Cinco de Mayo

For the past few years, Cinco de Mayo has meant going out and searching for delicious Mexican food. Unfortunately, most other people had the same idea and we would encounter crowd after crowd at every Mexican place we tried. This year, we decided to make our own Cinco de Mayo dinner at home, adapting this recipe for mushroom and chile tacos that I found on Chow. Although the recipe called for portabello mushrooms and poblano peppers, I decided to substitute based on ingredients we had at home and needed to use from our fridge. It was also a good excuse to finally break out the case of diced green chiles that we bought at Costco in Las Vegas.

Yes, we flew these cans of green chiles across the country

The ingredient list, as adapted for our tacos:

Ignore the queso fresco... Didn't end up using it as garnish

- 1 tbsp olive oil ($0.20)

- 1 tsp ground cumin ($0.07)

- 1 tsp dried oregano ($0.05)

- 7 oz can of diced green chiles ($0.78)

- 1/2 red onion ($0.44)

- 2 garlic cloves ($0.08)

- 1 tsp salt ($0.05)

- 1 lb of white mushrooms ($2.50)

- whites of 4 green onions ($0.20)

- 1 medium Roma tomato, medium dice ($0.29)

- 2 tbsp coarsely chopped fresh cilantro ($0.35)

- 1 tsp lime juice ($0.10)

- 4 tortillas, warmed ($1)

Prepped vegetables

Including the tortillas, the total taco cost was a little over $6. Not bad for 4 homemade tacos (with more veggies left over once the tacos were eaten).

The tacos were also pretty simple to make, once the prep was done. I love sauteing.

Making mushroom and chile tacos

1. Heat oil over medium heat, then add cumin and oregano and cook until fragrant.

2. Add chile, onion, garlic and salt, and cook until tender.

3. Add mushrooms, green onions and salt, and cook until tender.

4. Remove from heat. Stir in tomato, cilantro and lime juice. Season with salt and pepper.

5. Divide among tortillas and eat.

We continued our "Taco Tuesday on Monday" dinner by making some esquites (more on that here). They were better last time, but the flavors are still so addictive. One of our favorite things to eat.

Esquites!

The mushroom and chile tacos came out well. A didn't know what I was making, so he had been expecting a more buttery flavor when he saw the mushrooms. He did enjoy the fresh taste and flavors of the mushrooms made with olive oil and thought the tacos were a little more unique since they weren't buttery. I liked the addition of cumin to the mushroom-onion-chile saute, and thought they made nice, juicy veggie tacos. 

Final dinner plates

Feliz Cinco de Mayo!