When I arrived in Sydney to live, the first 3 weeks as a resident were completely and utterly unlike the 3 weeks I’d spent here as a tourist 8 months earlier. I’ll chronicle my various forms of culture shock somewhere else, perhaps. The most profound (for me anyway) changes were to be found in the grocery store. I was surprised that most grocers didn’t stock dry beans, with the exception of lentils sometimes in the Indian section. No dry beans equals no pinto beans. And, when I *did* find dried beans at some specialty shops, there were *still* no pinto beans. There is an imposter here in Australia called the Berlotti bean, which looks quite like a pinto, but has a sweet taste which renders it unattractive for savory borracho beans or refrijoles.
Yay Internet to the rescue!
Google promptly served up montereyfoods.com.au when I quested for pinto beans. The prices aren’t cheap, but the stuff is genuine and fresh. I can’t help but be amused that simple Mexican cuisine, which is designed from the ground up to be *very* economical, is quite expensive to source.
Monterey did a great job packing and shipping the items; the box arrived quickly and was packed full of goodies. So far, the dried chiles from Monterey are my favorites in Australia. And my favorite Mexican canned foods are La Costeña brand, which are well-represented in the stock.
Every couple of months, Monterey opens their warehouse in Prestons, NSW to the public. We took a drive out there one Sunday and arrived just as they were opening up.
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As we browsed through the stacks of delicious goodies, we talked to the proprietor about the costs to import Mexican stuff to Australia. The customs and quarantine inspections are quite arduous, and they tend to hold up shipments as they inspect or fumigate vegetable matter, passing the costs of doing so on to the shipper. He’s optimistic about getting a greater variety of items, and is increasing the variety of his stock with each container. I asked about getting corn husks for tamales, either sourced here or from Evil America, and he said he’d gotten a fair number of requests for these.
We ended up with a couple bags of dried chiles, some salsas and canned delicacies, and a bag of dried pinto beans. Totalled about $50. Sigh.
At least it was there! They’re having another open warehouse in early February. We’ll probably go again!
ña, Herdez and Goya canned products, and Maseca masa harina (corn tortilla & tamale mix).
In 2001, I was starting to cook more seriously, which meant more gadgets, of course. I was looking for a flat, cast-iron comal or griddle, and the traditional Mexican food grinder made of hollowed-out lava rock, the molcajete.