Mexican Made Easy

June 13, 2011
Valladolid, host of the Food Network's Mexican Made Easy, is a Tijuana native who commuted across the border daily to attend school. She is now a single mom to a "very impatient" six-year-old, so she understands the dilemma that dinner-preparing moms face nightly ("it's gotta be good, and it's gotta be quick"), offering 100 simplified, flavor-rich, crowd-pleasing recipes of Mexican classics, such as a tortilla soup; roasted chicken tostadas; spiced turkey breast with chocolate pasilla sauce (an easier version of mole sauce); creamy Mexican corn; and Victor's Caesar salad (the Caesar is said to have been invented in Tijuana). The book would feel more authentic without such entries as pasilla Bolognese spaghetti and a Mexican version of macaroni and cheese, but those dishesâalong with desserts like chocolate bread pudding and chocolate pecan pieâare sure to appeal to a wide audience, even though they have a little more spice than standard American fare.