Chef Lupita
Almendrado Oaxaqueño con Pollo
Oaxaca's eighth mole, the silky, almond-and-cinnamon almendrado, served over poached chicken. Mild, sweet, restrained, and a quiet rebuttal to anyone who thinks Mexican food has to be hot to be Mexican.
Culinary Explorer
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Cecina Enchilada con Frijoles y Plátano Macho
Created by
Oaxaca's adobo-rubbed thin pork seared hot and quick on the comal, served the way the Valles Centrales serves it: with black beans from the olla, fried plátano macho, avocado, queso fresco, and warm tortillas on the side.
Main Dishes
Mexican
Comfort Food
Special Occasion
Weeknight
30 min
Active Time
2 hr cook•2 hr 30 min total
Yield4 to 6 servings
This is from Oaxaca. Specifically from the Valles Centrales, where cecina enchilada hangs in the carnicería stalls of the Mercado Benito Juárez and the 20 de Noviembre, sheets of pork dyed deep red from the adobo, drying in the air with the chile aroma drifting halfway across the market. You point at the piece you want, the carnicero weighs it, and you carry it home or you take it across the aisle to the pasillo de las carnes asadas where they grill it for you on the spot.
This is not cecina from Yecapixtla in Morelos, which is salt-cured and pale. Cecina enchilada is a different animal. The enchilada part is not the dish you are thinking of. It means en chile, dressed in chile. Guajillo for color, ancho for sweetness, and costeño, the small chile from the Oaxacan coast, for the bright sting underneath. If you cannot find costeño, the adobo loses something specific to this state. Look for it before you settle for a substitution.
The plate is simple in its parts and serious in its execution. Black beans from the olla with epazote. Plátano macho fried until the sugars caramelize at the edges. Slices of avocado, raw white onion, queso fresco, lime, and a stack of hand-pressed tortillas. This is what comida looks like in an Oaxacan home when the carnicería sent you home with a good piece of cecina. Cada estado, su propia cocina.
My mother never cooked cecina enchilada. She was from Jalisco. The first time I made it was after a week in Oaxaca with a señora named Doña Crescencia who ran a comedor in Tlacolula. She had me stand at her comal for two days before she let me put the cecina down on it. The meat is thin, she told me, the chile sugars burn fast, and if you cook it like a steak you have ruined it. Lay it down. Wait. Flip it once. Pull it off. La cocina no es decoración, es trabajo.
Cecina is a preservation tradition that traveled to Mexico from Spain, where the word originally referred to dried, salt-cured beef from regions like León. In Mexico the technique split into two distinct lineages: the salt-cured cecina of Yecapixtla in Morelos, which preserved the original Spanish form, and the cecina enchilada of Oaxaca and the Mixteca, which married the European drying method to the indigenous chile-based adobos that had seasoned meats in Mesoamerica for centuries. The Oaxacan version owes its identity to the chile costeño, a small, bright-red chile cultivated along the state's Pacific coast and rarely found outside Oaxaca's domestic markets, which gives the adobo a heat and sharpness that distinguishes it from the milder marinades of central Mexico. The pasillo de las carnes asadas in the Mercado 20 de Noviembre, where buyers select cecina at the carnicería and have it grilled on the spot at communal comales, has operated in roughly its current form since the mid-20th century and remains one of the clearest living examples of market-to-table eating in Mexico.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
pork leg or sirloin
Quantity
1 1/2 pounds
butterflied or pounded into thin sheets about 1/4 inch thick
dried chile guajillo
Quantity
6
stemmed and seeded
dried chile ancho
Quantity
3
stemmed and seeded
dried chile costeño
Quantity
2
stemmed and seeded
garlic cloves (for adobo)
Quantity
4
peeled
Mexican oregano (preferably oregano de monte from Oaxaca)
Quantity
1 teaspoon
ground cumin
Quantity
1/2 teaspoon
whole cloves
Quantity
4
black peppercorns
Quantity
1/4 teaspoon
apple cider vinegar
Quantity
2 tablespoons
kosher salt (for adobo)
Quantity
1 tablespoon, plus more to taste
lard (manteca de cerdo), for searing
Quantity
2 tablespoons
dried black beans (frijol negro de Oaxaca, ideally)
Quantity
1 pound
white onion (for beans)
Quantity
1 medium
halved
garlic cloves (for beans)
Quantity
4
smashed
fresh epazote
Quantity
2 sprigs
lard (manteca de cerdo), for the beans
Quantity
2 tablespoons
kosher salt (for beans)
Quantity
to taste
plátano macho (very yellow with black spots)
Quantity
2 ripe
lard or refined coconut oil, for frying the plantain
Quantity
3 tablespoons
Hass avocados
Quantity
2 ripe
sliced
queso fresco (optional)
Quantity
1/2 cup
crumbled
small white onion (for serving) (optional)
Quantity
1
finely diced
fresh cilantro leaves (optional)
Quantity
for serving
lime wedges (optional)
Quantity
for serving
hand-pressed corn tortillas (optional)
Quantity
for serving
warmed
salsa de chile pasilla oaxaqueño (optional)
Quantity
for serving
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| pork leg or sirloinbutterflied or pounded into thin sheets about 1/4 inch thick | 1 1/2 pounds |
| dried chile guajillostemmed and seeded | 6 |
| dried chile anchostemmed and seeded | 3 |
| dried chile costeñostemmed and seeded | 2 |
| garlic cloves (for adobo)peeled | 4 |
| Mexican oregano (preferably oregano de monte from Oaxaca) | 1 teaspoon |
| ground cumin | 1/2 teaspoon |
| whole cloves | 4 |
| black peppercorns | 1/4 teaspoon |
| apple cider vinegar | 2 tablespoons |
| kosher salt (for adobo) | 1 tablespoon, plus more to taste |
| lard (manteca de cerdo), for searing | 2 tablespoons |
| dried black beans (frijol negro de Oaxaca, ideally) | 1 pound |
| white onion (for beans)halved | 1 medium |
| garlic cloves (for beans)smashed | 4 |
| fresh epazote | 2 sprigs |
| lard (manteca de cerdo), for the beans | 2 tablespoons |
| kosher salt (for beans) | to taste |
| plátano macho (very yellow with black spots) | 2 ripe |
| lard or refined coconut oil, for frying the plantain | 3 tablespoons |
| Hass avocadossliced | 2 ripe |
| queso fresco (optional)crumbled | 1/2 cup |
| small white onion (for serving) (optional)finely diced | 1 |
| fresh cilantro leaves (optional) | for serving |
| lime wedges (optional) | for serving |
| hand-pressed corn tortillas (optional)warmed | for serving |
| salsa de chile pasilla oaxaqueño (optional) | for serving |
Equipment Needed
- •Cast iron comal or heavy 12-inch skillet for searing the cecina
- •Clay olla de barro or 6-quart heavy pot for the beans
- •High-powered blender for the adobo
- •Fine-mesh strainer
- •Heavy 10-inch skillet for the plantain
- •Meat mallet or the flat side of a heavy knife if pounding the pork yourself
Instructions
- 1
Cook the black beans
Rinse the black beans and pick out any stones or shriveled ones. Place them in a heavy clay olla or a stockpot with the halved onion, smashed garlic, and one tablespoon of lard. Cover with cold water by three inches. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat and cook uncovered for one and a half to two hours, until the beans are tender all the way through and the broth is dark and glossy. Add the epazote and salt only in the last twenty minutes. Salt too early and the skins toughen. Asi se hace y punto.
If you have a clay olla de barro, use it. The bean broth tastes different out of clay. It is not your imagination. The mineral content of the clay rounds the flavor. - 2
Toast the chiles
While the beans simmer, heat a dry comal over medium. Toast the guajillo, ancho, and costeño chiles separately, pressing them flat with a spatula for about 20 seconds per side. They should puff and turn fragrant. The costeño is small and thin and burns the fastest. Watch it. Burned chile is bitter chile and there is no recovering from it later.
- 3
Build the adobo
Place the toasted chiles in a heatproof bowl and cover with hot tap water. Hot, not boiling. Soak for 20 minutes until pliable. Drain. On the same comal, lightly toast the cloves and peppercorns until they smell awake, about 30 seconds. Combine the soaked chiles, garlic, oregano, cumin, toasted spices, vinegar, salt, and 1/2 cup of the chile soaking liquid in a blender. Blend until completely smooth and the color of dark brick. Pass it through a fine-mesh sieve. The adobo should coat a spoon thickly. If it is too loose, the meat will not hold the marinade.
- 4
Marinate the cecina
Lay the thin sheets of pork on a tray. Slather the adobo over both sides of each piece with your hands. Every inch should be coated. Stack the pieces with the adobo between them, cover, and refrigerate for at least four hours, ideally overnight. In Oaxaca's mercados, the carniceros hang the cecina enchilada in the open air for a few hours so the surface dries and the chile sets into the meat. If you have time and a clean rack, do that for the last hour before cooking.
If your butcher cannot butterfly the pork thin enough, lay each piece between two sheets of plastic and pound it with the flat side of a heavy knife or a meat mallet. You want it close to a quarter inch. Thicker than that and it stops being cecina. - 5
Fry the plátano macho
Peel the plantains and slice them on a sharp diagonal about half an inch thick. They should be very yellow with black spots, not green. Green plantain is for tostones. Ripe plantain is for this plate. Heat the lard in a heavy skillet over medium heat. Fry the slices in a single layer for about two minutes per side, until the edges turn deep amber and the sugars caramelize into a sticky, dark crust. Transfer to a plate. Do not crowd the pan or they will steam instead of fry.
- 6
Sear the cecina on the comal
Heat a cast iron comal or a heavy skillet over medium-high until it is very hot. Add a thin film of lard. Lay one or two pieces of cecina down at a time, depending on the size of your comal. They cook fast, about 90 seconds per side. The adobo will darken and char in spots and the meat will firm up. Do not move it around looking at it. Let it sit, sear, flip once, and pull it off. Cecina is thin meat cooked hot and quick. Treat it like a steak and you will overcook it.
The adobo will smoke. Open a window. The dark spots on the meat are not burned, they are the chile sugars caramelizing. That is the flavor. - 7
Plate and serve
Lay a piece of cecina on each plate, generous and unfussy. Spoon a serving of black beans alongside, broth and all. Add three or four slices of fried plátano macho. Fan the avocado slices next to the beans and scatter queso fresco, raw white onion, and cilantro across the plate. Set lime wedges on the rim. Serve warm corn tortillas on the side wrapped in a servilleta. This is the comida plate of an Oaxaca kitchen on a normal weekday: meat, beans, plantain, avocado, tortillas. Nothing extra and nothing missing. Saber cocinar es saber vivir.
Chef Tips
- •The chile costeño is the chile that makes this Oaxacan and not generic. If you have a Mexican market with a serious chile selection, ask for it by name. If they do not have it, a chile de árbol toasted lightly will give you some of the sting, but you are missing the specific Oaxacan character. Substitution is a compromise, not an upgrade.
- •Buy the pork from a butcher who will butterfly it for you. Pork leg or sirloin works. Tenderloin is too lean and falls apart. The cecina should be one continuous thin sheet, not little medallions. Ask for it cut the way they cut it for milanesa, then a touch thinner.
- •The black beans are not a side dish. They are part of the plate and the broth matters. Cook them in clay if you have a clay olla. Use lard, not oil, and add the epazote at the end. Mexican grandmothers do not improvise on beans.
- •Plátano macho must be very ripe. Yellow skin with heavy black spotting. If it looks like a banana you would eat raw, it is ready. Green plantain has no place on this plate.
Advance Preparation
- •The adobo can be made up to three days ahead and refrigerated. The flavor only deepens.
- •The pork can be marinated in the adobo overnight, ideally for 12 to 24 hours. In Oaxaca, the carnicero hangs it in the air for a few hours so the surface dries before grilling. If you can do that for the last hour before cooking, the sear is better.
- •The black beans can be cooked one day ahead and reheated. The broth thickens overnight, which is a good thing. Add a splash of water if it gets too tight.
- •The plantain should be fried fresh. It does not hold.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 580g)
Calories
1080 calories
Total Fat
40 g
Saturated Fat
13 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
24 g
Cholesterol
110 mg
Sodium
1180 mg
Total Carbohydrates
125 g
Dietary Fiber
28 g
Sugars
15 g
Protein
54 g
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