White sauce at Mexican restaurants

[rede2learn]

Does anyone know how to make the white sauce that accompanies salsa at numerous mexican restaurants? It's like ranch dressing but much thicker and with different seasoning.

 

[mexican mama]

Most mexican white sauce has cheese in it thus the 'white' or light yellow color aka queso blanco most of them are dips for tortilla chips, as well as enchilada sauces. ALso walnut sauce is a popular kind of sauce in Mexican cooking
Walnut sauce
Chile en Nogada - Chiles in Walnut Sauce

This info is very useful
What is Mexican White Sauce?

 

[rede2learn]

The stuff I'm thinking of is not cheesy at all. I do love the queso with chorizo though. This is more sour creamy and served cold.

 

[GB]

It almost sounds like you are describing creme fresh, but that is French, not Mexican.

 

[vagriller]

The stuff I'm thinking of is not cheesy at all. I do love the queso with chorizo though. This is more sour creamy and served cold.

You are talking about the white sauce tha gets served with chips and salsa, not the white cheese sauce that is served over an entree, right? I will try to find a recipe. This is something I want to learn how to make too!

edit: here I found one! Some helpful tips in the reviews too!

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/mexican-white-sauce/detail.aspx

 

[Selkie]

It sounds like:

Baja Sauce

Ingredients:
12 ounces mayonnaise or salad dressing
12 ounces sour cream
1 1/2 cups cilantro leaves
6 jalapenos, seeded and chopped (remember to wear disposable latex gloves)
3 avocados, pitted and pulp extracted
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice

Instructions:
In a food processor, blend cilantro and jalapenos.
Add remaining ingredients and blend.
Keep refrigerated until served.

 

[powerplantop]

I would be curious where people are seeing this. I have never seen it at a mexican place. Sounds interesting but I have not seen it.

 

[vagriller]

I would be curious where people are seeing this. I have never seen it at a mexican place. Sounds interesting but I have not seen it.

I'd never seen it until I moved to the Mid-Atlantic region.

 

[Selkie]

I would be curious where people are seeing this. I have never seen it at a mexican place. Sounds interesting but I have not seen it.

The fusion between Mexican food and Mexican-American food is more of a blur everyday.

Tortilla chips were invented and first mass produced in Los Angeles in the 1940s, but they are now regular Latino fare at nearly every table from the Straits of Magellan to Hudson Bay. (Perhaps a bit of an exaggeration, but you get the idea... never the less, they are popular south of the border all of the way to Chile. )

Fish Tacos are also a product from Southern Calif., but they are now very popular in Mexico!

And for those who have a particular taste in fast food, the menu at Taco Bell only has two or three items of Mexican origin. The rest are American inventions.

So just because you haven't seen Baja Sauce (also a popular American invention, and a sauce used with Fish Tacos) at your local Mexican Restaurant, it doesn't mean it isn't used at many other places. I haven't seen Mole in very many Mexican Restaurants either, but it's a very popular sauce used throughout Central America and the Caribbean.

 

[GB]

I haven't seen Mole in very many Mexican Restaurants either, but it's a very popular sauce used throughout Central America and the Caribbean.

I love how different areas of the same country can be so different from each other. I can not recall ever being in any Mexican restaurant that did not have mole on the menu.

 

[jabbur]

I went to the link for allrecipes and read the reviews. It appears this is a VA thing at Mexican restaurants. Everyone who comments on how it is so much like the stuff they get at their favorite Mexican place is from VA!

 

[rede2learn]

Makes sense that it is a VA thing and so strange to the rest of you. I live in Hampton Roads, which encompasses Williamsburg to VA beach. It does accompany chips and salsa, I didn't realize it wasn't served everywhere or I would have mentioned that.
I love baja sauce, especially when we make fish tacos. I'll have to check out the link.
As always thanks for all the help.

This site is the best!

 

[vagriller]

I love how different areas of the same country can be so different from each other. I can not recall ever being in any Mexican restaurant that did not have mole on the menu.

Mole huh? That taste like chicken?

 

[vagriller]

I went to the link for allrecipes and read the reviews. It appears this is a VA thing at Mexican restaurants. Everyone who comments on how it is so much like the stuff they get at their favorite Mexican place is from VA!

That is funny! And if you go even to Raleigh, NC none of the restaurants there have it either. I wonder if Plaza Azteca started this white sauce trend.

Makes sense that it is a VA thing and so strange to the rest of you. I live in Hampton Roads, which encompasses Williamsburg to VA beach. It does accompany chips and salsa, I didn't realize it wasn't served everywhere or I would have mentioned that.
I love baja sauce, especially when we make fish tacos. I'll have to check out the link.
As always thanks for all the help.

This site is the best!

Well what is your favorite Mexican restaurant? There are a few at the link in my sig, and I'm always looking for new places to add.

And welcome to DC, this site is the best!

 

[rede2learn]

vagriller,

Our favorite mexican place is called "El Rancho." It use to be Cinco de Mayo and had a few locations. We frequented the one in Grafton most Friday nights for about 6 years. Really got to know the staff well. New owners took over up there 3 years ago, but the previous owners opened up in Poquoson. Business was so good that the expanded to a much larger setting a few shops down. They even have a lunch buffet!
If I had to pick one restaurant that was my favorite it would have been the Poquoson Seafood House. The chef that used to be at Cowboy Sids took over their kitchen. The food was always superb! Best she crab soup, clam chowder, seafood marina, seafood alfredo, oyster po boy and on and on. Unfortunately that place is now another Italian place. There are now 3 in town and none can make a decent pizza which is a huge turn off for me. Coming from Pittsburgh I'm very picky about pizza.
Anyway the best place for me right now has to be Little Philly. Best subs I've had in the south. The even used to put fried egg on my cheesesteaks. They stopped serving breakfast so their eggs are in short supply.

Sorry for the rambling but I love food.

 

[babetoo]

Mole huh? That taste like chicken?

i find how the same dish will move from culture to culture to be endless interesting. each puts it stamp on it. try sometimes to follow a dish and see how it is done in another country. the taco or tamale comes to mind. flat bread is another. i could cite more but you get the idea.

 

[Silversage]

Could you be referring to crema, a Mexican sour cream similar to creme fraiche? It's often used as a cooling balance to the spicy food. Maybe they're just spicing it up a bit.

Like you, GB, I've never seen a Mexican restaurant without mole on the menu. After all, it was the Aztecs who first cultivated cacao.

And fish tacos originated in Baja California, where the diet has always been heavily dependent on seafood, and which is in Mexico.

 

[powerplantop]

The fusion between Mexican food and Mexican-American food is more of a blur everyday.

That I will agree with. Even within Mexico you will find variation. I still want to try Arab tacos.

Fish Tacos are also a product from Southern Calif., but they are now very popular in Mexico!

Fish taco's are from Baja not CA. To be the real thing they come with cabage. (Cabage last longer in the heat than lettuce.)

So just because you haven't seen Baja Sauce (also a popular American invention, and a sauce used with Fish Tacos) at your local Mexican Restaurant, it doesn't mean it isn't used at many other places. I haven't seen Mole in very many Mexican Restaurants either, but it's a very popular sauce used throughout Central America and the Caribbean.

In the US (not counting Mexico) I have had Mexican food in CA, OR, WA, TX, AR, LA, MN, NY, FL, IA, NC, SC, GA, AZ, NM, OK, and IL so far I have never been served a Baja sauce with my chips. But usually I am in Mexican places where English may or may not be spoken, and I don't speak Spanish.

 

[Selkie]

...Fish taco's are from Baja not CA. To be the real thing they come with cabage. (Cabage last longer in the heat than lettuce.)...so far I have never been served a Baja sauce with my chips. But usually I am in Mexican places where English may or may not be spoken, and I don't speak Spanish.

If you're talking about Rubios Fresh Mexican Grill, on the Baja Penninsula, fish tacos didn't come from them originally. Rubio's actually began in San Diego in the 1980s, but picked up the idea of fish tacos from a local sandwich shop.

I never said Baja sauce was served with chips.

 

[Selkie]

I will concede that originally: "...it used to be something you'd get from a few sketchy vendors with little carts down in Baja, Mexico - a very good thing. These are Baja style with a piece of fried fish, shredded cabbage, a white yogurt sauce, and hot sauce on a small corn tortilla. They were originally made with the traditional shark, but as word spread that sharks were endangered, they switched to other fish."

And from what I can glean, American fishermen and surfers brought the idea back to So. Calif., and that tasty creation exploded in sandwich shops and food vendors along the entire southern coast.