Cañada Balandra

19th February. My veggie chilli and a spread for the gang at Balandra beach.

The night before, for Jen's Birthday, we'd met a wonderful bunch of folks, including Argentinians Lucas and Ben, the former of which is famous in Latin America after an Instagram video he made went viral. He now travels off the back of what that brings him. His pal, Ben owns a video production company so they make a good team. And they're both pretty attractive specimens, so there's little to dislike. Maybe in a stupor of awe with Lucas' presence, and certainly influenced by the booze which had flowed all night, I suggested I cook for the whole party of new friends who had assembled to make Jen's birthday an amazing, unexpected treat.

When I awoke, somewhat hungover, in the public car park in town where we'd camped for tje night, and remembered my proposal, I felt it was important to honour it. I decided the most practical thing would be a big pot of veggie chilli and a good spread of sides. A mission around the supermarket saw us tooled up- $40 was enough to make enough food to feed 10 of us for 2 nights, and still have leftovers.

We went out to a cool spot called Balandra- a ridiculously beautiful cove with sand bars. Very touristy and busy as hell, so I was cooking the prep stuff in the middle of a packed car park, whilst Susie slept off the hangover and Patrick and Jen went a walk and for a swim.

Before starting to cook, we got some tostilocos- a packet of tostito tortilla chips, sliced open and rammed with crispy nuts, cucumber, jicama (like a turnip), 3 hot sauces and some fresh cheese. It's a beast of a thing. Tangy in the extreme and pretty satisfying.

I managed to chill for a while on the beach with the gang as they reassembled from their separate forays in town, returning in time for the sunset. Once it was dark, I had to spring into action to ensure I didn't end up late as can happen when cooking with booze. The nature of the spread was that it all benefited from last minute prep, besides the chilli which was already done.

The spread in total was;

Veggie chilli

Longaniza sausage, fried and crumbled

Fresh cheese (queso fresco)- nice and sour

Home made pickled jalapeños

Lettuce

Cabbage

Green tomato salsa

Guacamole 

Pico de Gallo salsa

Radishes

Creme fraiche

Fresh tortillas- supermarkets or tortillerias sell them warm and freshly made

Tortilla chips

The green tomato salsa was a first. I've been eating it with many tacos and felt it was time to start increasing my repertoire. I checked a recipe as a reference point and was surprised to find that it involves slightly grilling the green tomatoes - it doesn't taste like a cooked tomato sauce. But the trick is that they're only grilled lightly. Normally, with the cooking styles I'm used to, if grilling, it would be done until fully cooked to get that grilled flavour and texture, but not so here, so that was a learning.. The only other components were white onion, Serrano chillies, lime. The important thing is sitting the onion in water first to take the harshness out. Throw it together into the blitzer, and done.

As food was served, along with some roasted veg and a potato and egg dish from another chap, keen to contribute, I realised that the guy knocking them out was Mexican. Here was I, on a beach in Mexico, serving up traditional Mexican food (the chilli, excepted) to a Mexican, who was cooking arguably more European food. I was nervous about what he'd think- Mexicans are proud and are willing to share their opinion, and I could tell he was curious to see whether I could deliver. He gave me 10/10 for my guacamole and my salsas. He'd never had anything like the veggie chilli and he was super impressed. Honestly, I was nearly in tears, that's one of my highlights of any cooking episode.

It was nothing short of magic, seeing everyone gathered around in the dark with candles and head-torches, making up their tacos with all different combinations. The place was silent for the most part, with groans of pleasure, and eventually building into conversation about the individual components. I was so happy to have played my part in bringing together people around food to help make a really special occasion to continue the celebrations for Jen's Birthday.

Good photos will need to wait until Ben completes production of the video he made of me preparing the food. I may yet be famous.

Note- our friend, Susie, makes a mean sandwich filling with chicken, whipped avocado, hard boiled egg, mayo and mustard. We'll defo be doing that one in future.Read more