Destination
Puerto Vallarta
The story
The piedrazo is Puebla's most divisive street snack — a name that literally means "a hit with a stone," a reference to the hard, dry, stale-tortilla base that gives the dish its distinctive crunch. Stale corn tortillas, dried out to the point of tortilla-chip-hardness, are soaked in a fierce vinegar brine seasoned with chile powder, oregano and salt. Onto the softened tortilla base are piled shredded lettuce or cabbage, chopped radish, cucumber, pickled cactus (nopales curtidos), pig's-foot pieces (pata de cerdo, cooked and pickled), and a shower of more chile powder. What arrives on the plate is a wet, sour, spicy, crunchy, cold plate of contradictions — and it's a favourite of the Puebla street-market Sunday crowd.
Method
If not using pre-stale tortillas: preheat oven to 100C. Lay corn tortillas in a single layer on a baking sheet and dry 25 to 30 minutes until they crack when snapped and feel firm. Cool on a rack.
Combine vinegar, water, chile powder, oregano, salt, cumin, bay leaves and sugar in a small pot. Bring to a simmer, cook 3 minutes to marry the flavours. Cool to room temperature.
Chop the cooked pig's foot into 2cm pieces. Combine with vinegar, chile, oregano and salt in a bowl. Toss and leave at least 30 minutes.
Shred the cabbage, slice the radishes, cucumber and red onion. Drain the pickled cactus. Have everything ready before you assemble.
Pour the cooled brine into a wide shallow dish. Soak each dried tortilla in the brine for 30 seconds — just enough to soften without falling apart. Lift onto plates, 2 per plate.
Onto each brine-softened tortilla, pile: a small mound of shredded cabbage, a scatter of radish and cucumber slices, some pickled cactus, a few slices of red onion, and a couple of pieces of pickled pig's foot if using.
Spoon a small pool of the leftover brine over each stack — you want the toppings to sit in a shallow puddle of the spiced vinegar. Dust with extra chile powder.
Serve immediately with lime wedges. Piedrazos are a fork-and-knife dish or a very-messy-hands dish. Best eaten with a cold Poblano lager.
Tips
- Fully dry the tortillas. A tortilla that's still slightly pliable won't crunch the way a piedrazo should. Oven-dry at low heat until it snaps.
- Don't over-soak. Thirty seconds in the brine softens the tortilla just enough. Any longer and it falls apart on the plate.
- Chile piquín is the classical chile. This tiny, hot, fruity chile powder is sold at Latino grocers as chile piquín or chile pequín. Tajín is the closest supermarket substitute but sweeter and lime-flavoured.
- Pig's foot is optional. The vegetarian version — extra pickled cactus, more radish, more cucumber — is entirely respectable and served at plenty of Puebla stands.
- Serve immediately. Piedrazos are not a hold-over dish. Assemble the moment you plate them; a piedrazo sitting for 10 minutes turns to mush.
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