Agua de Pitaya Yucateca

This is from Yucatán. The pitaya that makes it is not the Asian dragon fruit you see in supermarket displays. It is the fruit of the pitahaya cactus that grows wild and cultivated across the peninsula, magenta-fleshed, full of tiny black seeds, in season from late May through August and then gone until next year.

You will see this agua in every sorbetería and lonchería from Mérida to Valladolid during the summer months. It sits in tall glass jarras on the counter, neon-pink against the white tile, sweating in the heat. The women who make it do not measure. They scoop the pulp, they pour the water, they squeeze the lima agria that grows in their own patios, and they sweeten it just enough to bring the fruit forward without burying it. The lima agria is the detail that makes this Yucateco and not generic. Regular lime is sharper and one-note. Lima agria is fragrant, almost floral, with a bitter edge that the fruit needs to balance the sweetness.

My mother did not make this. She was from Jalisco and pitaya did not grow there the same way. I learned this agua from a woman named Doña Ofelia who has run a juice stand inside the Mercado Lucas de Galvez in Mérida for over forty years. She told me two things and made me write them down: do not strain the seeds, and do not over-sweeten. The fruit is the show. Everything else is support. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.

If you cannot find pitaya right now because it is not the season, do not make this. Make agua de jamaica or agua de tamarindo instead. Mexican grandmothers cook with what the mercado is selling today.