SHITACOS!

Here is my good mate Alice chillin' on some toadstools in Central Park. She was once wisely told the following:
"My dear, here we must run as fast as we can, just to stay in place. And if you wish to go anywhere you must run twice as fast as that"."But I don’t want to go among mad people," Alice remarked."Oh, you can’t help that," said the Cat: "we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.""How do you know I’m mad?" said Alice."You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."

My love affair with tacos began in this magnificent city (New York) on a blistering hot summer's day in the grounds of the Old Tobbaco Warehouse, a stunning red brick ruin, in DUMBO. I was here doing a J1 and as luck would have it, I landed a job on my second day working for Choncho's Tacos at the Brooklyn Flea Market. The menu was simple and so flippin' delicious (2 fish options, 1 Chicken option, and all of the coriander!) To say that I fell hard for these little delectable pockets is an understatement. Needless to say, I have eaten my body weight in tacos since I returned 3 weeks ago. In this patchwork quilt of cultures and cuisines I found myself living a few subway stops from a taco factory who make, package, sell and eat their corn tortillas in full sight, on an assembly line, beside your table.  Praise the lord!  It is unassuming, kitch, dimmly lit with red lights, decorated with Virgin Mary's,  incredibly cheap and altogether bizarre! The fire behind my love of tacos has been well and truly reignited. And so, I have decided that my first recipe shall be an ode to my last summer spent here and a good way to kick start this new chapter in a city where there is always an abundance of new food, places and people to experience. 

Ideally, I would have bought the mushrooms at the farmer's market in Union Square which I pass EVERYDAY and I would have made the short trip to the taco factory to buy the tortillas. Ideally. But alas, the past few days have been rather hectic, what with starting a new job in a cheeseshop (yay!) and coming up to Thanksgiving...and having one too many beers last night. Sooooooo, here's how I actually gathered my ingredients:

1) Went to nearby supermarket only to find they had only pickeld mushrooms and 1 box of tortillas which was sitting in a pool of water underneath a leak (see photo on the right also featuring my finger)
2) Left said supermarket and trekked to another, fully stocked,  higher priced store.
3) Found mushrooms.
4) Rejoiced.
5) Spent 5 minutes debating whether 'spicy spanish sausage' meant chorizo.
6) Decided to risk it and threw said sausage into basket laden down with shitakes.
7) Got to checkout and remembered that my roommate, Ciara, had asked me to surprise her with 'a little savoury treat'. Cracked under the pressure and threw an energy bar amongst my purchases. Oops.
8) It was 12 already at this stage and was in need of coffee. So, forgetting how bad I am at multitasking (even simple things like walking whilst holding a cup are a struggle) I got a coffee en route home.
9) Accidentally made eye contact with a man in a truck who proceeded to roll down his window and scream 'Are you Ukrainean? Cause yo hot, girl!' which NATURALLY sent me into a fluster causing me to spill my coffee down my top. (Fun fact: I'm not Ukrainean but was most definitely hot from the scalding coffee on my skin)
10) Made it back to my front door and realised that there's a small shop 2 doors down that sells ALL of what I needed. 

After my not so successful morning, I then made some well earned Mushroom Tacos which I'm coining 'Shitacos' cause they're made with shitake mushrooms. And plus, its fun to say.

Here's how it goes:

Ingreedyents:
Splish splash of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Salt'n'Pepper
(Oooh a honey) honey
10 Corn Tortillas
15ish Shitake Mushrooms ( I chose these cause I always think their texture is kinda meaty. But obviously also add actual meat)
5 Chorizo Sausages
1 Large White Onion
1 large knob of Truffle butter (cause when it comes to butter I'm a princess)
Grated Parmesan

And here's how this:

Became this:

1) CTC (chop the chorizo)

2) FTC (fry the chorizo)
3) Stop using acronyms and get back to cooking.
4) Finely chop the onion. Cry a little in the process. Also chop the shitakes into slender strips. Cry here too if you're not emotionally cleansed.
5) Pop the truffle butter in a pan and when that's all melty and stuff add the onions. Season with salt and pepper.
6) Then add the sexy shitakes for approximately 7 minutes of heaven.
7) Whilst all this madness is happening pop the tortillas in the oven to warm up.
8) Drizzle a smidge of honey over the chorizo.
9) When all of this is, as the wise R Kelly would say 'hot'n'fresh out tha kitchen' you can assemble the tacos and sprinkle (and by sprinkle I mean smother) with parmesan.
10) Eat.