Celebrating Cinco de Mayo with Discovery Foods

I don’t need an excuse to cook up a Mexican feast. Fajitas, enchiladas and tacos often appear on our menus – they are quick, tasty and fairly healthy evening meal choices. But if you do need an excuse to give Mexican food a try at home, then Cinco de Mayo is this weekend…

Cinco de Mayo (Spanish for 5th May) a Mexican holiday celebrating their country’s victory over France during the Battle of Puebla in 1862. Actually it is quite a small celebration in Mexico itself, but in the USA it has evolved into a celebration of Mexican culture and heritage, particularly in areas with large Mexican-American populations. There are parades, mariachi music performances and street festivals which bring communities together.

To help me celebrate Cinco de Mayo in my own home this year, Discovery Foods sent me a bag full of their Mexican inspired products to try out. The other evening LincsGeek and I sat down to our feast – chicken fajitas using The Perfect Fajita Kit and the three colourful squeezy bottles.

I could dive into that lot again right now!

Cooking fajitas is so very easy and is really quick, especially when you have a fajita kit to hand. The kit contained eight tortilla wraps, a packet of fajita seasoning, and some tomato salsa. There are only two of us in our house and even though these kits are designed for four (two wraps each), LincsGeek and I seem to manage the whole lot between us with no problem – we don’t serve anything else with it unless we’re really really hungry, in which case we’d have some potato (or sweet potato) wedges too.

My chicken fajita recipe is very simple. I start by frying an onion and some garlic in a little oil before adding two diced (into quite small pieces) chicken breast fillets. Once the chicken has started to cook I add the seasoning sachet – I use the whole lot, Mexican food is full of flavour and I want all of that in my finished wraps. Once the chicken is cooked I add a decent amount of chopped peppers and mushrooms to the mix too – we like lots of veg in this sort of food (a colourful meal is a healthy meal!). The smell of Mexican spices fills the kitchen and make us very hungry!

I served up the fajita filling with warm wraps, rocket leaves, grated mature cheddar, the salsa that came in the kit, and the sauces provided in my hamper. Normally I would use fresh salsa and soured cream so I was very interested to see what the bottled variants would taste like.

We both create our wraps quite differently. I start with the salsa and soured cream, and then add rocket leaves and some cheese before spooning on the hot filling. LincsGeek puts the filling on first and then the salsa, soured cream and cheese – he has his rocket on the side. I generally overfill my tortillas to get as much filling in each of two or three wraps one as possible, whereas LIncsGeek puts less in and has more wraps in total. Either way fajitas are always a favourite meal choice of ours, so good.

The squeezy bottles were completely new to me. I mentioned above that I normally buy fresh tomato salsa and soured cream to have with our Mexican food, so I was very interested to see how these longer life versions compare. We were very impressed actually. The Garlic and Herb Soured Cream was very tasty, although the squirt was a bit violent at times and on one wrap I got much more than I’d anticipated. It was a good alternative to fresh soured cream and had a lovely flavour. The Green Jalapeno Relish was also nice, it had a lovely flavour and was something that I don’t normally get at all for our Mexican feasts. The bottle said “medium” heat but LincsGeek felt actually it was mild so don’t be put off by the Jalapeno content, it’s well worth a try. It could definitely do with more of a kick but it’s got a great flavour. I think it’s fair to say that in both cases I still prefer fresh, but these work well and are a good idea to have in the cupboard for an impromptu feast!

If you’ve not planned your menu for Sunday then really you have no option but to celebrate Cinco de Mayo and have a Mexican feast of your own. If you have planned your menu for Sunday then have Mexican food on Monday! I can recommend these Discovery products to help with your cooking.