Aguachile is a cold dish that is a perfect summer lunch for the upcoming hot days. It’s healthy and fresh, full of strong flavors and contrast textures.
Aguachile could be translated as “chile water” and it gives you a huge hint on the presentation of this recipe.
It’s lime marinated shrimp in a watery sauce of peppers/chile. It’s accompanied by cucumber, purple onions, and avocado. It resembles a lot a Peruvian shrimp ceviche but the technique -and of course flavor- is different. This is more refreshing and, in Mexico, aguachile is often consumed at the beach.
How to make an authentic aguachile ?
A great
These shrimps will be soaked in lime juice to “cook” them with the acid. This is the same technique that is used when making ceviche.
Another thing that a good Mexican aguachile has is different textures like purple onions and cucumbers that give you a nice crunch in every bite.
The spicy factor is made of two types of chile/pepper: chile serrano and chile habanero.
The habanero pepper is one of the spiciest peppers out there so I will reduce the amount to 1 small habanero pepper —- or ½ regular size. Also, make sure to clean and deseed the pepper before using it. The spiciest part of a pepper/chile is in the seeds, so be careful. This habanero will be thinly cut into teeny tiny pieces.
On the other hand, serrano peppers have a gentle heat and for that reason, I will use 2 to create the emblematic “chile water”.
This is the most representative part of an authentic Mexican
To make this “water” you need to blend the lime juice, where previously we macerated the shrimp to “cook” them, with coriander, garlic, and the serrano peppers. This will create a green and watery sauce where the rest of the ingredients will be added.
