheat and some of the
best wheat in Mexico from Sonora.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Is that this tortilla.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Can I have a little bit of butter as well,
So sorry salty butter.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
This summer on flour.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
It has less gluten and it has this sort of
sweet nutty flavor.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
It's like the best flower. This is sweeter. This is sweeter, thinner,
super thin.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
You can see if you hold it up. Yeah, paper thin,
paper thin. Where my tortilla that I just make flower
tortilla is pretty thick. It is pretty and larger. Yeah,
it's thick and larger. Yeah, this is so good. We're
just going to shut her and eat. So you guys
can hear this.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
My mom's from Mexico, seating growing up in Loryda. It's
like they're like, that's not Mexican food. Is text mex
but it is. It's like also northern Mexico. The wurritos.
Apparently this guy Juan Mandez, I mean, these are these legends,
right that he was making these facos wrapped in these
huge thirtillas, basically wrapping the fillings to keep it warm,
and he was transporting them in a burro in a donkey, hence.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
The name the wurtos. And this was in Chihuahua and
the northern state of Chihuahua.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
So they're popular in northern Mexico and then also calmex
food and tex mex food. But it's basically it's it's
a flower dirtilla always, right, So more like northern Mexico,
South Texas.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Where we're from. Yeah, you don't flower the flower in
the south. You don't find it. You don't find it.
It's only in the north.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
It's only in the north. Yeah, the Holy Day of Wheat,
I mean when we think of you know, Mexico, that
sort of soul of Mexico is corn.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
It's the it's the massa.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
And I grew up eating you know, both of them
because that's where my parents are from.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
That's what we always had.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
Do you have a favorite type of deco? That's a
good question. My favorite taco. Okay, it's probably a chicken talgo.
I make these all the time. I might smoke these
twice a week because their peppa is favorite. But it's
a corn tortilla with rotisserie torn chicken with a salsa
ver dae. But I half fry it the tortilla, so
(15:14):
it's not like a taco bell crunch, but it's not
a soft taco, so it's.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
In between, so you just lightly.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
It's a little bit cris yeah, but it's still.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Soft, yes, but it's still chewy.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And I put chicken, sour cream, lettuce, tomato salad, and
it's just peppers.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Like this is the best taco I've ever at.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
That sounds it's chicken tacos, but there's just chick fried
corn tortilla, just like just hand fried, yeah, pan fried
in a little olive oil. They're the best I love.
And I'll do the same thing with beef, so that's
my favorite taco. I'll post is up there for me too.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
I'll past is up there. I'll post that might be
my favorite.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Also, growing up on the ranch, we would do a
sada just on the grill and we would do sausage,
like barbecue sausage, and we just grab it literally off
the grill with the tortilla, and that was our dinner.
It was like you just grabbed the sausage that sounds rial,
which is like it's like a polar sausage, and you
just grabbed, you know, whenever you saw your sausage ready,
(16:15):
you grabbed it with the tortilla and you ate it.
And that was a flower tortilla. Yeah, so that's my favorite.
Like a flower tortilla with a barbecue sausage inside. That's amazing.
Am I probably sorry? The best taco. My favorite taco
is a breakfast taco, okay, like the Texas breakfast tacos
with like bean cheese, cheese, ch soak and webble potato eggs,
(16:40):
chotes on egg and bean and it's in a fat,
fat tortilla, right, flour tortilla.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
What's your favorite taco though, I that's you, that's your favorite.
That's my favorite. Yeah, that was with my favorite lamb. No no, no,
with pork, with with pork.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Yeah, no you have to you have to go to
a truck and it's like greasy and yeah, that's my
favorite echo. I also like just kinda sound like this,
just like a simple just yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
I just love a skirt steak.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
I prefer corn for that, but I always have both.
I like to have the option of both just in
case and when I heat them up, I like for
them to get really nice and poofy.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
After the break, Corge Gaviria Massien that he will tell
us his thoughts on the partiya conundrum.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
And we're sharing a recipe with you.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Welcome back to Hungry for History. We are so excited
for you to hear from Je Gaviria. He is the
founder of Macienda, an online marketplace that celebrates the Mexican kitchen.
He has a new book out called Masa Techniques, Recipes
and Reflections on a Time a Staple, and he's here
to tell us his thoughts on the dirtilla conundrum.
Speaker 4 (18:06):
So maybe it's just the times we're in, but tortilla
preferences can be polarizing, believe it or not. And of
course I'm referring specifically to corn and flower tortillas here.
It can get pretty divisive. Corn critics typically tend to
lament the lack of pliability and a corn tortilla, I mean,
clearly they just haven't had a good one, while flower
(18:28):
tortilla haters or flowers say that they're just not as
authentic flower tortilla as that is so our fifty to
fifty tortillas are kind of the ultimate compromise. I would
say they take the best of corn and the best
of flour and put them together. You know, for a
corn tortilla, that extra bit of actual wheat flour gives
(18:48):
it that kind of glutenous stretch that you might crave
from a flower tortilla, while you know, the corn itself
is giving an extra layer of complexity to you know,
an otherwise you know, single note of flowa.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Interesting fact, I didn't know this when I read this.
I didn't know that either.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Flower tortillas are one of the United States astronauts favorite foods.
I don't know how they did this, pole but it's
not just because they're delicious. But in nineteen eighty five,
NASA used tortillas as a solution to a bread and
gravity issue.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
How crazy is that? Crazy?
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah, Mexican on Jnai exactly, always, always, always.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
So the tortilla is so versatile. I mean you can
use it for so many things. And you can see
how the American culture has just made it their own.
I mean, everybody has a rap for lunch, you know,
they really Ringo sized it. Yeah, yeah, americanized it. But
not only America, but all these other cultures. And what's
(19:54):
some creative dishes you've seen with the tortillailla?
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Gosh, well, the kogi, the Korean tacot roco dago draw.
I think that was like the big one a few
years ago that everyone's like, oh my god, where is he?
Speaker 5 (20:05):
Where is it?
Speaker 1 (20:05):
I want to taste this is like a that go
with some grand barbecue, with Korean barbecue, and it's like
the lines, it's like to taste this. And there was
this talk of like, oh, it's not authentic, and it's like,
you know, well, this is what I grew up with.
I grew up in the Mexican neighborhood, and I would,
you know, put our barbecue in a tartilla, So yeah,
this is authentic to me, to him, right, So that's
(20:26):
really the one that that And gosh, there's like with
Polish sausage and all sorts of different you know, variations.
But even like the text mextaco is the original with
yellow cheese, but the Korean.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Barbecue green barbecue's booin is it? Big?
Speaker 2 (20:42):
I saw in a Chinese restaurant of the day spring rolls,
but it was it was filled with all your normal
vegetables Asian variety, but it was wrapped in a tortilla.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
Oh really yeah, and deep fried.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Like like an egg roll, like an egg roll, but
it was a tortilla.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
But it was oh interesting, it was so good. I think.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
You know, every culture has their form of a rap tortilla.
France has the crepe, and ye, Greece has the peda exactly,
and I mean which brings us.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
To the right.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
It's not Greece, but you know Lebanie, Lebanese immigrants they
brought the tacosaraves and then there you know, second third
generation turned those into tacos pastor flower tortilla.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Using pork lamb. Yeah it wasn't lamb. It's poor.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
It's poork instead of lamb. And then they added the
pineapple to it.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
The pineapple and cilantro, and the cilantro a little bit
of lime and a lot of lime, a lot of yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
And I think the soul of the tackle is the tortill. Yeah, yeah,
I think that's what makes a really good that that's true.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
Let me tell you. Robert Rodriguez gave me.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Robert Rodriguez, the director who's also text mex like us,
gave me.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
A great tortilla recipe. He uses butter.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
I use Crisco shortening, but the butter, the yellow one, okay, yeah,
but I do two cups flour, I do a teaspoon salt.
I do two teaspoons baking powder, and then a fourth
cup of shortening. So you can use mantika or a
fourth cup fat. You can use mantka, you can use Crisco,
(22:23):
you can use olive oil. You could use butter. It's
just what's your fat. So just a fourth cup fat.
And you don't want to overdo the fat because that
will cause it to get cracky. It's almost like it
becomes too crackery, too.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
Much like a cracker.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Okay, and then a cup hot water, and that's the
trick is hot water, like boiling hot water. And you
have to neat it and then you let it sit
for thirty minutes. That's what makes it go poof because
you got to let the gluten settle. You gotta let
the baking powder do its thing, and then the other trick,
so you leave that alone. Then you roll them out
(23:02):
and you put them on the on the gomal on
your a griddle, and then you have to put it
in this. This is the fia holder, a tortilla holder,
but it's cloth because those plastic ones.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
You got to put a towel inside.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
You gotta have it warm so that once it's super
hot coming off the griddle, off the comal, and then
the steam almost cooks it more and that's what makes
it super soft.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
So that's my flower tortilla recipie.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Let's talk about technique of the tortilla, because the flower
tortilla is a very different technique with the rolling pin
as compared to the corn tortilla, which you need a you.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
Need a press, a press.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
You roll a little tortilla like a little like a
little golf ball or pink punk ball something I like.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
I like them a little, put it in.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
The center and then squeeze it, close it and then
you put the plastic sort of so that it doesn't
stick to the press. It's easy to remove, and then
you just put it on a dry comad and then
just heat it. I like to heat it until it
puffs up. And that is like, how does it puff
up if it puffs because it's I guess it's different.
Doesn't have us The flower has the gluten and the corn.
(24:11):
It's basically because it has water in it. It's basically
the water. Once it touches the heat is like, oh god,
what is that?
Speaker 3 (24:20):
And then the steam just explodes.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Okay, And that's because I like when corn tortillas puff up,
and that's not common that don't all do that.
Speaker 3 (24:30):
They don't always do that.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Yeah, And when they don't, I think it's they're just
a little dry.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
The bane of our existence. I hate when my tortillas
don't puff up.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
And then so the flower tortilla, you roll it out
like like you would a pastry dough.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Right.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Well, my aunt taught me this one two turn, one
two turn, So you don't want to overwork your flower
because of the gluten. And so my son does it
all the time with me. My son loves making flower
tortillas with me.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
You was just down there. One too turn, one too turn.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
And also I don't know how it because I don't
make corncher teas you would know this. You don't flip
them a lot. And so for flour, you're only supposed
to flip it once, so you let it cook on
one side, flip it on the other and take it off.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
My mom is a flipper. My mom flip flip it.
My mom leave alone.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
I hate when she comes over and takes over the
comaale because I'm like, you're flipping it too much. It's
not cooking. It needs to rise, it needs to be
one with the heat. And my mom will be flipping, flipping, flipping, mom,
let it, let it rest, flip.
Speaker 3 (25:32):
It once, just flip it once. That's so funny.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
But it's too different, too different. It's very different techniques.
And usually when I heat them up, like if I
have them cooked already and then I reheat them, I
always put the I don't do this with flour, but
with corn, I put it directly on the open flame,
on the open gas flame.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
So that has a little burnt little chart.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Yeah, so what was the verdict, corner flower?
Speaker 3 (25:58):
It's both, Oh you can't. I can't decide. I love both.
I do love both.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Well, I do love both for different things, but yes,
I do love both.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
I you know I'm a flower tortilla. Your team Flower,
I'm team Flower.
Speaker 3 (26:10):
I need a shirt.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Team Flower, Team Corn.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
Deam Core.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
I think you're deem Corn and you just don't want
to admit it to the lovers.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
I do love corn. I am fascinated by corn. I
love the history of corna the soul of corn.
Speaker 3 (26:27):
I grew up with both.
Speaker 5 (26:29):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
You really can't decide.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
I can't decide because I love them both for different things.
Most things I like to eat with corn, but there
are a few things that you just have to go flower.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
So I'll let you off and say both. Thanks so
much for listening. Don't forget to subscribe. Thank you bye.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Everybody Hungry for History is an unbelievable entertainment production in
partnership with Iheart's my podcast network.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
For more of your favorite shows, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Today's episode is all about the corn and flour dirtilla.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
My name is Evil Longoria and I am Myra and
welcome to Hungry for History, a podcast that explores our
past and present through food.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
On every episode, we'll talk about the history of some
of our favorite dishes, ingredients, and beverages.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
So make yourself at home. When Rachel.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
So excited, here we.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Are, here, we are.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Our first episode needed a really strong topic THIRTI yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
This is like how much better can it get? Talking
about tortillas.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
That's everything. It's the soul of Mexican food. It's either
a tack or it's eaten with a thirty yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
Right, everything.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I mean, it's the center of our universe. It's the
center of the dinner table, lunch table, breakfast table.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
It's I always yeah, I always have thirty yes in
refrigerator and then also in my freezer just because I
can never run out.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Yeah, there's so much history to this that we're going
to unpack.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Yes, it's like, okay, who made the first or they
who made the first. It's impossible to give it a
time and a place. But corn is every like in Mexico,
corn is life like humans. According to the Mayan Book
of Creation. Right, humans were molded from Massa and you
know that Malie of course, and we're definitely gonna do
it that Mala episode. But it's this whole idea of
(01:25):
just humans were molded from Massa and corn was was life.
Then of course comes the conquest, and one of the
first things that was introduced was wheat, and it was
sort of corn was associated with God's wheat was the
eucharistic waferst So it's like, okay, no, this, we're converting
everybody to Christianity. We need flour, like we need to
(01:48):
supplant corn with flour. The initial argument, right, the initial
conundrum wasn't cornterilla versus flower. It was a corndrvia versus bread.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
The other legends of where the tortilla comes from is
Jewish unlovend bread. And to hide the Jewishness of families,
they didn't eat the corn, you know, so they brought
their unlovend bread with them that they made it flatter,
and hence, hence that flower tortilla was born.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
And you'll see in the map of the.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Spanish Inquisition where Jews landed was not in Veracruz.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
It wasn't the main port.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
It was further north because if they knew if they
would be identified in the port of New Spain, they
could be arrested, so they entered more northern. Hence why
Northanolsi flower tortillas is because there was a huge Sephardic
hidden Jewish population that landed there and used their loved bread.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
I find that's so fascinating because it's a big part
of the culture in Mexico that we don't really talk about.
The crypto Jews right then, they were crypto juice. They
were worshiping in price it eating the flower derthias, right
instead of their matsa like making flower derthias. Granted corn
would have worked as well, but you know, making the
flower and the religious orders, the Jesuits and the Franciscans,
(03:12):
they also were planting them to make the eucharistic wafer.
So one thing sort of morphed into the other, which
is so interesting. And then also a lot of the
Jewish population were hired to work in bakeries. They were
introducing like orange blossom water and sesame seeds and these
you know, flavors that was very similar to what they
(03:34):
were used to, you know back home in Europe. The
flower thertilla has a ton of tons of history.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
Because if you follow the food, you follow the history
of a country in a nation.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Of all of the products that was that were introduced
from Europe to Mexico, the one the best symbolized European
culture was wheat.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
I was just in Wahaka where the earliest evidence of
corn as a food is there. It's in the caves
of Wahaka, and we went. It was beautiful, Like you're like,
oh my gosh. The earliest tools and like it's not
a moltke hit, the what do you call them, were
in these caves and it predates anything else. So that's
how they know corn has been such an essential part
(04:26):
of their life for thousands of years. But like you
said that, the original inhabitants of this land still to
this day know how sacred corn is and how they
want to preserve the seeds of it and how there's
so many varieties.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
And that's the thing that's so important about with weed,
just like there are in.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
Wahaka with corns. Like, let's protect.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
These lands and let's just make sure that this history
doesn't go away, because this is our soul, right, this
is our history.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
The United States is obviously the largest consumer of most things,
but specifically corn, and they have only ordered white corn,
white corn tortillas, white corn massa. And because there's such
a high demand for just white corn, the other varieties
are dining off because they have no buyers for it,
if you will, except for the local communities.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
You know, the real corn. And I'm sure you saw
this in your travels through Wahaka. The nixstamalization, that process
of nicks tamil, you know. And this is like the
boil the corn kernels with this calcium hydroxide and it
softens the corn and pulls out the necessary nutrients, makes
it easier to grind. And that's like the really good
tortilla that tastes like the earth. This is this nix
(05:42):
stimalization process. And then around you know Nafta, which is
not that long ago. It's like the nineties, right there
is this man Roerto and Saleza known as the King
of Dirty as he created Maseecah.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
So that's a big brand. That's the big brand.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
That's so rather than doing this whole nick stimalization process
that takes too long, let me just take the corn
dehydrate it and make cornflour and this is masseeca. But
you're skipping these rituals, what you experienced when you're in
Mohaka and all of these different corns and the people
knowing that it's sacred.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Forget about that. Let's do this.
Speaker 1 (06:20):
You could make a ton more that doesn't taste like
if you're in Whaka or you get these real you know.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
That's the difference. Is that process.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
That's the process, is everything.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
The ancient process. It's like the.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
French government saying, you know what, we're going to replace
the baguette with sliced white bread.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
That's what happened in Mexico. We're going to replace corn.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
It's completely sacrilegious. Okay, we are at Agabuco.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Mexico, Testen in East La.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
We just arrived and it is this super cool spot
where they make massa from scratch, the Nixtamal wave.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
I've eaten tafias forever.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
I've read about this nextimization process forever, but I've actually
never seen it in action, and it's super cool to
see it on a large scale.
Speaker 3 (07:18):
Basically, it looks like a lab. Everything is stainless steel.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
Everybody's wearing hairnuts, everybody's wearing white lab coats and boots,
and we were with the owner, Gruben Ivara, and the
thirtiero Masero Crosse Samoura, and what.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
He did was amazing.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
It's a cooking tank pretty much.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
It's a cooking than cooking.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
Tank, looking a giant cooking sink that he's filling halfway
with very very very hot water. And the next epos
do I'll put the c which is kind of like toxic,
so it's better like back up a little bit because
of calcoes in the air. And now he's getting the gun,
which is a calcium hydroxide that is for the nixt
Samal process.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
So it was just added all.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Of this white gun, which is a white powder to
the hot water. He used this giant metal padal to
swish it all around to make sure all of this
lime was dissolved, and it looked like a giant tub
of hot milk.
Speaker 5 (08:19):
He's about to shoot seven hundred pounds of dried corn
in through a shoot. Because the corn is so loud
when it's shot into the hot water, they have to
wait to do this until after nine o'clock in the morning,
otherwise the neighbors complain that is.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
How loud it is.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
This is the coolest brain ever. And the corn was
a very pale yellow, almost white, and as soon as
it hits the calcium hydroxide, it turned bright yellow. And
he kept swishing it around to make sure that all
of the corn kernels who were covered with this gun.
(09:00):
And then after he finished this process, he lit a
fire underneath the giant sinc And so the nicksta malized
corn was going to lay with this direct flame in
the hot water, but now with direct flame for fifteen minutes.
Then they're going to pass it to another barrel and
then after at rest for about twenty four hours. And
(09:23):
so this is when.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
The magic happens.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
This is when all of the nutrients are pulled out.
This is when the husk becomes really you know soft,
And this is something that's been around four centuries. The
earliest evidence of this has been discovered in Guatemala, dating
to about twenty five hundred BC, which is something that's
(09:48):
I think amazing. For over four thousand years, this process
has been done in Mexico and in Central America, and
this is what brings out all of the necessary nutrients
in the corn, you know, acid, and it also it
softens the corn, making it easier to grind. So in
meso America, even in Mexico today, when it's done this way, theya,
(10:11):
the massa together with beans and vegetables is essentially the
perfect diet. And the pre colonial diet of the Americas
was mainly vegetarian, very very very little animal protein. And
here at Acapulco, Mexicanist they do it this old school way,
which is something that is so amazing. Up next, even
(10:37):
I do a taste test, including the flower dirtia she
makes every day with her son.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
We are here at my house. I make flower dirtias daily.
Speaker 2 (10:57):
Corn versus flower is one of the most controversial topics
you didn't talk about.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
It's like the cirtilla conundrum.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
I grew up eating both. I love, but I did.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
You grew up being but I only grew up eating
flower because I'm a Texican.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
You are, but I grew up in Texas. I know,
but I grew up with both.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
And there's certain things that has to be flower, certain
foods that have.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
To be eaten with corante.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
I just pulled out a hot tortilla from my tortilla holder, which, by.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
The way, if you make flower tortillas.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
You know they have to rest in a cloth toilla holder.
You know that it helps them steam and like puff up.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Well, let me just describe this stia that Eva made.
It is perfectly round. Because you were watching me, but
this is it looks like you're pro even I'm pretty
much your prose daily and I eat them with butter.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
My son, my son will we eat bean tacos in
the morning with flower tortillas and my son loves it,
just like this with manthikia butter.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Yeah, they're delicious, but I love them with butter and
a little bit of sugar and cornarthias.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
I love with butter and ariff salt. Oh interesting, mm hmmm,
I'm gonna put sure. It's really good.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
So not only is there the conundrum of flower versus corn,
there's the conundrum of thin flower tortillas more translucent one
which is in the north, like in Monterrey, they like
a thinner flower tortilla, And in Texas we have almost
what looks like pea bread.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
That's how thick it is. It's very very thick.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
And I brought some, yes, just to taste, okay, to compare,
to judge, to compare to the Texas one that are thick.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
I love both, but I have to say I prefer
the thin.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
Because I I grew Brilarto and Revelorado where I'm from,
like they have the thin ones. But I do love both,
but yes, the thin are like my favorite. So I
ended up going to Sonora town here in LA that
has it's an amazing pacheta. They just opened one near
my house and they make really thin, tiny tiny These
(12:57):
are really small and they sot their flour from Sonora
and Sona and wheat is supposed to be some of
you know, the original heritage wheat and some of the
best wheat in Mexico from Sonora.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Is that this tortilla.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Can I have a little bit of butter as well,
So sorry salty butter.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
This summer on flour.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
It has less gluten and it has this sort of
sweet nutty flavor.
Speaker 3 (13:27):
It's like the best flower. This is sweeter. This is sweeter, thinner,
super thin.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
You can see if you hold it up. Yeah, paper thin,
paper thin. Where my tortilla that I just make flower
tortilla is pretty thick. It is pretty and larger. Yeah,
it's thick and larger. Yeah, this is so good. We're
just going to shut her and eat. So you guys
can hear this.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
My mom's from Mexico, seating growing up in Loryda. It's
like they're like, that's not Mexican food. Is text mex
but it is. It's like also northern Mexico. The wurritos.
Apparently this guy Juan Mandez, I mean, these are these legends,
right that he was making these facos wrapped in these
huge thirtillas, basically wrapping the fillings to keep it warm,
and he was transporting them in a burro in a donkey, hence.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
The name the wurtos. And this was in Chihuahua and
the northern state of Chihuahua.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
So they're popular in northern Mexico and then also calmex
food and tex mex food. But it's basically it's it's
a flower dirtilla always, right, So more like northern Mexico,
South Texas.
Speaker 3 (14:32):
Where we're from. Yeah, you don't flower the flower in
the south. You don't find it. You don't find it.
It's only in the north.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
It's only in the north. Yeah, the Holy Day of Wheat,
I mean when we think of you know, Mexico, that
sort of soul of Mexico is corn.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
It's the it's the massa.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
And I grew up eating you know, both of them
because that's where my parents are from.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
That's what we always had.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
Do you have a favorite type of deco? That's a
good question. My favorite taco. Okay, it's probably a chicken talgo.
I make these all the time. I might smoke these
twice a week because their peppa is favorite. But it's
a corn tortilla with rotisserie torn chicken with a salsa
ver dae. But I half fry it the tortilla, so
(15:14):
it's not like a taco bell crunch, but it's not
a soft taco, so it's.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
In between, so you just lightly.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
It's a little bit cris yeah, but it's still.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Soft, yes, but it's still chewy.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
And I put chicken, sour cream, lettuce, tomato salad, and
it's just peppers.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Like this is the best taco I've ever at.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
That sounds it's chicken tacos, but there's just chick fried
corn tortilla, just like just hand fried, yeah, pan fried
in a little olive oil. They're the best I love.
And I'll do the same thing with beef, so that's
my favorite taco. I'll post is up there for me too.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
I'll past is up there. I'll post that might be
my favorite.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Also, growing up on the ranch, we would do a
sada just on the grill and we would do sausage,
like barbecue sausage, and we just grab it literally off
the grill with the tortilla, and that was our dinner.
It was like you just grabbed the sausage that sounds rial,
which is like it's like a polar sausage, and you
just grabbed, you know, whenever you saw your sausage ready,
(16:15):
you grabbed it with the tortilla and you ate it.
And that was a flower tortilla. Yeah, so that's my favorite.
Like a flower tortilla with a barbecue sausage inside. That's amazing.
Am I probably sorry? The best taco. My favorite taco
is a breakfast taco, okay, like the Texas breakfast tacos
with like bean cheese, cheese, ch soak and webble potato eggs,
(16:40):
chotes on egg and bean and it's in a fat,
fat tortilla, right, flour tortilla.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
What's your favorite taco though, I that's you, that's your favorite.
That's my favorite. Yeah, that was with my favorite lamb. No no, no,
with pork, with with pork.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Yeah, no you have to you have to go to
a truck and it's like greasy and yeah, that's my
favorite echo. I also like just kinda sound like this,
just like a simple just yeah.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
I just love a skirt steak.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
I prefer corn for that, but I always have both.
I like to have the option of both just in
case and when I heat them up, I like for
them to get really nice and poofy.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
After the break, Corge Gaviria Massien that he will tell
us his thoughts on the partiya conundrum.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
And we're sharing a recipe with you.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Welcome back to Hungry for History. We are so excited
for you to hear from Je Gaviria. He is the
founder of Macienda, an online marketplace that celebrates the Mexican kitchen.
He has a new book out called Masa Techniques, Recipes
and Reflections on a Time a Staple, and he's here
to tell us his thoughts on the dirtilla conundrum.
Speaker 4 (18:06):
So maybe it's just the times we're in, but tortilla
preferences can be polarizing, believe it or not. And of
course I'm referring specifically to corn and flower tortillas here.
It can get pretty divisive. Corn critics typically tend to
lament the lack of pliability and a corn tortilla, I mean,
clearly they just haven't had a good one, while flower
(18:28):
tortilla haters or flowers say that they're just not as
authentic flower tortilla as that is so our fifty to
fifty tortillas are kind of the ultimate compromise. I would
say they take the best of corn and the best
of flour and put them together. You know, for a
corn tortilla, that extra bit of actual wheat flour gives
(18:48):
it that kind of glutenous stretch that you might crave
from a flower tortilla, while you know, the corn itself
is giving an extra layer of complexity to you know,
an otherwise you know, single note of flowa.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
Interesting fact, I didn't know this when I read this.
I didn't know that either.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Flower tortillas are one of the United States astronauts favorite foods.
I don't know how they did this, pole but it's
not just because they're delicious. But in nineteen eighty five,
NASA used tortillas as a solution to a bread and
gravity issue.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
How crazy is that? Crazy?
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah, Mexican on Jnai exactly, always, always, always.
Speaker 2 (19:33):
So the tortilla is so versatile. I mean you can
use it for so many things. And you can see
how the American culture has just made it their own.
I mean, everybody has a rap for lunch, you know,
they really Ringo sized it. Yeah, yeah, americanized it. But
not only America, but all these other cultures. And what's
(19:54):
some creative dishes you've seen with the tortillailla?
Speaker 1 (19:57):
Gosh, well, the kogi, the Korean tacot roco dago draw.
I think that was like the big one a few
years ago that everyone's like, oh my god, where is he?
Speaker 5 (20:05):
Where is it?
Speaker 1 (20:05):
I want to taste this is like a that go
with some grand barbecue, with Korean barbecue, and it's like
the lines, it's like to taste this. And there was
this talk of like, oh, it's not authentic, and it's like,
you know, well, this is what I grew up with.
I grew up in the Mexican neighborhood, and I would,
you know, put our barbecue in a tartilla, So yeah,
this is authentic to me, to him, right, So that's
(20:26):
really the one that that And gosh, there's like with
Polish sausage and all sorts of different you know, variations.
But even like the text mextaco is the original with
yellow cheese, but the Korean.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
Barbecue green barbecue's booin is it? Big?
Speaker 2 (20:42):
I saw in a Chinese restaurant of the day spring rolls,
but it was it was filled with all your normal
vegetables Asian variety, but it was wrapped in a tortilla.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
Oh really yeah, and deep fried.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Like like an egg roll, like an egg roll, but
it was a tortilla.
Speaker 3 (20:58):
But it was oh interesting, it was so good. I think.
Speaker 2 (21:02):
You know, every culture has their form of a rap tortilla.
France has the crepe, and ye, Greece has the peda exactly,
and I mean which brings us.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
To the right.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
It's not Greece, but you know Lebanie, Lebanese immigrants they
brought the tacosaraves and then there you know, second third
generation turned those into tacos pastor flower tortilla.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Using pork lamb. Yeah it wasn't lamb. It's poor.
Speaker 1 (21:32):
It's poork instead of lamb. And then they added the
pineapple to it.
Speaker 2 (21:35):
The pineapple and cilantro, and the cilantro a little bit
of lime and a lot of lime, a lot of yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
And I think the soul of the tackle is the tortill. Yeah, yeah,
I think that's what makes a really good that that's true.
Speaker 3 (21:53):
Let me tell you. Robert Rodriguez gave me.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
Robert Rodriguez, the director who's also text mex like us,
gave me.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
A great tortilla recipe. He uses butter.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
I use Crisco shortening, but the butter, the yellow one, okay, yeah,
but I do two cups flour, I do a teaspoon salt.
I do two teaspoons baking powder, and then a fourth
cup of shortening. So you can use mantika or a
fourth cup fat. You can use mantka, you can use Crisco,
(22:23):
you can use olive oil. You could use butter. It's
just what's your fat. So just a fourth cup fat.
And you don't want to overdo the fat because that
will cause it to get cracky. It's almost like it
becomes too crackery, too.
Speaker 3 (22:40):
Much like a cracker.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Okay, and then a cup hot water, and that's the
trick is hot water, like boiling hot water. And you
have to neat it and then you let it sit
for thirty minutes. That's what makes it go poof because
you got to let the gluten settle. You gotta let
the baking powder do its thing, and then the other trick,
so you leave that alone. Then you roll them out
(23:02):
and you put them on the on the gomal on
your a griddle, and then you have to put it
in this. This is the fia holder, a tortilla holder,
but it's cloth because those plastic ones.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
You got to put a towel inside.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
You gotta have it warm so that once it's super
hot coming off the griddle, off the comal, and then
the steam almost cooks it more and that's what makes
it super soft.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
So that's my flower tortilla recipie.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Let's talk about technique of the tortilla, because the flower
tortilla is a very different technique with the rolling pin
as compared to the corn tortilla, which you need a you.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
Need a press, a press.
Speaker 1 (23:43):
You roll a little tortilla like a little like a
little golf ball or pink punk ball something I like.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
I like them a little, put it in.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
The center and then squeeze it, close it and then
you put the plastic sort of so that it doesn't
stick to the press. It's easy to remove, and then
you just put it on a dry comad and then
just heat it. I like to heat it until it
puffs up. And that is like, how does it puff
up if it puffs because it's I guess it's different.
Doesn't have us The flower has the gluten and the corn.
(24:11):
It's basically because it has water in it. It's basically
the water. Once it touches the heat is like, oh god,
what is that?
Speaker 3 (24:20):
And then the steam just explodes.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Okay, And that's because I like when corn tortillas puff up,
and that's not common that don't all do that.
Speaker 3 (24:30):
They don't always do that.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Yeah, And when they don't, I think it's they're just
a little dry.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
The bane of our existence. I hate when my tortillas
don't puff up.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
And then so the flower tortilla, you roll it out
like like you would a pastry dough.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
Right.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
Well, my aunt taught me this one two turn, one
two turn, So you don't want to overwork your flower
because of the gluten. And so my son does it
all the time with me. My son loves making flower
tortillas with me.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
You was just down there. One too turn, one too turn.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
And also I don't know how it because I don't
make corncher teas you would know this. You don't flip
them a lot. And so for flour, you're only supposed
to flip it once, so you let it cook on
one side, flip it on the other and take it off.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
My mom is a flipper. My mom flip flip it.
My mom leave alone.
Speaker 2 (25:18):
I hate when she comes over and takes over the
comaale because I'm like, you're flipping it too much. It's
not cooking. It needs to rise, it needs to be
one with the heat. And my mom will be flipping, flipping, flipping, mom,
let it, let it rest, flip.
Speaker 3 (25:32):
It once, just flip it once. That's so funny.
Speaker 1 (25:35):
But it's too different, too different. It's very different techniques.
And usually when I heat them up, like if I
have them cooked already and then I reheat them, I
always put the I don't do this with flour, but
with corn, I put it directly on the open flame,
on the open gas flame.
Speaker 3 (25:50):
So that has a little burnt little chart.
Speaker 2 (25:53):
Yeah, so what was the verdict, corner flower?
Speaker 3 (25:58):
It's both, Oh you can't. I can't decide. I love both.
I do love both.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Well, I do love both for different things, but yes,
I do love both.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
I you know I'm a flower tortilla. Your team Flower,
I'm team Flower.
Speaker 3 (26:10):
I need a shirt.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Team Flower, Team Corn.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
Deam Core.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
I think you're deem Corn and you just don't want
to admit it to the lovers.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
I do love corn. I am fascinated by corn. I
love the history of corna the soul of corn.
Speaker 3 (26:27):
I grew up with both.
Speaker 5 (26:29):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (26:31):
You really can't decide.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
I can't decide because I love them both for different things.
Most things I like to eat with corn, but there
are a few things that you just have to go flower.
Speaker 3 (26:43):
So I'll let you off and say both. Thanks so
much for listening. Don't forget to subscribe. Thank you bye.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Everybody Hungry for History is an unbelievable entertainment production in
partnership with Iheart's my podcast network.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
For more of your favorite shows, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Hosts And Creators
MAITE GOMEZ-REJÓN
Eva Longoria
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