Obviously, no one in their right mind would put mayonnaise on a corned beef sandwich. The requisite bread is corn rye, thin-sliced, with mustard. This is 2014 and everyone knows this. Not so back in 1976.
Fast forward to multicultural La Cañada Flintridge in 2014.
Last week, we had a hankering for kosher pollo pibil, a delicious Yucatán chicken dish, marinated in a red achiote-and-citrus sauce. Trader Joe’s sometimes sells cilantro, but it was gone. Ralphs still had kosher tortillas. But neither store stocks banana leaves or achiote. (Achiote is the seed of the fruit of the achiote tree, which grows in jungles and tropical regions.)
That’s why home-cooked kosher pollo pibil in La Cañada requires the following steps.
No. 1: purchase kosher chicken at Trader Joe’s.
No. 2: Go to the Lotte Korean Market for cilantro and jalapeños.
No. 3: No, no. This isn’t working.
To make kosher Mexican food, everyone must leave. We must take the back road to Altadena. We must turn right on Oak Grove, continue onto Woodbury, turn left on Lincoln.
There, only 2 miles away, is the source, Super King Market, 2260 N. Lincoln Ave. Here’s what you will find at Super King: tomatillos, achiote, dried chiles, inexpensive nonorganic vegetables, Middle Eastern food, sunflower seeds, olives, Armenian staples, Ukrainian bread and 100 brands of tequila.
Of course, Super King sells banana leaves, the very banana leaves essential to pollo pibil. The recipe for Pollo Pibil is too complex to describe in one column. Here is an easy chile verde recipe, with the caveat that chile verde sauce is not used in pollo pibil.
