Garlic Butter Enrichment

Ajo Preparado

Preparation info
  • Makes about

    ¾ cup

    • Difficulty

      Easy

Appears in
Zarela's Veracruz: Mexico's Simplest Cuisine

By Zarela Martínez

Published 2001

  • About

Many cooks in the port city and throughout Sotavento — the prime fish and seafood areas of Veracruz state —swear by a sauce enrichment consisting of pureed garlic cooked in butter. Sometimes onion is added as well. People make up the mixture, or buy a prepackaged version that I’ve seen at street markets, and add it to all sorts of prepared seafood dishes to give an extra dimension.

My recipe is based on a formula used by Tomasita Meléndez at the restaurant Las Brisas del Mar in Boca