Known for his intense and vibrant cooking style, described as Baja’s coastal brightness meets the depth of the Sonoran Desert, Wes Avila has created a stellar menu at Hecho Libre, an artful and stylish restaurant at the newly renovated Kimpton Miralina Resort & Villas in Scottsdale.
Avila, author of “Guerilla Tacos: Recipes from the Streets of L.A.,” transformed his successful street cart into a brick-and-mortar restaurant in L.A.’s Arts District, winning accolades and awards and propelling his assertive, flavorful culinary take into an international restaurant career.
‘‘Hecho Libre means made free,” says Avila, who twice was a James Beard Award finalist. “It’s about freedom in cooking, honoring tradition but also creating your own path. We wanted to marry that idea with the spirit of the Sonoran Desert.’’
When Cassie Hepler and I met Avila at Hecho Libre, he was getting ready to leave for PIOPIKO, his restaurant in Kyoto, Japan. But Avila always has time to chat, spending time with us talking about the menu items at Hecho Libre and what to try. So, of course we did.
Among those stellar dishes were Frijoles Charros, Chiles Veneno—bacon wrapped chile Guero peppers stuffed with carnitas, cheese and frijoles charros and then brushed with guajillo honey, Halibut Veracruzana—pan-seared Pacific halibut, roasted tomato, sliced onion, garlic, peppers, olives, and capers, Yellowtail Aguachile with red onion, Asian pear, cucumber, and avocado, Jumbo Garlic Prawns which Cassie rightly compared to succulent lobster meat, and The Cowboy, a 26 ounce K-4 ranch bone-in ribeye with grilled scallions and salsa macha.
If you can’t get to one of his restaurants any time soon, here’s Avila’s recipe for Roasted Tomatillo Salsa.
“Tomatillos can be used raw or prepared in one of many ways – roasting, boiling, simmering. That way I like to do them is roasting them over fire – especially if you have an open fire-pit outdoors. You can make makeshift an open fire-pit indoors with a grate placed over gas stove burner, then give some color to your tomatillos. This recipe specifically uses oven-roasted tomatillos for ease of preparation. Use fresh or store refrigerated for one week.”
Ingredients
- 1 pound tomatillos, husked, rinsed, and halved if larger than a silver dollar
- 1/2 cup sliced yellow or white onion
- 2 garlic cloves, peeled
- 1 serrano chile, stemmed
- 1 poblano chile, stemmed, seeded, and sliced
- Vegetable oil for drizzling
- Kosher salt
- Juice from 2 limes
Place a rack at the highest possible position in your oven and preheat the broiler.
Put the tomatillos, onion, garlic, and both chiles on a large baking sheet. Drizzle lightly with vegetable oil, season with salt, and gently toss with your hands to lightly coat the vegetables. Broil for 10 minutes, remove from the oven and toss the vegetables once with a spatula, then broil for another 5 minutes. You’re looking for the vegetables to be nicely roasted and slightly blackened in spots.
Slide the contents of the baking sheet into a food processor and pulse until chunky but not liquified or fully blended. There should be chunks of the chiles and flecks of roasted skin. Add the lime juice and pulse once more to incorporate. Season with salt. Use fresh or refrigerate for up to one week.
