David Castro Hussong - The Baja California Cookbook: Exploring the Good Life in Mexico

Many of us who grew up in Baja, even fairly recently, have a connection to ranches and farms; for generations, those were at the center of peoples lives here. While the texture of Baja life has changed a lot in the last few decades, the food we eat is still influenced by Spanish-flavored ranch culture.

For almost twenty thousand years, indigenous people had the peninsula to themselves. Then, in the 1600s, colonizers flying the Spanish flag established their first mission in Loreto, on the Sea of Cortez in what now is the state of Baja California Sur. These missionaries, in order to better control Californias land and people, asked Spain to send ranchers to establish farms.

Many of those first Spanish ranchers were from the south of Spain and had Moorish heritage. People say they brought Bedouin hospitality traditions with them, which are still present in Bajas small mountain villages. Its tough to prove this conclusively, but what we can show is that they did bring with them their Mediterranean larder, including olives, wine grapes, dates, cattle, and wheat for flour. These were the original cultivated crops of the California ranch, and they are still being farmed here today.

In the 1970s, my dad not only was a university professor but he also owned a butcher shop outside Ensenada that served the fishermen of the tuna fleet. Hed feed them sandwiches and sell them meat to cook at home. The beef and lamb he sold came from his ranch, and from his neighbors ranches, in the mountains outside town. It was old-school farm-to-table living.

When the fishermen came to shore for the last time each week, theyd buy enough meat for the families to eat all weekend; and then my dad would close the shop and go up to the mountains. Hed always take me with him. If my mom spent the weekend with us, shed mostly be painting she is a well-regarded fine artist. My dad and grandfather would work on the ranch, and I would tag along.

The first order of business was to butcher and cook a lamb so wed have food for the weekend and, if any of us were staying over, for the following week.

In the summer, wed cook the lamb as barbacoaoutside, slow over a fire. Barbacoa is where the word barbecue comes from; it was a tradition throughout the Americas before any Europeans arrived here. Nowadays, barbacoa is often associated with mainland Mexico, but its been a thing in greater California for hundreds of years. On the coast above Santa Barbara, in the Santa Maria Valley, its still common to slow-cook beef that way; they call it Santa Maria Barbecue. Its a great method for cooking any large cut or whole animal, as long as you have the space and the weather is good enough for people to be outside.

When the weather was less favorableit snows in the Sierra de Juarez in the winterwed cook the lamb inside, in a pot on the stove. This was simple cooking. The lambs were raised very well, so we didnt need to flavor them at all; we just gave them a little salt, pepper, onion, and maybe garlic.

Once the lamb was cooked and pulled, we would eat it for daysas burritos, on tacos or sopes, or just on a plate with some beans.