Pati, voice-over: They say it's all in the name.
And the area of Milpa Alta is no exception.
Roughly translated as "high field," this region on the outskirts of Mexico City produces two of the most iconic Mexican culinary staples.
Chef Jorge Crcega is my guide here.
[Speaking Spanish] Pati, voice-over: First, he takes me to meet Laurencia Agordo... Como... Como... [Speaking Spanish] Pati, voice-over: who teaches me a new technique for preparing one of my favorite ingredients--nopales.
Mm!
Pati, voice-over: And in the nearby mole capital of Mexico City, San Pedro Atocpan, Don Luis Juan Alvarado Retana shares a secret family recipe and the delicious reason everyone knows this place by name.
[Speaking Spanish] [Laughter] Pati, voice-over: The flavors of Milpa Alta follow me home as I make my new go-to breakfast-- a potato, nopalito, and egg taco.
Look at this beautiful thing!
Pati, voice-over: And I also try to bring decades of technique into making my own mole.
Pati: I'm doing so many ingredients that I think I just put Mila to sleep.
Pati, voice-over: From up here in Milpa Alta, it's clear some of the best recipes come from those closest to the land.
[Birds chirping] Pati: Mm!
Mm-hmm.
This is so beautiful.
That's fabulous.
[Laughter] Mm.
Est delicioso.
[Birds chirping] [Bell rings] Announcer: "Pati's Mexican Table" is brought to you by... Announcer: La Costea.
Por sabor!
Announcer: From the flavors of the Caribbean to the tastes of Latin America, on the menu with Marriott Bonvoy.
Men: Avocados from Mexico [Acoustic guitar plays Avocados from Mexico jingle] Announcer: Over 40 years bringing authentic Latin American flavors to your table-- Tropical Cheese.
Eggland's Best, available in your grocer's egg aisle.
Visit egglandsbest.com.
[Acoustic guitar playing Nationwide jingle] Pati, voice-over: In Mexico City's least-populated borough, the land is wide open and the roads trace gentle curves through the hills.
Out here in Milpa Alta, Chef Jorge Crcega runs a program connecting farmers with restaurants in the city.
[Speaking Spanish] [Speaking Spanish] It's my first time here.
Yeah.
This is another face of Mexico City.
Pati, voice-over: Farmers here specialize in a crop unique and iconic to Mexican cuisine--nopales.
Jorge Crcega: Like, you know, always when you're thinking Mexico, you're thinking many buildings, cars, people.
And it's true, obviously, but this is completely another face.
Every time I leave Mexico City, I see the fields of nopales.
Yes.
When you're thinking nopal, you think always in Mexico.
You don't think in Bolivia or Colombia or another country.
Always Mexico.
For us, it's identity.
It is one of our, like, most iconic symbols and things that we eat.
Yes.
Pati, voice-over: Across this region, roughly 40,000 families work to produce nearly 1 million tons of nopales a year.
Laurencia Agordo is one of these producers.
[Speaking Spanish] [Speaking Spanish] OK.
Como... Como... OK.
[Conversation in Spanish] Pati, voice-over: Even though I cook with nopales all the time, I feel like I need a little lesson from an expert.
[Speaking Spanish] Pati, voice-over: All over Mexico, you'll find people peeling nopales by hand like this.
Using a slanted surface means the small thorns fall away during the cleaning process.
Once both sides are clear and the edges are shaved off, the nopal is ready to cook.
[Speaking Spanish] [Speaking Spanish] Uh-huh.
[Wind blowing] Mm!
[Speaking Spanish] Mm!
Mm.
[Speaking Spanish] OK.
[Speaking Spanish] OK.
[Speaking Spanish] Let me tell you why this side, because... [Speaking Spanish] Uh-huh.
OK.
The skinny part is the belly.
Uh-huh.
[Speaking Spanish] The skinny part.
[Speaking Spanish] Pati, voice-over: Purslane is a succulent, highly nutritious leafy green.
It's been found to have the highest recorded levels of omega-3 fatty acids of any land-based plant.
Pati: OK.
Pati: Mm.
OK.
[Speaking Spanish] It's Mexico on a tortilla.
[Speaking Spanish] the Mexico that people don't know.
Jorge: Many people say this is like a poor ingredient, but... Pati: No.
Jorge: this is not.
Obviously not.
Its richness, its nutritiousness, the best way to eat.
This is how we eat.
Yeah.
Yes.
Pati: I was so in awe by being in the middle of this gigantic nopal field, and I was more in awe by the simplicity and beauty of the food that we were making with the freshly harvested nopales.
This taco that I'm making for you today is inspired by that beautiful simplicity.
We are going to start by making a sauce that's gonna finish off my nopalito and potato base.
I'm gonna start by hydrating some chiles.
And today I'm using the beautiful guajillos.
Remove the stem... opening the chile, and you just release the seeds.
Very easy to do.
And I have a few here that I already cleaned.
So I'm adding my chiles here.
And I'm just gonna heat them for a minute or two.
Meanwhile, I have my water that I'm bringing to a boil.
I'm gonna add one garlic clove along with a pound of ripe Roma tomatoes.
The chiles are nicely toasted.
Add in the water.
I'm gonna add a couple of tablespoons of oil.
Here I'm going to cook the nopalitos and the potato.
Now, you know the nopalitos.
Remove the thorns.
Once you clean the nopalito, we're cutting into strips.
Adding the nopalitos in here.
[Sizzling] Now we're gonna peel your potato.
So we're gonna cut the potato into strips.
Now I'm gonna add my potato.
[Sizzling] Sprinkle some salt... coarsely ground black pepper.
And meanwhile the chile is hydrated, I'm gonna puree this and turn it into a sauce.
So I have my tomatoes.
You want them super mushy with the skin starting to break and open.
All the tomatoes.
This garlic clove.
Beautiful.
And the chiles--meaty, soft.
Half a teaspoon salt.
So I'm gonna flip the nopalitos and potatoes.
Ah.
[Sizzling] The last thing I wanna add to my sauce is white onion, about an ounce a slice.
And I'm starting to heat a tablespoon of oil.
And we're gonna puree the sauce until completely smooth.
And I want every bit of the sauce to go into that pot.
Let's taste the sauce.
Mm.
It's bright, tomatoey.
I'm gonna pour it in the saucepan.
[Sizzling] And stir.
And I'm gonna let it cook 3 to 4 minutes before I add the sauce into the potato nopalitos.
I'm gonna bring my tortillas, queso fresco for the garnish.
The nopalito and potato mixture is perfect.
Look at this.
The browned potato, softened nopalito.
Mm.
Mm.
Mm!
I'm gonna add the sauce in here.
[Sizzling] I want it to cover all my vegetables... like this.
I'm gonna bring my comal.
Mm!
My nopalito and potato mix is ready.
This tiny, little guy is perfect.
The egg is gonna take a little bit longer than the tortilla.
That was beautiful, Pati.
Salt and pepper.
I'm gonna heat my tortilla.
And this plate I got and brought all the way from Milpa Alta.
Tortilla... the potato-nopalito mix.
And now add your egg right on top.
The sauce.
Queso fresco on top.
Look at this beautiful thing!
The homemade corn tortilla, nopalito-potato-- guisadito-- my sunny-side up egg, which I love in a taco.
I love this so much already.
Mm.
Mm.
I don't even know what to say.
It's so satisfying.
The nopalito and the potato, and then look at the yolk.
It broke, so I can clean that yolk with the same taco.
So all that delicious mess.
Brilliant to have a sunny-side up egg inside of your taco.
Breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner.
This is so, so good, so, so good, so good.
So good.
In Milpa Alta, there is a little town famous for one thing.
Welcome to San Pedro Atocpan, where nearly every resident makes their living making mole.
And Chef Jorge is helping me find the best.
Don Luis Juan Alvarado Retana grew up in the business.
While learning the techniques from his mother as a teen, he started dating his neighbor, Marta, and the two were married a few years later.
Now this husband and wife duo make over a dozen gourmet mole recipes with their daughter Magali.
Hola.
Hola.
[Speaking Spanish] Qu tal?
Mucho gusto.
Pati, voice-over: The specialty here is mole Almendrado.
Every recipe starts with a base of almonds and different kinds of dried red chiles.
After that, dozens of ingredients can be added to create unique flavors for any taste.
And I get to sample this mole buffet.
[Speaking Spanish] Mm.
[Speaking Spanish] [Laughs] [Speaking Spanish] Mm.
[Speaking Spanish] [Chuckles] Mm.
[Speaking Spanish] Pati: No.
No, no, no.
[Laughter] Pati, voice-over: It's estimated that this tiny town of only 9,000 people makes 60% of the mole consumed in the entire country of Mexico.
[Speaking Spanish] Bravo.
[Laughs] Pati, voice-over: Before going home, I'm stopping by Jorge's kitchen to learn a new recipe using mole along with cocinera Sonia Perez.
Pati: We're gonna use... The corn husks.
the purple corn husks... Yes.
to make?
Tlapique.
Tlapique.
OK.
Yeah.
It's a kind of tamal without masa.
Pati, voice-over: Inside this purple corn husk, we're cooking nopales, cheese... [Speaking Spanish] Pati, voice-over: chile and onion.
Pati: Que rico.
And salt, OK?
Remember, like, you wrap it, obviously, you know?
Mm-hmm.
OK?
Then close completely, just like that... Just like this?
[Speaking Spanish] Uh-huh.
To the ends.
We put the tlapiques... Uh-huh.
on the comal.
Pati, voice-over: Lau couldn't resist stopping by to see what we're doing with her nopales.
Hello, Lau!
Hola.
[Chuckles] Pati, voice-over: While the tlapiques cook, Jorge and Sonia teach me how to use a special tool for making tortillas.
You're gonna take some dough with this.
Pati: Uh-huh.
OK.
And this angle is like your finger inside.
Mm-hmm.
You can see?
Yeah.
OK.
And you're gonna go to the front always with not too much pressure.
Wow.
[Speaking Spanish] Jorge: Like a print.
Jorge: Slowly.
Yeah.
Again.
Don't worry.
Pati: Do it again?
Take more.
It's like making tortillas with Play-Doh.
Yeah.
Open.
Four fingers, like this, on the edge.
The dough.
Pati: I am ready to eat.
OK.
You want to try the tlapique with mole.
Pati: I'm gonna grab a tortilla, and I'm just gonna put the tamal in the tortilla.
I'm so happy with my taco.
OK.
Me, too.
Looks fantastic.
But then I'm gonna have one of yours.
Yeah.
Yes.
[Speaking Spanish] Mm.
So when--you have to try it.
Wow.
OK.
[Chuckles] Mm.
I told you.
Now our language is mm, mm, mm, mm.
Mm.
Mm-hmm.
[Speaking Spanish] Thank you for coming with us.
Remember, this is Milpa Alta, and this is our work.
And we are so proud and share all of this cultural tradition.
It's so, so good food.
So wonderful.
Pati: The Milpa Alta mole is one extraordinarily exquisite, silky mole sauce.
An essential thing is to fry almost every single ingredient before you puree it into a paste.
You have to have a big batch of oil.
I've been heating it here over medium heat.
You have so many ingredients.
The smaller ingredients will take between 3 to 5 seconds in the hot oil.
What you wanna see is them transforming.
So I have a teaspoon of thyme.
1, 2, 3.
Marjoram.
Anise seeds.
[Sizzling] And now, boom, all their flavor is bursting out and being transformed.
Coriander seeds.
Allspice berries.
Whole cloves.
With the garlic, I'm gonna give it a few more seconds than the spices.
Half a cup of dark raisins.
Dried bay leaves.
For the cinnamon, it's not the cassia, it's the Ceylon.
You know that it's true canela, the one we use in Mexico, when you can break it.
[snap] And you wanna break it into pieces, so that the passing through the oil is through most of the canela and not just the outside.
Pumpkin seeds.
Sesame seeds, untoasted.
And I'm combining peanuts with pine nuts, hazelnuts, and pecans.
Peanuts first.
I'm doing so many ingredients that I think I just put Mila to sleep.
Pine nuts.
The hazelnuts.
Pecans.
And we have four different kinds of chiles: pasilla, which is this chile.
It has a delightful, bitter, and kind of metallic taste.
We have the ancho chiles that you know, and then the mulato chile, which is even more chocolaty.
And it's a variety of the poblano chile that's also dried, and then the chipotle chiles.
So I wanna start with the anchos.
[Sizzling] See how they puff?
So this is the mulato.
Also adding the chipotles.
Look at the beautiful bright red from the chipotle.
The pasillas.
I'm obsessed with Maria cookies, so I'm using Maria cookies.
Now, Marta used a different kind of cookie that has a little bit of an orange taste, but you can try any biscuit or cookie that you like.
We're gonna use corn tortillas as well.
I could not believe it when Marta told me that she also passes the chocolate through oil.
And this is your Mexican chocolate, the typical that comes from the bar.
Of course, I'm not keeping it in the hot oil for a long time because that would just melt it immediately.
Chocolate, a cup of sugar, two tablespoons of salt.
I'm gonna turn off the oil.
Mix this.
Now I wanna start pureeing the ingredients in batches.
And here we go.
[Whirring] I mean, how flavorful does this look already?
I'm gonna mix it, and I'm gonna give it another round until it's a finer paste.
Yes, yes, yes, yes.
Now that you know how to make your base, you make enmoladas, which is what we're gonna do right now.
And enmolada is like an enchilada that has a mole sauce instead of a salsa, roja or verde, or another kind of a sauce.
So I have the base... and then I'm adding chicken broth, and then you just start mixing with the broth.
You can get a whisk in here.
You'll scream when you taste it, how good it is.
Mm.
Mm!
Mm!
I mean, it is just heavenly.
I have homemade corn tortillas.
This chicken is just chicken breasts that I poached.
I'm mixing the chicken with the mole.
Now we're gonna have the mole inside, outside, under, over, everywhere.
Tortilla, chicken covered in mole.
Fold.
So this I'm not even gonna pretend I'm adding a little mole sauce.
Crema mexicana, Mexican-style cream.
And toasted sesame seeds.
[Speaking Spanish] Mm.
Mm.
Mm.
It's filling.
It's satisfying.
It has so many layers of flavors.
It comes so harmoniously together in one bite.
And I get to eat three of those.
And you can, too.
Pati: For recipes and information from this episode and more, visit patijinich.com and connect.
Find me on Facebook, TikTok, X, Instagram, and Pinterest @PatiJinich.
Announcer: "Pati's Mexican Table" is brought to you by... Announcer: La Costea.
Por sabor!
Announcer: From the flavors of the Caribbean to the tastes of Latin America, on the menu with Marriott Bonvoy.
Men: Avocados from Mexico [Acoustic guitar plays Avocados from Mexico jingle] Announcer: A tradition of authentic Latin flavors and family recipes.
Tropical Cheese.
Eggland's Best, available in your grocer's egg aisle.
Visit egglandsbest.com.
[Acoustic guitar playing Nationwide jingle] Announcer: Proud to support "Pati's Mexican Table" on public television.
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