With the publication of Tacopedia almost a decade ago, you’d think there wouldn’t be the need for another book from Phaidon focusing squarely on the traditional Mexican dish of tacos, and yet here the publisher is with a new book that does exactly that.
This time round it is the turn of acclaimed Mexican chef Enrique Olvera – he of Mexican restaurant Pujol, which is a regular on The World’s 50 Best Restaurant list and which celebrates its 25th anniversary this month – who, alongside co-author and Mexico-based food critic Alonso Ruvalcaba, has penned Sunny Days Taco Nights, described as the ultimate insider’s guide to preparing and enjoying authentic and contemporary tacos.
Despite the obvious similarity of topic, Olvera’s new book is significantly distinct enough from Deborah Holtz and Juan Carlos Mena’s encyclopaedic reference on taco culture. While Tacopedia traces the dish all the way from its history in Aztec civilisation, taking in aspect such as the regions the various tacos come from, the parts of animal used and even revealing the best places across the country at which to find them, Sunny Days Taco Nights is much more straightforward but no less thorough in its approach.
Featuring 100 taco recipes, a cursory flick through this new book’s pages and the array of vibrant dishes that jump out from them shows that this is a serious and comprehensive book that lets the taco do the talking.
No taco book worth its salt would omit to cover the various styles of the dish found throughout the country, and Sunny Days Taco Nights is no exception. The taco tome runs through the differences between grill tacos (plancha); steamed or ‘sweaty’ tacos (vapor) - where tacos are stacked and stay hot thanks to steam generated from a covered bano maria; those with a hard shell, and the trompo taco, described as being ‘as important as a Mexican museum or library’, but before you know it you’re into the meat and potatoes (or meat and corn in this instance) of the book.
There are no chapters per se, with the book instead divided into two equal parts – classic and original, featuring 50 recipes for each – although there are short sections devoted to salsas and the various types tortillas. Within the classic tacos section there’s everything from stewed pork rib tacos served on a bed of rice atop a corn tortilla, sweet pork belly and duck varieties, to Michoacan-style carnitas tacos, while in the original section Olvera gets creative with variations including kobe beef tostadas, lobster gringas, fish chorizo tacos, and one with green bean and peanut.
Unlike Tacopedia, which is as much a food travel guide, reference book and historical tome as it is a recipe book, Sunny Days Taco Nights is all about making tacos, with a double page spread and beautiful photography (courtesy of photographer Araceli Paz) devoted to each recipe.
In the press blurb, Sunny Days Taco Nights is described as an ‘invaluable compendium for the home cook’, and it is. But more than that is a beautiful reminder of the intricacies and diversity of what is one of the world’s great dishes.
Sunny Days Taco Nights
Enrique Olvera
Number of pages: 223
Must-try dish: Brussels sprout tacos (tacos de col de Bruselas)
Publication date: 1 June
Publisher and price: Phaidon, £29.95