How-To (DIY stuff)

How to Make Corn Tortillas

How to make corn tortillas at home, from either fresh dough or masa harina. Homemade tortillas are much better than store-bought, once you learn how.

How to make longaniza sausages, Mexican style. They’re a bit like chorizo, but less vinegary.

Nopales, prickly pear cactus paddles, are delicious, but you need to know some tricks to cook nopales without slime.

How to make Mexican empanadas from scratch. These are masa empanadas, corn dough, not flour. You can fill them with anything you like.

Masa harina is dried tortilla dough. You can buy it, but if you have good corn, here’s how to make homemade masa harina.

How to clean nopales, prickly pear cactus paddles. Step by step instructions, with a video, on how to remove spines from nopales.

Smoked pork chops, using real, meaty, fatty, thick pork chops. Useful in all sorts of ways!

Classic mid-Atlantic scrapple is pork, spices, cornmeal, buckwheat flour and love.