It’s summer! The time when I reach for Lucy Buffett’s cookbook before anything else.

This one is based on Lucy’s Cadillac Margarita, adapted to, naturally, include key lime juice. Because I am obsessed love it.

Do me a favor and combine in a shaker:

• 1.5 ounces tequila
• 3/4 ounce Grand Marnier
• 1 ounce key lime juice
• 1 ounce simple syrup
• juice of 1/2 lime

Add as much ice as will fit in the shaker and do the margarita dance (shake it up). If it’s your thing (it’s certainly mine) run a lime wedge around the edge of the glass and dip it in coarse salt.  When the drink is fabulously cold and frothy, pour into said glass and enjoy.

It’s another LuLu Buffett recipe! This was every so slightly modified from LuLu’s Crazy Cheesy Queso Dip. I love it especially right now because the red and green peppers look all Christmasey. Aww!

Here’s what I used:

• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/2 sweet yellow onion
• 1/2 red bell pepper
• 1/2 green bell pepper
• 1 can (4 oz) diced green chiles
• 1 pound Velveeta or other melty cheese
• 1/2 cup whole milk
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper (white pepper if you have it)
• Salt to taste

To make the cheesy goodness:

1. Slice cheese into 1″ chunks and put it and milk in top of double boiler, or in a large glass or metal bowl put over a pan of boiling water to start melting
2. Finely dice onion and peppers in the food processor
3. Melt butter in heavy saucepan and add diced veggies; cook and stir for 2-3 minutes or until veggies are soft
4. When cheese/milk mixture is melted, stir in cooked veggies and add cumin, pepper and salt
5. Serve immediately with chips, or keep warm in a crockpot for your fiesta

Before you do anything, get a bunch of corn husks soaking in water.

You will need for the tamale sauce:

• 3 tablespoons oregano
• 4 tablespoons cumin
• 2 onions, quartered
• 2 cloves garlic
• 3 oz. package dried Ancho chiles
• 3 oz. package dried California chiles

1. Bloom the oregano and cumin in olive oil: warm a bit of olive oil in a small skillet, and toss in the spices; stir till you just start to smell them, then remove from heat
2. Put onions, garlic and chiles in a large pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil, then let it rest
3. When cooled off, run through a food processor, then warm back up
4. When hot again, add 2 tablespoons sugar, and salt to taste

For the tamale masa:

• 1 cup grease, Crisco, or pork fat (I had bacon grease in the fridge, of course)
• 3 cups dried corn masa (such as Maseca)
• 1/2 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 tablespoon salt
• 1/2 cup tamale sauce (above)

1. Beat grease in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment
2. Mix dry ingredients in a separate bowl
3. Add tamale sauce to dry ingredients
4. Add a bit of water if it looks too dry — you want it to feel kind of like Playdoh
5. Slowly add mixture to grease in stand mixer and mix until smooth; add more water or dry masa as necessary

To make your tamales:

1. Remove husks from water and pat dry (don’t have to completely dry, just make them a little easier to handle)
2. Spread masa on smooth side of husks
3. Put filling in the middle of the masa; roll the husk tightly, then fold up the end (see video here — not mine — for a very quick demonstration)
4. Stand them upright, open side up, in a tamale or vegetable steamer for 90 minutes. Fantastic hint from The Cousin: put pennies in the bottom of your pot under the steamer; if they start clanging around you’ll know you need to add more water

After they’re finished cooking, discard husks and serve with your tamale sauce. SO YUMMY, and great comfort food for the cold weather upon us. Enjoy!

The salsa roja recipe is popular. Ridiculously popular. But we had some company in town and I needed salsa fast — nigh onto immediately. Rick Bayless recipe to the rescue! This is quick and easy, and simple to tweak:

You’ll need:

• 1 to 2 fresh jalapeño chiles (my late-season ones from the garden weren’t that hot so I used 5)
• 3 garlic cloves, unpeeled
• 1 15-ounce can diced tomatoes in juice, preferably fire roasted
• 1/4 cup (loosely packed) chopped fresh cilantro
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• Salt

Easy steps to yum:

1. Heat an ungreased skillet over medium heat and roast the chiles and garlic, turning often until they’re splotchy and brown and soft — this takes about 10 minutes for the chiles, and 15 minutes for the garlic
2. Cool until you can handle them, then roughly chop the chiles, discarding caps, and drop into food processor
3. Peel the garlic and scoop the softened cloves into a food processor; pulse until very finely chopped
4. Add the tomatoes with their juice to the food processor then pulse until puree is coarse
5. Pour into serving dish and stir in cilantro and lime juice, and salt to taste — about 1/2-3/4 teaspoon
6. Serve and enjoy!

I recently came across this Rick Bayless recipe for simple mashed black beans. Can you ever go wrong with a Rick Bayless recipe? I’m saying no. With a little tweaking for what I had on hand and what sounded good, I ended up with this:

• 2 Tbsp. bacon drippings (I always have some in the fridge)
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1 15-oz can black beans, drained and rinsed
• Salt

In the time it took The Yankee too cook up our fajitas (more on that later), I had these done like so:

1. Put a dry skillet over medium heat and drop in three unpeeled garlic cloves; keep turning them till the skin is nice and browned and the garlic inside is soft; set aside to cool enough to handle, then remove skins
2. While the garlic is roasting, drain and rinse a can of black beans
3. Remove the pan from the heat for just a minute and drop in 2 Tbsp. bacon fat; let it melt (it will do this quickly and will also smoke quickly, thus the part about removing the pan from the heat), then drop in softened garlic and crush the cloves with a potato masher
4. Pour in can of beans and give it all a good stir to incorporate the garlic
5. After everything is heated through, use a potato masher or the back of a wooden spoon to mash the beans; you’re not looking for ice-cream texture here, just smush them up a bit
6. Take the pan off the heat and add in as much water (probably 2-3 Tbsp) as is needed to be able to easily spread or spoon the beans
7. Season with salt to taste — 1/2 teaspoon or so

These are fantastic eaten as is, sprinkled with cheese, on nachos, with fajitas, with burritos… use your imagination!