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For a city renowned, in part, for its sophisticated eateries, San Miguel de Allende delighted me most when I visited a not-so-sophisticated restaurant, where I was introduced to huazontle, an ancient Aztec veggie. As an amateur chef and dedicated foodie, I like to think I've been exposed to a lot of ingredients and cooking techniques, but growing up in Nebraska and living in Colorado has not given me the kind of exposure I'd get if I traveled more internationally. Huazontle isn't an unknown ingredient to super-foodies on the coasts. Heck, one blogger said she can buy it in Baltimore, of all god-forsaken places. Rick Bayless has used it, as well, in his Chicago restaurants.
My encounter, however late in life, came last week, when my wife and I stayed for a week in Colonia San Antonio, a small neighborhood in the southwest section of San Miguel, central Mexico's home to the arts and several thousand retired gringos.
After eating at a couple of overpriced restaurants closer to the jardin (the town's zocalo), we decided to try a local spot called Cha Cha Cha, which is open only from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. every day but Monday. (Note: some say the place can be closed for a month at a time, though, if the owner decides to leave town. It was closed in May 2007, for example.)
We walked from our flat to the restaurant on a Saturday night and sat down at a table next to a family of locals who were sharing drinks and conversation. We were the only patrons, it turns out -- the other party was the owner's family.
The owner/chef immediately greeted us and handed us a menu, where we first noticed a few dishes with huazontle listed. Before ordering, though, we were captivated by the three handmade salsas presented with chips. Two of the salsas were green and had a bright fresh flavor, with hints of avocado and lime, but something else quite different from anything we'd had before. Though we didn't know it, that was our first bite of huazontle.
Eventually, faced with the daunting list of traditional Mexican items (all priced at $50 pesos for a meal with rice and beans), we decided to ask the owner what he would recommend. He pointed directly at the pechuga con salsa huazontle: pieces of chicken breast covered in a green sauce. Susannah ordered it, and I decided on the albondigas in chipotle sauce.
Susannah made the right choice.
The huazontle, while described by many as an Aztec broccoli, was made into a creamy green sauce that had a fresher and zippier taste than any broccoli I've eaten. I'd compare it more to cross between cilantro and spinach, with the texture of really fine broccoli.
We asked the chef how he prepared it. Our Spanish being about as good as his English, we were able to piece together a conversation that revealed that he had simply boiled the huazontle, then combined it with a little cream, a little broth and some salt for a simple and delicious sauce.
He then brought out a picture of huazontle, which we studied carefully. The chef told us he can get it in the market at the San Antonio Church in San Miguel, but that it's most easily available in Mexico City. The more traditional preparations include dipping it in egg, combining it with cheese and deep frying it in lard; or sauteing it with garlic, tomato and other Mexican veggies.
However huazontle is prepared, I highly recommend a cold Mexican beer to go with it.
Buen provecho.
(Cha Cha Cha is on Calle 28 de Abril Norte in Colonia San Antonio in the southwest section of San Miguel de Allende.)
Last night, at a fashionable bar in downtown Denver, more than 100 former Colorado State University journalism and speech majors gathered to remember their days in Fort Collins.
CSU grads Mitch Jelniker and Jim Benemann couldn't sneak away from their respective newsrooms, of course, and neither could several reporters and columnists from The Denver Post, The Rocky Mountain News or other metro papers, but the professionals who did make it reminded me that CSU (my employer for the past eight years) should be considered the foremost producer of skilled journalistic talent in the state.
Of course, I'm biased now. But years ago, as a resident of and a teacher in the Denver metro area, I carried around this dangerous misperception:
Denver is Buff Country.
That's not to say everyone in the metropolitan area has a deep connection with, or even a loyalty to the University of Colorado, but the amount of media time and space devoted to coverage of Boulder's campus has always exceeded that given to CU's country cousin in Fort Collins.
True, Boulder is much closer to Denver (28 miles compared to 64) than is Fort Collins, so there's some basis for the coverage discrepancy. Yet we're all part of the same television market, Denver's radio stations have a clear signal (not to be confused with Clear Channel, of course) into Northern Colorado, and I see as many copies of The Denver Post and The Rocky Mountain News in my neighborhood as I do of the local Gannett paper.
Still, news from Fort Collins comes less frequently -- and is covered by fewer journalists -- than news from Boulder, if you live in Denver.
I lived in Denver for six years, and in Littleton for three more. I taught at the state's second-largest high school, Smoky HIll. Maybe because of that difference in coverage, and maybe because of a perceived difference in academic prestige (and Smoky Hill students, moreso than any group I'd ever been around, slavered over perceived academic prestige), most Smoky students contemplating a public education considered CU long before they thought about CSU. And as a journalism instructor, I sent students all over the continent to study journalism, more of them to Columbia, Missouri, than to Fort Collins.
It was a mistake, however, not encouraging more of them to drive that 36 extra miles and park for four years in Fort Collins.
Consider the journalistic and educational opportunities at both CSU and CU:
* 11,000 copies of CSU's 115-year-old student-run daily newspaper are distributed daily around campus and around town, and students at The Rocky Mountain Collegian also produce special content for the paper's Web site. There you'll find podcasts, multi-media packages, surveys, bloggers and all the other output expected of a 21st century, 24/7 news operation, all produced by students.
* CU's student-run newspaper, The Campus Press, no longer publishes a print edition, choosing to be an online-only paper. CU School of Journalism and Mass Communication Dean Paul Voakes' decided to move The Campus Press away from a print edition just this year because it couldn't compete for advertising with the professionally run campus paper, The Colorado Daily.
* CSU's student-run television news outfit, CTV, produces four 15-minute news shows per week, all of which are shown to the Fort Collins community via Comcast Cable channel 11. In addition, the students produce a weekly sports show.
* CU's students produce two news and one sports show per week, all three of which are shown over cable channel 62 in Boulder. They're able to work from the shiny new ATLAS Building studios, a point of pride for students and faculty in Boulder.
* 3,000 copies of CSU's student-run quarterly magazine, College Avenue, are distributed around campus, providing another outlet for student journalists and local advertisers.
* KCSU-FM is a 10,000-watt student-run radio station whose signal reached from Cheyenne to Broomfield, but can't make it to Denver because of a Christian radio station from Colorado Springs that shares its 90.5 frequency. If KCSU could reach Denver, I have no doubt that Westword's "Best of Denver" designation would not have been awarded to KVCU Radio 1190, an AM station that does reach Denver. Listen to both, and decide for yourself:
* Finally, students at CSU have the opportunity to work as public relations interns for the Colorado High School Press Association, housed in our offices at CSU, which allows us to host Journalism Day every October.
