The aguachile, the Mexican dish that conquered Rosalía

2023-04-05T18:44:03.434Z

Three chefs specialized in seafood give their advice to the singer, who asked for help to prepare it. These are her story and her recipes, with one premise: nothing to do with ceviche

A shrimp aguachile.Alexander Suastegui

“Hello, does anyone have the recipe for the shrimp aguachile?

Diossss, it's great, I discovered it on this last trip to Mexico and it would be a dream to learn how to do it, is it difficult??

The message, posted on Twitter, turned on social networks in Mexico on Tuesday.

In a matter of minutes, Rosalía received an endless list of aguachile recipes.

Some included ingredients such as a clove of garlic, something that is not usual in that dish.

Hello, does anyone have the recipe for the shrimp aguachile? Godssss, it's delicious. I discovered it on this last trip to Mexico and it would be a dream to learn how to make it. Is it difficult?

💚🍋🥑🍤

— ROSALÍA (@rosalia) April 4, 2023

Aguachile is a dish that Mexicans born in the west of the country love and defend, because there is always someone who says: "It's like a ceviche, right?"

No, it's not like a ceviche.

That delicacy of almost raw shrimp seasoned with chili, lime, salt and pepper, topped with a bit of sliced cucumber and filleted red onion is much simpler than ceviche.

It seems easy to prepare, but there are certain important details that make it unique, or make it a terrible and watery porridge, with an acid taste, impossible to eat.

Three chefs specialized in seafood advise the singer

Tomás Bermúdez, the chef and partner of La Docena, a restaurant originally from Guadalajara, is not a purist and believes that the recipe can vary.

“I know so many, for example, the cilantro and serrano chile aguachile, the one with black sauces, one with hot sauce and lemon, or the tatemado from La Docena.”

This chef's roasted aguachile is peculiar, because the dressing has roasted or roasted green tomato, and that gives it an unparalleled smoky touch.

For Bermúdez, there is only one rule: “the base is spicy”, but he explains that “aguachile is not only made from shrimp: the one with scallops is crazy, with those Sonora tripe that looks like you are biting into an apple ”.

Of course, if it is done with shrimp, these must be used in a butterfly cut.

To make it clear, they are cut in half along the spine and are joined by the belly,

Chef Alexander Suastegui specializes in the gastronomy of northeastern Mexico.

She believes that an aguachile can go bad "if the acidity, salt and spiciness are not well balanced."

Suastegui recently opened Costela in the Mexican capital, a laid-back restaurant where she has her own version of this dish.

“I really like making black aguachile.

It has a black chiltepin sauce, blue shrimp from Sinaloa [from sustainable fishing], cucumber, purple onion, a touch of olive oil and cilantro.”

Chiltepin is one of the mandatory ingredients in aguachile.

It is a common chile in various parts of Latin America, but it is essential in the gastronomy of various northern states of Mexico: it has the shape and size of a pea, which when young is green,

but it is generally consumed when it has reached maturity and turns red.

And beware, it's super spicy!

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It is not known which version Rosalía tried, but there are three common versions: the green aguachile, which usually has serrano chili and coriander;

red, which is the most traditional because it has chiltepin, which gives it its red color;

and the black one, which is usually very, very, very spicy —and a Mexican says this— and to which Maggi or English sauce and habanero peppers are sometimes added.

Both Suastegui and Bermúdez remember that shrimp must be fresh and of very good quality, this is important because seafood is eaten practically raw, and a good product guarantees not having to go to the emergency room.

Precisely the good shrimp points to the origin of the dish.

Both chefs point out that the aguachile was created in Sinaloa, a Mexican state on the Pacific coast, better known as El Chapo, but with one of the tastiest cuisines in the country.

Keys of the aguachile

Aguachile bears one of its key qualities in its name: the seafood is marinated in a lemon-chili aguita that makes anyone salivate.

And perhaps this “little water” tells its origin.

Alex Zárate is the chef of Campobaja, a Baja California-style seafood restaurant, and affirms that, “this dish was originally eaten by the indigenous communities of the northeast, but instead of using shellfish and lemon, they used venison crushed, boiled in water with touches of chiltepin”.

For an aguachile to be delicious, the shrimp must be crispy when you bite into it, and that can only be achieved by doing it right away.

And another infallible proof that the aguachile is delicious is that you are not going to allow them to take away the dish until you savor the last drop of that spicy aguita.

Zárate says that the best he has tasted in his life are from Sonora and Sinaloa, "they both blew my brains out";

Suastegui does not forget one that he ate in Sonora, “in a place called Mariscos La Torre 2″;

And to balance the scales, Bermúdez believes that there are no better aguachiles than those from the seafood carts of Culiacán and Los Mochis, both cities in Sinaloa.

Rosalía mentioned a “Godssss, it's great”, however, Bermúdez goes a little further and says that this dish has an almost magical quality: “The special thing about an aguachile is that feeling of curing your pain at the first bite, like you covers flavor and texture;

it is acidic, spicy and rich”.