A few years ago I visited Mexico with my friend. This being my first time visiting, I won’t lie, I was nervous. There were a lot of worst case scenarios playing in my head. My friend was probably getting tired of my incessant rants about getting mugged at the beach or eaten by rabid sharks. Sorry, I’m a crazy person sometimes.
My fears were unjustified. We stayed in a small beachside town called Bucerias, a place I would highly recommend visiting, and the experience could not have been better. (there is a huge honking Walmart and multiple Starbucks…I guess people can’t live without their chocolate chip frappuccinos…).
More than our safety, though, I was concerned about food. What’s a vegan girl to eat in Mexico, you ask? I envisioned days and nights of Chipotle (oh lord those baby-sized coma-inducing burritos…) or worse…7/11 Taquitos. Yes, there was a time in my life when I ate those. Yikes.
Luckily this was not the case. Not even close! The food we ate was not weighed down by rice and cheese like the American Tex-Mex I’m used to. We were spoiled by delicious produce – local avocados and bananas, fresh salsas, new vegetables (cactus anyone?). I proceeded to pig out on pumpkin tacos and black bean enchiladas like it was no one’s business.
I confess, though, that not everything heading to my stomach was a crunchy healthy hippie dream (that’s what vacation are for after all). It’s only a matter of time before tortilla chips and refried beans don’t feel good anymore, no matter how many vegetables are surrounding them. Sigh.
Since returning home, I’ve been dreaming of how to recreate my favorite tastes of Mexico. Marrying these flavors in a flatbread seemed like an obvious choice – like taking a tortilla and making it bigger and stacking all my favorite things on top. You could call this a pizza, but I’m calling it a flatbread because it sounds cute. Plus, no one really knows what a flatbread is so I can make it whatever the hell I want heh. I was fantasizing about a crispy, corn-flavored crust, reminiscent of corn tortillas and this fits the bill. Unlike traditional pizza dough, it whips up in about 15 minutes, with no prep time for rising, so you can make it without any forethought.
At multiple restaurants in the Bucerias area, we had this black chili sauce that was fantastic. It was treated as more of a salsa for dipping chips or adding on top of dishes and has a great smoky flavor. It also kind of looked like tar…yum. I wasn’t able to get the name from anyone (unless someone out in the internet knows…?), so I had nothing to go on but my taste buds. I used beans and dried chills here to create a thicker version of what I remember.
Cactus, I discovered, is big in Mexico. Yes – cactus is edible – mind blown. It’s a pretty unique flavor that reminds me of a mild-tasting pickle. The slimy texture can be a little off-putting – I cooked the cactus with mushrooms to try to reduce this effect as much as possible. In Mexico, they seemed to have dried cactus on hand, but here, I was only able to find the canned stuff (which also seemed to be extra slimy…boo). It wasn’t hard to find in San Francisco, but I don’t know if that is the case elsewhere. If you can’t get ahold of it, artichoke hearts would be a nice substitute.
Mexican Flatbread
Makes 2 8″ flatbreads. I used pie pans, which worked well, but you could also use a single, larger cast iron skillet.
For the bread
1/2 cup cornmeal
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 cup water
For the topping
1 cup black beans
3 dried chipotle chiles, soaked for 20 minutes
1 clove garlic
1/2 lb mushrooms, sliced
1 cup cactus
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
2 tomatoes, seeds removed and diced
1/2 onion, diced
1 jalepeno pepper, finely diced
1 avocado, sliced
Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.
In a small bowl, mix the cornmeal, flour, yeast and pepper to taste. Add about a cup of water and 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Stir until well-mixed and leave for 15 minutes. The consistency should be like pancake mix – not too liquidy but still pourable.
Coat your pans with the remaining olive oil. Divide and pour the batter into the two pans, or one pan, or however many pans you are using. Bake for 15 minutes.
In a food processor, mix the beans, chills and garlic until they form a paste.
Over high heat, cook the mushrooms in a saucepan for about 5 minutes. Stir constantly, as the mushrooms will try to stick to the pan. This process gives the mushrooms a nice sear. Add a couple tablespoons of water to prevent sticking, and turn the heat down to medium. Add the cactus and balsamic vinegar and continue cooking for about 5 more minutes.
Remove the flatbreads from the oven and spread a layer of bean paste on top. Cover with the mushroom and cactus mixture and place in the oven for another 5 minutes.
In a separate bowl, mix the tomatoes, onion and jalepeno.
Remove the flatbreads and top with tomato mixture and avocados to serve.
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