I'm from Texas. That would not be immediately obvious if you didn't see the Texas necklace hanging around my neck and the obnoxious (yet obligatory) Texas flag I have plastered to the wall of my room. Weirdly enough, people always tag me as a Pennsylvanian. I don't know what this means. Nonetheless, I have a lot of Texan pride and my biggest source of Texan pride comes in one of the objectively best cuisines known to mankind that is native to the Lone Star State: Tex-Mex. Just to clear a few things up no, Gusanoz does not count as real Mexican food, and no, California, adding a ton of avocados and unnecessary fish to your Mexican restaurants' menus does not make it a signature cuisine. If you want the best Mexican food, you simply have to go to Texas (Mi Cocina, to be exact). So this week, I wanted to tip my (cowboy) hat to one of my favorite cuisines in a kind of unconventional way. This recipe fuses Mexican flavors with the delicious sticky rice of Sunja's sushi to make what I call a Mexican rice casserole.1. At Collis, get a bowl with one scoop of black beans, one scoop of corn, and one (or two!) scoops of cheese.2. Go to the Sunja's sushi line and ask one of the chefs to put a scoop or two of sticky rice in your bowl (it's free!)3. Using a spoon, mix the entire thing so that the beans, corn, and cheese are incorporated fully into the rice and that everything is stuck together.4. Spritz the juice of one lemon slice on top of the mixture.
5. Stick that in the microwave for 45 seconds.6. Let it cool it will be really hot!7. Top that with salsa, salt and pepper to taste.
To all you Texans out there: Unfortunately, as tasty as this dish is, we all know that nothing will ever match up to the real deal. In the meantime, I would advise listening to a healthy dose of country music and locking yourself in One Wheelock (which I have come to confuse for a Bikram yoga room) for an extended period of time in order to recreate a Texas summer. Being a Texan has never felt so good
