Tsom food in Mexico

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I already explained what Tsom food was a few blog posts ago. I managed to keep up this peculiar kind of eating while in Mexico, sticking only to plant foods and no animal products.

One of the cool things about Mexican food is all the plants, the fruits and vegetables, that they already use prevalently. I mean, if you take away all the popular junk food and sweets, Mexican food is actually a very healthful cuisine. Think about all those legit, homemade salsas: green, red, habanero, pineapple, mango... so many salsas. Then there's the cabbage salads, pico de gallo, grilled onions & grilled peppers, avocados, cucumbers, and all the rest.

A lot of the places we went to on this trip had comprehensive salsa bars with a massive amount of vegetables on them, and all that stuff is free. You just pay for your tortilla and your protein (usually meat or fish, but I was able to get veggie alternatives a lot of the time) and then load up at the salsa bar as much as you want.

My favorite thing of all is the tortillas. Tortillas de maize, that is (I can't eat wheat flour on account of the Celiac). And then they make some of those corn tortillas into Totopos (what us Americans would call "tortilla chips"). And there are the tostadas, the crispy corn tortillas. Load these up with a bunch of veggies, maybe some beans, and who needs meat?

The best I found was a taco place that gave me a plate of fresh corn tortillas along with grilled portobello mushrooms and grilled nopales (cactus). Their salsa bar included beans, guacamole, pico de gallo, grilled poblano peppers, grilled onions, pickled onions, cabbage slaw, radishes, and so many other great things. I was able to load those tacos up and eat my fill.

Mexicans are also super into Sushi. I knew that already because I'd encountered a ton of sushi on my prior trip to Mexico a few years back. But, that was a different part of Mexico, closer to the Pacific, so I wasn't sure if that was an everywhere thing. Well, here we were in the middle of the Sonoran desert and there are sushi places all over the city. So, I was able to get some awesome pure veg sushi rolls and poke bowls too.

My favorite thing of all was the chilaquiles. In the USA, we like to make nachos. I've been making those all my life by just melting a bunch of cheese over a pile of chips and accompanying it with salsa, guacamole, or maybe some meat or other veggies (jalapenos are popular). But, I still haven't seen nachos anywhere in Mexico. What I found down there was Chilaquiles. They take the same totopos (chips), but fry them in a pan with sauce (could be a green sauce, red sauce, chile colorado sauce, mole, I saw this done a lot of different ways). Then they are served hot with some beans and anything you want from the salsa bar. Often they will put eggs, cheese, or meat on top of them, but that was not for me this trip. Trust me, I was happy. The sauced-up chips are delicious enough just with some onions and avocado on top.

I have to make mention of the over-the-top fast-food salsa bar we found at the top of the Cerro de la Campana (Hill of the Bell). This place didn't have ANY of that health food stuff, but they did have a huge variety of sweets and snacks. One really popular one is the Tostitos. They turn a Tostitos bag sideways, slit it open all along one edge, then fill it with something (Javan got beef and cheese, I got a mango/cucumber/tomato salad). Then, you go to the salsa bar to lay down your choice of hot sauces and Chamoy (a salty pickled fruit sauce). This was no replacement for a real meal, but it was super good (and it kept my son away from the candy and Duritos ).

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