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Cooks Country S18E21 Tucson Tacos
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00:04Cook's Country is about more than just getting dinner on the table.
00:09We're also fascinated by the people and stories behind the dishes.
00:14We go inside kitchens in every corner of the country to learn how real people cook.
00:20And we look back through time to see how history influences the way we eat today.
00:25We bring that inspiration back to our test kitchen so we can share it with you.
00:31This is Cook's Country.
00:37Today on Cook's Country, Brian visits Tucson and then makes his version of mesquite grilled tacos racerados.
00:45And Hannah reviews portable burners.
00:48That's all right here on Cook's Country.
01:02Stretching all the way from southern Arizona to northern Mexico,
01:05the Sonoran Desert is home to one of North America's oldest food traditions.
01:13I met up with Felipe Garcia, the president of Visit Tucson, to learn more about Sonoran cuisine.
01:19Sonoran food is very simple food.
01:21A lot of meats, a lot of flour, seafood, but it's really using simple quality local ingredients.
01:28And that's what makes it again so unique.
01:31Layered with influences from Mexico, America, and several groups of indigenous peoples,
01:36Sonoran cuisine is an amalgamation of these cultures and the unique desert environment it emerged from.
01:42People think that Mexican food is like one set of, like there's like three or four kinds of food.
01:48But it's so diverse and there's this amazing pocket in the Sonoran Desert.
01:53Part of this pocket is Tacos Abs贸n, a taco joint in Tucson, Arizona run by husband and wife duo Francisco
02:00Javier Durazo and Yasmine Aldecoa Durazo.
02:03Tacos Abs贸n opened 22 years ago as a way to showcase all that Sonoran cuisine has to offer,
02:09using flavors of their Mexican hometown, Agua Prieta Sonora.
02:12We decided to have something 100%, the most original we can do from our state, Sonora, Mexico, to Arizona.
02:22Tucson is just 60 miles from the southern border, meaning Yasmine and Francisco can travel back and forth with ease,
02:28bringing ideas and ingredients with them.
02:32Francisco is the man behind the grill.
02:34Every day he cooks one of their most popular menu items, Mesquite Grilled Tacos Racerado.
02:41I started picking up ideas from different taco shops in Mexico.
02:45I was selling carne asada, burritos, and pastor, tripa, but not ribs.
02:51So I said, I've never seen this before, so I was surprised.
02:55It's very simple.
02:56If I take it to Arizona and I do this, it's going to be a boom.
03:00Yeah.
03:03Everything about this dish is made to reflect Sonora, but the Mesquite wood is one of its true distinctions.
03:09Mesquite is a family of small trees and shrubs suited to survive in the arid Sonoran environment
03:14and was one of the most crucial ingredients in the diets of indigenous people in the region.
03:18Mesquite wood can be used in a variety of different applications, from food and fuel to traditional medicine.
03:25But at Tacos Apsone, it's the mesquite charcoal that makes the food safe.
03:29When the heat and smoke combine and the carne asada, it's totally different.
03:34It's got to be 100% mesquite, so you have the flavor of the mesquite, and when you put them
03:39together, that's a special flavor.
03:42That's a unique flavor that comes from originally from Sonora.
03:45It's also the flavor that represents the resourcefulness needed to survive in this kind of rugged environment.
03:50We have to be resilient, and you use what you have available, and mesquite trees, that's one of the plants
03:56that are available, and that's what you use.
03:57That's what we have.
03:58It's amazing.
03:58I mean, the heat that it creates is beautiful, and the flavor it gives.
04:03Francisco's days always start the same way, hauling massive bags of mesquite charcoal into the kitchen and firing up the
04:09grill.
04:11When the coals are glowing, he knows they're ready for the meat.
04:15He places a gorgeous rack of ribs on the smoking grill.
04:20Then comes the second most important ingredient, a hefty coating of Mexican sea salt.
04:26After the ribs have been grilled and salted on both sides, he takes them off and carves each one off
04:31the rack.
04:34He carefully assembles them back on the grates, cut side down, and takes care that every rib is positioned for
04:40maximum flavor from the charcoal below.
04:43Another generous shower of salt, and the ribs are ready to go.
04:48As soon as they come off the grill, Francisco shaves the meat right off the bone, warms our flour tortillas,
04:54and charred some jalapenos and spring onions to go on the side.
04:59After we've got our toppings from the salsa bar, I'm ready to try the Sonoran staple.
05:03Let's go eat.
05:04Excellent.
05:06Always some limon.
05:07It's not a taco if you don't put limon.
05:09Absolutely.
05:12Mmm.
05:13Like it?
05:15I'm more than like it.
05:16I love it.
05:17I love how the meat, the restaurato, is so rich compared to like the carne asada.
05:22It tends to be a little bit more lean.
05:23But you really get that smoky mesquite coming through.
05:25You really taste it here.
05:27It's just salt, meat, and charcoal.
05:30And that's all.
05:31As Felipe puts it, the simplicity of the meal is really what makes it Sonoran cuisine.
05:37So you cannot hide anything.
05:39You cannot cheat.
05:39You cannot do something if it's the medium-on-guret tortilla.
05:42So you know it's going to be very basic, and you will taste the ingredients.
05:46But for Yasmina Francisco, it goes beyond delivering exceptional food to their community.
05:51It's about preserving the traditions of the region and keeping the foodways of the Sonoran
05:56desert alive.
05:57And you can taste the commitment to that tradition in every bite at Tacos Epsom.
06:11Well, it looks like you were well-fed.
06:13It was amazing.
06:14I mean, Tacos Racerados, it really changed my entire perspective on tacos.
06:18I'd never had ribbed meat tacos before.
06:21But I see a lot of vegetables.
06:22So it looks like we're going to start at that salsa bar you were hitting up.
06:25Absolutely, we are.
06:26So we're going to start with the aguamole, which was explained to me as like a way to
06:30stretch guacamole.
06:31Rather than make a stiff batch of guacamole, this is like a water thinned down version of
06:36an avocado sauce.
06:37So we're going to add half of an avocado to our blender here.
06:41And then one minced garlic clove.
06:44A tablespoon of lime juice.
06:46Three quarters of a teaspoon of salt.
06:49And then to help the blender do its job here, we're going to add a third of a cup of
06:53water
06:54to start.
06:54Throw a lid on this thing and we'll just blend it for about 10 seconds.
07:03All right, let's take a look.
07:06So it's still looking a little bit thick.
07:09So we'll add a little bit more water and blend it up a little bit more.
07:16Okay, we'll take a look at it now.
07:19This is perfect.
07:20It's pourable, but it also thickens up a smidge as it sits.
07:24So we can just go ahead and drop this into our bowl here.
07:28Okay.
07:28So now we can talk about some of our salsa tatamata ingredients.
07:33So we have here Roma tomatoes, jalapenos, and an onion.
07:38That's going to be part of our salsa tatamata.
07:40Tatamata means it's charred salsa.
07:42So all these things will go onto the grill.
07:43So we're only going to use half of this onion here.
07:45So we'll just take and cut it in half.
07:50I want to keep the root end intact because we don't want it to fall apart on the grill.
07:57So, all right, and so that is good now.
07:59And then our garnish for the tacos are going to be these beautiful spring onions, also called cebolitas.
08:06So when you have these, you would just want to trim off any of the dead end there and pull
08:10off any leaves or other stem that doesn't look great.
08:14So just give them a thin shave.
08:18So our salsa and our garnish are prepped.
08:22And now we can talk about the beef.
08:25So these are an entire rack of beef ribs here, seven bone beef rack.
08:29These are back ribs.
08:31So racerado means shaved in Spanish.
08:34This is about four pounds.
08:36It's a big boy.
08:37That is a gorgeous cut.
08:38Yeah, it's wonderful.
08:40And, like, the flavor that comes off this meat, especially when you shave that meat in between the bones, is
08:44just phenomenal.
08:45Awesome.
08:45So if you want to carry that, I'll carry the beef ribs, and we'll head out to the grill.
08:50Sounds great.
08:56They say you can't take it all with you.
08:59I don't buy that, because I know for a fact you can take portable burners just about anywhere.
09:04And to prove this point, we've got Hannah here.
09:06She's going to take us through an army of different kinds of portable burners.
09:10You're right.
09:10There are a whole lot here.
09:12This is not all we tested.
09:13We tested 15 different burners.
09:15Yeah, these things can be great if you're in an RV, if you have a small kitchen, if it's a
09:19holiday.
09:19Even just cooking outside, I love to use mine at home for that.
09:22So we tested 15 total.
09:24The price range was massive.
09:26I'm talking $12 for a little electric burner to $1,500 for that big fella over here.
09:32For this one?
09:33$1,500.
09:34$1,500?
09:35Yeah.
09:35That better call me pretty or something.
09:38We'll come back to that big fella over there.
09:40But we learned a ton.
09:42We tested them all different ways.
09:44We held fondue at precise temperatures.
09:46We made tomato and egg stir-fry.
09:49We had deep-fried zucchini because we want these to be real burners.
09:52We used real cookware on them, not camp cookware, because we want to do real cooking on them.
09:57Okay, great.
09:57And we found a winner in each fuel type.
09:59That's handy.
10:00So let's talk electric first.
10:02Clearly, they're smaller and lighter and plug and play, which is nice.
10:07Right.
10:07Literally, you just plug it in and you're ready to cook.
10:09Right.
10:10But there's a catch.
10:11They're not that powerful.
10:13Most in our testing could never even boil water.
10:16I think that's a bare minimum.
10:17You need them to boil water.
10:18It's the bare minimum.
10:19Our winner right here from Amusa was able to do it.
10:22It was slower, but it was able to do it.
10:24Nice, simple controls, wipe clean, like I said, plug and play.
10:28For $12, a really handy extra burner.
10:30But look how small it is.
10:32You're not going to be using Dutch heavens.
10:33You're not going to be using stock pots.
10:35Smaller pans, handy, inexpensive, a nice option if that's what you're looking for.
10:40But let's talk about gas ones.
10:42So gas, you have to use it outdoors or in a very well-ventilated area.
10:47And you have to buy fuel separately.
10:49So I have a butane fuel source right here.
10:52And there was a little bit of a downside with that.
10:54So you'll notice all these four chambers, that's where the butane goes inside them.
10:59Okay.
10:59And you never want the pan to overhang the fuel chamber.
11:03That's a dangerous thing.
11:04A dangerous safety issue.
11:06And if you'll notice how close it is, we quickly ran into issues with pan size here.
11:11Most of these could only be used with much smaller pans than we preferred,
11:15except for our winner over here from Grill Boss.
11:17So this also uses butane, and you have the same limitation, but it has a second fuel hookup.
11:22So you can hook up a propane tank, like the one you use on your gas grill.
11:26Right.
11:26You have tons of runway there with a propane tank.
11:28You're not going to run out halfway through your project.
11:30And the propane tank sits on the floor, away from the burner.
11:34So you can use any pot you want on here.
11:36You want to use a full Dutch oven on here, you're going to be fine.
11:39All right.
11:39So that first one was $12.
11:40What's this one?
11:41This is $55.
11:42Oh, that's not bad.
11:43Yeah.
11:43They were all plenty powerful.
11:44We actually had to turn some down because flames were licking up the side of pans.
11:49But on the other side of things, on the low, some of them would flicker out,
11:53or some low was actually pretty hot and we scorched our fondue.
11:57This guy had some finesse.
11:59It could keep the fondue nice and perfect.
12:01And it could also boil water really fast.
12:04Let's go down to induction.
12:05No, this one I feel like should be studded with diamonds.
12:08It should be for that price.
12:10Induction has been popular in other parts of the world for a long time.
12:13And it's becoming more and more popular here.
12:15So induction burners work with a coil inside that creates a magnetic field.
12:20You put a pot with a ferromagnetic bottom on there and it will enter the energy field.
12:25And they will interact in a way that heats the metal of the pan, which then in turn cooks the
12:30food.
12:30And you can test by just putting a magnet on the bottom of your pan.
12:33If it sticks, it's going to work on induction.
12:35All right.
12:35A good thing to check.
12:36And how about the performance here?
12:38These were fantastic as far as performance.
12:40These boiled water in 20 minutes, which was the same as on a gas stove.
12:44The other thing is precision.
12:45You could literally type in 285 degrees and that will produce that right here.
12:49Very precise and cool to the touch.
12:52So, you know, you could have a pot of boiling water on here and slide a $100 bill under there.
12:56If you had it left.
12:57So if you can't spend that kind of money over here for less than one-tenth of the price at
13:01$117, the ducts top was a fantastic option.
13:05I think, you know, 5% of people probably should get that one.
13:0895% should probably get this.
13:10Sure.
13:10It was responsive, easy to clean, great control panel.
13:14The trade-off is it's a little smaller.
13:16This is so big because it has to house a big heating coil and all the machinery required to cool
13:20it down afterwards.
13:22This, smaller coil, smaller machinery, smaller pans on top work best due to all of that.
13:28So maybe a 10-inch skillet max.
13:30I wouldn't say max.
13:31You can use a 12 if you want to.
13:32Give it time to preheat, even out.
13:35Expect best performance, though, 10 inches and under.
13:38That is a lot of information, so thank you.
13:40And if you want to find out more about our complete ratings of portable burners, go check out our website.
13:53All right, Bridget, today we're using mesquite hardwood charcoal for this recipe, okay?
13:57And mesquite charcoal is like the aroma, the perfume of Tucson, Arizona.
14:01It's in the air.
14:02It's on the food.
14:02It's just really a unique flavor.
14:04So for comparison, I have our traditional charcoal briquettes, which are just compacted, pressed, small pieces of wood that have
14:11been carbonized versus these whole pieces of mesquite wood that have been carbonized and pressed.
14:16You can really see the difference.
14:17You'll notice the difference in the way it burns, but also and especially in the way it tastes.
14:21Okay, great.
14:22And I have six quarts of that mesquite charcoal burning right here.
14:25I'm going to pour that evenly over half the grill.
14:27So we have a hot side and a cool side.
14:29Okay, so we're just going to put the grate on this and cover the grill and let that heat out
14:34for five minutes.
14:35And I've got both the top and the bottom vents fully open.
14:38All right, the grill's been heating up for five minutes.
14:41We can go ahead and clean it.
14:45And oil it.
14:48All right, the grill's nice and hot.
14:50Now we could go ahead and start grilling our vegetables for our salsa.
14:54So we're going to put the spring onions here, put the bulbs resting right over the coals.
14:59They take the brunt of the heat, get those nice and charred.
15:04So we'll just kind of work all these vegetables on and off the grill as they get done cooking.
15:08It takes about 10 to 15 minutes to cook all these vegetables entirely.
15:11You can smell it immediately.
15:13Grilled onions, nothing better.
15:15These tomatoes actually take the longest to cook because there's so much water in them.
15:19And as they get done charring on each side, they're nicely browned and cooked.
15:23We'll start removing them from the grill and we'll rotate the vegetables in.
15:26Great.
15:26We're just working over this hot side here.
15:28So this kind of nice charring.
15:30Oh, yeah.
15:31That's exactly what we're looking for.
15:32And it happens quick because this hardwood charcoal is so intense.
15:36So this is all very active grilling.
15:38You've got to stay involved with this and turning the vegetables as they get more and more charred.
15:41And so this will take about 10 to 15 minutes until we're finished with the entire batch.
15:45Okay.
15:46Okay, these spring onions are nicely charred.
15:48So we'll start pulling those off.
15:50Those are gorgeous.
15:51So you want to charm and also at the same time cook them all the way through.
15:55So you don't want to just quickly blast them.
15:57You want to give them a little bit of time on the grill.
15:59These tomatoes are going really quickly because they're over the really intense part of the fire here.
16:05We'll pull those off.
16:07All right.
16:08So this is our last few jalapenos getting charred here.
16:11We'll just drop those under the tray.
16:13Everything's nice and charred and tender.
16:15It's looking good.
16:16Bountiful.
16:17So now we're ready for our ribs.
16:19All right.
16:19So we're going to throw our ribs on there.
16:21We're going to start them bone side down and we're going to sprinkle the tops with some salt.
16:24Okay.
16:25We're going to put about a little bit more than two teaspoons, about two and a quarter teaspoons on top
16:30of these ribs.
16:30It's a generous sprinkle of salt.
16:32This is coarse sea salt.
16:34Now at this stage, it doesn't always look like it, but there's a lot of fat on these ribs.
16:38So as they begin to cook, and they'll go about six minutes on this first side, we want to be
16:43ready to kind of extinguish any flare-ups.
16:46So we're going to use like what Francisco does, a water bottle.
16:49Okay.
16:49So when those flare-ups start to happen, you just kind of like pop it.
16:53I'm actually going to remove this lid here so I have a little bit more access all the way around.
16:58Nice.
16:58It seems counterintuitive to grilling.
17:00It seems like it's going to extinguish all this, but this is a good reason why we're using a two
17:04-level fire here or a half-grill fire.
17:06So we can just remove these ribs, if it gets to be too aggressive, and just extinguish these flames.
17:12Then we'll go back on top and let it go.
17:15Nice.
17:16We want to go so they get nice and brown on the first side, extinguishing the flames as they pop
17:20up.
17:21And if it gets to be too much, you can just kind of maneuver them around the grill, have the
17:25fatty half hanging off away from the coals for a second,
17:27and kind of rotate it to give the charcoal a little bit of a break.
17:31Okay, so it's been about six minutes.
17:33Let's take a look.
17:34Nicely brown on that side.
17:36All right, extinguish a few flames here.
17:39Hubba, hubba, ahuga.
17:42We're going to hit it carefree with some of that coarse sea salt and let it go for six minutes
17:46on this second side.
17:48Same thing, just manning our water bottle, extinguishing any flare-ups.
17:52Okay, it's been six minutes on the second side here.
17:55We can transfer these ribs to our cutting board.
17:58Oh, wow.
17:58So they're already looking gorgeous, right?
18:00Yes.
18:01Okay, so now if we were to cut into them as we're about to do, you're going to see they're
18:04almost still raw on the inside, in between the bones.
18:06So we're going to cut them in between the bones at this stage.
18:10The chef's knife.
18:13Oh, yeah, that's pretty pink.
18:16All right, let's cut through this last rib here.
18:18Now we're going to put these back on the grill, but first we're going to nestle them inside one another,
18:23like this.
18:24And we'll just drop these back onto the grill.
18:28Cooking the ribs like this is going to allow us to cook all that rare meat that's still stuck to
18:32the bones there, that was in between the ribs.
18:34And this will get nice and charred and crispy.
18:36Gorgeous.
18:37We're absolutely going to hit it with some more of our salt.
18:40Okay, and we'll let that go for five minutes on that side.
18:44Okay, it's been five minutes on that cut side.
18:46We're going to flip these ribs over.
18:49Take a look at how gorgeous those are.
18:51See, all that meat in between the bones is now nice and crispy.
18:55So this will be our final cook on this side to cook the rest of that rare meat up against
19:00the bone.
19:00We'll hit it one more time with some salt, about another generous two teaspoons, about two and a quarter teaspoons.
19:06And that'll go for five minutes.
19:09Okay, these ribs are finally ready to come off.
19:11Can we help you out there?
19:12Drop them onto the tray.
19:16Okay, these ribs are looking gorgeous.
19:21So when we go back inside, we're going to throw these into a 200-degree oven and let them sit
19:24and just hang out while we make our salsa.
19:27All right, and then it's almost taco time.
19:28Then it's taco time.
19:31Okay, our ribs are resting in a 200-degree oven.
19:34And while they're doing that, we can finish our salsa tatamata.
19:37Lovely.
19:38Okay, so we have our tomatoes here that have been nicely charred on the grill.
19:42And we're just going to remove the core.
19:47We can drop the whole tomatoes in with the charred skin on there.
19:49Great.
19:50So we want that charred, smoky flavor.
19:52And then our onions, we're going to just remove the root end from the onions.
19:59And then one jalapeno.
20:01So I'm just going to remove the stem, keep the seeds in there, and drop this in whole.
20:05Nice.
20:06And to that, we're going to add a quarter cup of cilantro leaves and stems.
20:10Nice.
20:11Those cilantro stems are nice and tender, so we could use those.
20:14Yes.
20:15One and a half teaspoons of lime juice and half a teaspoon of table salt.
20:20And we're just going to blend this briefly.
20:21We want it to be a little bit chunky still, so about seven seconds on low speed in the blender.
20:26Okay.
20:33It's a good-looking salsa.
20:34Mmm.
20:35All right, we're going to throw our salsa in the bowl.
20:40All right, we'll set that aside, clean up our station, and pull the ribs out of the oven, start shaving,
20:44and making some tacos.
20:45Shaving time.
20:47Now we're going to shave our ribs.
20:49All right, so this is the rosserato part, the shave.
20:52So we have a chef's knife.
20:54You could use a boning knife if you'd like as well.
20:56Just kind of work down the blade.
21:01Work down the bone here with the blade of the knife.
21:04All right, and we can just hold on to the rest.
21:06This is plenty for the two of us, I think.
21:09And we'll just give this a nice chop here.
21:15And throw this into a bowl here.
21:18I'm going to build you a taco.
21:20Yay!
21:21It's been so good and so patient.
21:23So we're going to take a couple of tortillas out of here.
21:25In Tucson, it's a flour tortilla city.
21:28A little bit of our beef.
21:32A little bit of this finely chopped cabbage.
21:36Just regular green cabbage.
21:37Regular green cabbage, just finely chopped.
21:39A little bit of our salsa tatamata.
21:42Oh, yeah.
21:44And then some of our aquamole.
21:48Alongside this, you take one of your spring onions, one of these jalapenos.
21:55Okay, and this is for you.
21:58Thank you, Brian.
21:59And then one for me.
22:01A little lime.
22:02Here's one for you.
22:03All right.
22:04And a plate there.
22:05All right, and there's a method to this.
22:07So you want to fold your taco, take a bite with a full mouth of food.
22:11Take a bite of your spring onion, take a bite of your jalapeno.
22:13All right.
22:13Oftentimes, they'll even dunk the spring onion and jalapeno into salt.
22:20All right, cheers.
22:22Cheers to you.
22:38A little fiesta in your mouth there, huh?
22:40Since we finished with the jalapeno, that's actually the first thing I'm tasting right now.
22:43Get that burst of char and, of course, a little bit of heat.
22:46Spring onion is glorious.
22:48That meat.
22:49Yeah, it's so good.
22:50Is beautiful.
22:52I mean, that smoke, kind of fattiness, the richness of it all.
22:57And all the char on the vegetables that you grilled, it tastes unlike any taco I've ever, ever had before.
23:04Now, I love that light little kind of guacamole with the water added to it.
23:10It's just perfection.
23:12That is as good as it gets.
23:15Just like you, Brian.
23:17You're so sweet.
23:18Thank you so much for bringing this back to the country for us.
23:21You're very welcome.
23:22So, if you want to make these unbelievably great tacos at home, it starts by grilling onions, jalapeno, and tomatoes
23:29for the salsa tatamata.
23:30After grilling the whole beef rack, cut into individual ribs and return them to the grill until browned all over.
23:36Shave the meat from the ribs and then layer the beef, salsa, and aguamole into tortillas.
23:42And serve with charred jalapenos and spring onions.
23:44So, from Cook's Country, via Tucson and Brian, it's Mesquite Grilled Tacos Racerados.
23:51Fully expected to look down, it's going to be gone.
23:55Mine's almost gone.
23:56I don't know if that.
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