So we are on holiday this week, which means a bit of a change in terms of shopping and eating.
We’re staying at our family holiday house which has a fabulous kitchen, so we tend to eat most meals in. However as it’s a 12 hour drive from where we live, we don’t tend to bring a lot of the food-comforts of home. And we can’t take a lot home.
Which means careful shopping, and usually a few culinary shortcuts.
One of these was buying a tub of guacamole to have with corn chips while sitting on the front deck admiring the view. Now normally I would make my own as it takes about three minutes. If that.
However the supermarket (yep, a holiday concession) didn’t have any ready to eat or reasonably priced avos, and so I weakened. I’d also been in the car since 1am, and it was now noon. And I was hungry. Never shop when you’re hungry. Or massively sleep deprived.
I weakened.
Today I thought mmm. Corn chips. Mmmm. Guacamole. Mmmm.
I opened the tub of guacamole. The tub I chose because it screamed “Fresh Guacamole” and “No Preservatives”. Yay. Stupidly I didn’t read the back of the label (blaming sleep deprivation for that. And hunger). The part that said avocado 50%. And listed cream cheese in the ingredients list. Um. WHAT!?! Cream cheese DOES NOT BELONG IN GUAC. Not to mention all other crap on the label. Sigh. At least I learnt from this.
It looks pretty good doesn’t it!
But it’s not. Just look at ALL THOSE AWFUL INGREDIENTS 🙁 And um, 20 serves? Give me a break. More like 2. Maybe 3.
My easy peasy guacamole recipe is sooo simple.
I’ll be hunting down some ripe avocados tomorrow. And I don’t even care if I have to pay $3 each. As long as they are ripe.
THE BEST guacamole. And so easy peasy.
What you need
- 3 ripe avocados
- 1/2 a small red onion, finely minced
- 1 clove of garlic, finely minced
- about a tablespoon of finely chopped coriander
- juice of 1 fresh lime - add half to start and more to taste (not that nasty stuff in a bottle)
- a splash of tabasco (optional and to taste)
- generous pinch of salt
What you do
- Remove the skin and stones from the avocados and place in a bowl.
- Add all other ingredients and roughly mash together.
- Taste and add more lime, tabasco and salt to taste.
- Pop in the fridge for a couple of hours then taste again, adding more lime, tabasco and salt if needed.
- Eat with corn chips.
- Mmmm.
So this is my recipe. Very simple. No tomato. No green capsicum. Definitely NO CREAM CHEESE.
How do you make your guacamole?
Don’t beat yourself up about this – we all take shortcuts sometimes and some days they are more successful than others.
At least hubby will eat it so I don’t have to bin it!
I’m with Amanda, don’t beat yourself up about it…. I did wonder why you’d bought some when you’e such a wonderful cook, this post is great, Mel. Home made guacamole is the best and, as you say, so very simple. Love your recipe xo
Thanks Lizzy. I had loads of people asking what possessed me to make that purchase so I figured I should explain 🙂
Oh I hear you, I have made that mistake a few times myself.
Sometimes its depressing to think that so many people buy this kind of stuff. No wonder they rave when you cook the simplest things. They are not used to fresh good food. Its hard when you want to take a break isnt it?
I always make my own, or have none at all: see, I’ve made THE MISTAKE previously! I do like to include much the same ingredients as your recipe, with quite a lot of chopped coriander (including stems) plus chopped fresh tomato and red capsicum. Even cucumber sometimes. Makes it go further, gets more veg into the kids and tastes yum. Hope you ahd a relaxing holiday Mel.