beef neck birria

A while back I had the pleasure of visiting Butcher & Larder here in Chicago.  There were a huge variety of meats and goodies but something that stood out to me were these beautiful beef neck bones that I spotted in the front case.  I never really worked with them, but I knew I could put something together with them.  What instantly came to mind was birria.  I knew the flavors involved would work well with the beef and the neck bones would provide more than enough flavor to create a delicious broth.

To begin I marinated the beef neck bones in a sauce I made with vinegar, ancho chile, guajillo chile, bay leaves, Mexican oregano, cloves, canela, garlic, salt and pepper.  I marinated the neck bones in this combination for about 6 hours to make sure the the flavor permeates.  I then placed the bones in a stock pot with the sauce and extra water and set it to a slow simmer for about 3-4 hours.  I wanted to make sure to extract as much of the flavor from the bones as possible as well as assure that the meat is tender and falls off the bone.

Once the bones were done cooking I separated all the meat and set it aside.  I placed the bones back in the broth and let it come to a boil for bit longer just to let the flavors concentrate even further.  I removed the bones one last time and added back in the meat.  I also added some diced potatoes and let it simmer together until the potatoes were cooked.

To serve I garnished the birria with thinly slice onion, cilantro and a couple of good squirts of lime.  This is typically eaten with a tortilla on the side, the starchiness helps to counteract the richness of the broth.  As typical with any birria-making process there is always tons of broth left.  This is best served the following morning in a coffee mug with some cilantro, diced onion and lime, sip away!

caldo tlalpeño

Caldo tlalpeño is one of the first soups I learned to make on my own.  To me, it is a soup somewhat similar to menudo or pozole.  The meat in this case is chicken, and the chile used to flavor the broth is typically chipotle.

It's been a while since I've made caldo tlalpeño, probably not since college.  I was excited to revisit it.  To begin, I made my broth from the bones of a couple of roast chickens.  I prepared the salsa to add to the broth to further flavor the soup.

Normally, chipotle is used in the salsa but I decided to use chile morita, which is a smaller and spicier version of the chipotle.  It still contains that deep smoky flavor which will go well the chicken.  I rehydrated the chile morita in some of the boiling chicken broth for about 20 minutes.

To complete the salsa I placed the chile in a blender along with garlic, cumin, bay leaves, oregano, salt and pepper.

To complete the soup I added diced potato, carrot and boiled for a few minutes.  I later tossed in some cooked garbanzo beans, before adding the salsa to the soup.  I let it all boil together before serving. i garnished the caldo tlalpeño with diced onion, cilantro and pieces of avocado which provide a texture contrast and a needed cool creaminess.  tostadas can be broken up into the soup and of course no caldo is complete without a few squirts of lime.

Making caldo tlalpeño brought back so many memories of trying out new recipes on my own in high school.  It feels good to revisit that.