Panuchos

As tradition built it

Panuchos

Serves 8. About 2 hours 30 minutes, plus the pollo pibil.

Ingredients

The beans

• 720ml black beans, cooked, with a little of their broth
• 12 leaves epazote

The onion

• 1 red onion, finely sliced
• 360ml white vinegar
• to taste salt
• 2, optional chiles habaneros

The panuchos

• 500g corn tortillas, freshly made with a little lard and salt
• 120ml lard or oil
• as needed pollo pibil, shredded

To finish

• 1 romaine lettuce, chopped
• 2 tomatoes, sliced

Method

1. Blend the beans with the epazote and a little of their broth to a very thick paste.
2. Rinse the onion in hot water, drain it, and put it in the vinegar with salt to taste and the habaneros if you use them.
3. The tortillas must puff. Cook each on a hot comal without fat, turn it when it lets go, and press it lightly so it swells and makes an air pocket.
4. Lift the thin top skin of each tortilla, the telita. Spread bean paste inside and lay the telita back over it.
5. Heat the lard in a pan or cazuela and fry each panucho until lightly golden. Drain off the fat.
6. Top each with a little pollo pibil, lettuce, tomato and the pickled onion.

Notes

The recipe is Alicia Gironella's, from Larousse de la cocina mexicana, with the puffing of the tortilla from Excélsior's recipe, which Gironella takes as given. Excélsior dresses the onion in sour orange with oregano and rests it 30 minutes, fills with strained refried beans, uses turkey or chicken in escabeche or recado rojo, and adds cucumber and avocado.

What a modern chef changes

Dehydrated masa, chinois-smoothed beans, sous vide confit topping

Method

1. Dehydrate the masa briefly before pressing, for a tortilla that fries to a crisper, more even shell with less oil absorption than a fresh-pressed dough gives.
2. Pass the frijol colado through a chinois after blending for a properly smooth, pipeable filling rather than one with the fibrous skins a coarser strain leaves in.
3. Confit the shredded turkey sous vide in a little of its own fat and stock beforehand, for a topping that stays moist against the crisp base.