Interview with Pati Jinich
Pati Jinich is a Mexican American chef, author, and television host.
Huevos Con Hijos
Contents
Max Raskin: I have this fascination with eggs and cooking eggs —what’s your go-to way to cook an egg?
Pati Jinich: First of all, let me say I am obsessed with eggs. My husband and I are empty-nesters, but when my kids were at home, I think we ate eggs six out of seven mornings. I think they're a magnificent ingredient. Incredibly affordable, accessible, easy to use. It can shine on its own or it's happy to help other dishes shine.
One of my favorite ways of eating eggs is connected to a dear memory of when I was growing up. My dad used to make soft-boiled eggs. Soft boil the egg, open the top, cut a good piece of butter, drop it in there, add salt, pepper, mix it, and then just break a piece of toast.
MR: You would eat it out of the shell?
PJ: Eat it out of the shell, but first you dunk in a little bit of the toast in the yolk that has the melting butter. To me, that's exquisite.
MR: If you need to eat just to survive, not cook anything fancy, what’s the thing you cook?
PJ: For sure an egg scramble. An egg scramble with turkey, an egg scramble with cheese. Maybe four out of the six times that I eat eggs at home, I make Mexican-style eggs. You cook a lot of onion, a lot of jalapeno and a lot of tomato until it becomes a mushy paste. Then I add nopales which are cactus paddles — you dice them, cook them, then mix it with a Mexican style sauce, and then scramble the eggs. I think I eat that four times a week with a piece of black toast and some mashed avocado on top.
Something I love to make when I'm having guests is chilaquiles crowned with sunny side up eggs. That’s Sami’s, my middle son’s, favorite thing when he comes back to visit.
My oldest son, Alan, went to visit him without us. When we FaceTimed on Sunday morning, Sami was making chilaquiles for his oldest brother.
MR: That's sweet!
PJ: That was super moving to me.
MR: Do you have any guilty pleasures to eat, not to cook?
PJ: Yes, for sure. Cocoa Pebbles with whole milk. I love Cocoa Pebbles so much.
MR: How often will you have it?
PJ: I don't. I don't buy them because I will finish the box. If I do, the box disappears in two nights because that is something that I will eat right before going to bed.
Sisters
MR: What does your morning routine look like?
PJ: I make myself a giant batch of green juice that I learned from my sister Sharon.
MR: Your other sister Karen started Niddo in Mexico City?
PJ: Correct. So we're four sisters. The oldest is Karen, who has Niddo, and she's building an insane culinary empire in Mexico City. Niddo is a mix of Mexican, Jewish, Middle Eastern…it’s like shakshuka chilaquiles and a chocolate babka that my grandmother used to make.
My next sister, Alisa, is a trained pastry chef. She had a restaurant in Mexico City — it was a French-Mexican restaurant. Then she moved to Miami and opened a restaurant there. She’s the most incredible cook. And then my next sister, Sharon, is into a healthy lifestyle, eating, healing.
MR: Is she a chef?
PJ: She's not a chef, but she's an incredible cook. But she does vegetarian and she's the one who taught me this green juice.
MR: So what's in it?
PJ: It’s celery, cucumber, aloe vera, ginger, fresh ginger, and fresh turmeric.
MR: How do you take your coffee?
PJ: I used to take it like a milkshake with a lot of milk and brown sugar. But for a year, I’ve been training myself to drink it black. Now I appreciate it much more.
MR: Are you particular about the kind of coffee you drink?
PJ: Yes. I love Mexican coffee from Chiapas or from Veracruz. My sister Karen gets me batches sometimes. Chocolatey, I like it with a chocolatey taste.
Salt of the Earth
MR: Which of your sisters would cook your last meal on death row?
PJ: I will not tell you because my sisters will get really mad at me.
MR: So there's no consensus about who is the best?
PJ: No, each one is extraordinary. But what we all agree on is that I am the worst cook of them all.
MR: Really?
PJ: Yes, for sure. I am messy. I tend to over-season food because I'm overly enthusiastic. I love salt to an extreme.
MR: Before I eat anything, I'll put salt on.
PJ: Me too. Always kosher salt. I don't use fine salt. A lot of people recommend it for baking, but to me, fine salt salts the food, whereas kosher coarse salt seasons the food.
MR: Do you have any hobbies?
PJ: I love gardening. I wouldn't say it's a serious hobby. I just love my flowers, I love my fruit trees. I have a plum tree.
This is how I knew that I was Mexican-American instead of a Mexican living in the US — because I always would define myself as a Mexican living in the US. About seven or eight years ago, I planted a plum tree, an apricot tree, a cherry tree. I planted a couple of figs, a lime tree, and I have some blueberries and some grapes. The trees wouldn't bear fruit, year after year. And suddenly one year they all bloomed, and all of a sudden there were thousands of plums. Sami, my middle son, had to make like 10 jars of jam. And when the fruit started giving fruit, I told my husband, "Okay, I am also a Washingtonian now."
MR: Why is that?
PJ: Because I feel that unbeknownst to me, I've grown really deep, beautiful, strong roots to the United States.
Tequila
MR: Do you enjoy drinking?
PJ: Yes.
I'm one of four girls and my dad used to drink a lot — he was not an alcoholic, but he really enjoyed drinking. He had four daughters, and my three older sisters are really pretty. Since we were little, he would always give us some of his wine, some of his beer, some of his tequila because he wanted to give us tolerance to alcohol — he was afraid somebody was going to get us drunk.
The funny thing is that none of us knows how to drink. We can barely handle one or two cups. I know not to drink during the day because I just get so sleepy. If I drink, I drink at night.
I like to drink something that will last because I don't like to drink a lot because it just makes me too sleepy or too silly, so I'll have a Negroni. I love a Negroni because it lasts a long time with a big cube of ice or bourbon on the rocks or tequila on the rocks.
MR: Do you have a favorite kind of tequila?
PJ: Gran Centenario for sure. They have one that's called Leyenda, which translates to legend, which is aged, añejo, but it's aged in barrels of bourbon. It’s caramel. You should get it.
MR: It doesn't look so expensive.
PJ: It's not that expensive.
MR: Do you have any apps on your phone that you use that people might not have heard of that you think are great?
PJ: Actually, I downloaded one that's called Tripit. It organizes your travel.
Pati Jinich Explores PanAmericana (…and Her Polish Roots)
MR: What’s your favorite place in America?
PJ: This is a great question because it leads me to my new docu-series, called Pati Jinich Explores PanAmericana.
It starts at the top of Alaska and the idea is to go all the way down to the bottom of Argentina. It’s a road trip that loosely follows the Pan-American Highway, which is a symbol of connection and collaboration between all of the countries of North and South America.
I was in Alaska, and they recommend this place that's called Birch & Alder outside of Anchorage. They had the best bagels because the owner Reuben is a master, and they’re made with Alaskan water. It's insane. Honestly, it's better than New York water for bagels. They also have the best bialys. I used to eat bialys in Mexico City with my Polish grandfather.
My grandfather arrived in Mexico City in the 1920s, escaping the pogroms in Poland. It turns out Reuben, who's feeding me bialys with wild foraged mushrooms and melted cheese and wild herbs…his grandfather was from a neighboring town in Poland. He left at the same time as my grandfather, fleeing to America for safety and freedom. His grandfather was able to get into the United States.
My grandfather was trying to get into the US, but he couldn't because by the time he came, the Polish quota had been filled. So they diverted him to Mexico. And two generations later, these two grandkids of these two Polish grandparents, who could have been neighbors, were eating bialys in Alaska.
Shabbat
MR: Are you a big music person?
PJ: Huge, gigantic. I love, I love music. I wanted to be a flutist when I was growing up.
MR: Can you check what your most played songs on Spotify were last year?
PJ: The first one is “All the Debts I Owe” by Caamp. The second one doesn't surprise me at all — is Grupo Frontera’s “UN X100TO.” And the third one is called “La edad del cielo” by Jorge Drexler.
This interests both of us because we're both Jews. Jorge Drexler has a song that I am obsessed with called “Milonga del moro judio.” It talks about a man who is a Jew and how he's trying to fit in in the diaspora and the world. "I'm a Jew, but I'm not home. I am everywhere." It is a beautiful song. You’ll love it.
MR: What does your Shabbat table look like?
PJ: My Shabbat table has the best ever marzipan challah in the universe. The recipe is from Uri Scheft who founded Breads bakery in New York. His book is insane.
I started making his marzipan challah every Friday a couple of years ago, and it's become the thing that I look forward to cooking the most during the week. It takes so much time — the dough has to rise a couple of times, and you have to fill it and roll it so the marzipan is in the filling. I started blocking my Friday mornings with no Zooms. I'm becoming famous in my neighborhood because it smells so beautiful. I will make one challah with marzipan, one plain, and I will make a soup, either a Mexican soup or my grandmother's Austrian soup, which has the clearest, most flavorful chicken broth. Savory crepes, sliced super thin, or a matzo ball soup and then, I make a big meal.
MR: Other than family, who are your favorite Shabbos guests?
PJ: All our friends, I adore. We recently had a friend, Frank Foer, who writes for The Atlantic and his wife, Abby Greensfelder. Everything that comes out of Frank’s mouth amazes me. He has such a beautiful brain and in fact, it was because of him that I got a book called The Sabbath by Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel.
I didn't know the concept of Shabbat as a “cathedral in time,” but I absolutely love it. This is what I believe. The marzipan challah is not mine. It's lent by this baker. I really believe that all our traditions or foods are here before we come to this earth. And after we leave, they're going to be here. I feel so lucky that we can join in for a little while.