Chef Lupita
Atole Agrio de la Mixteca
Oaxaca's Mixteca region ferments nixtamalized masa for days until it turns tart and alive, then simmers it with piloncillo and canela into a thick, warm atole served at first light in clay.
Culinary Explorer
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Chilaquiles de Frijol Negro Oaxaqueños
Created by
Oaxaca's morning chilaquiles built on pureed black beans fried in asiento with epazote and avocado leaf, topped with a fried egg, threads of quesillo, and crema. The breakfast that proves beans are a complete cuisine.
Breakfast & Brunch
Mexican
Weeknight
Budget Friendly
Comfort Food
20 min
Active Time
30 min cook•50 min total
Yield4 servings
This is an Oaxacan breakfast. Not the red chilaquiles you find all over Mexico City, not the green ones from Puebla. In Oaxaca, the sauce is black bean. Frijol negro pureed with its own broth, fried in asiento until it darkens and thickens into something that coats the back of a wooden spoon and holds a fried tortilla without drowning it. That's the dish. That's the whole argument.
Asiento is what sets this apart from any chilaquiles you've had outside the state. It's the dark, concentrated sediment that settles at the bottom of the pot when manteca de cerdo is rendered, sold by weight at the mercados in Oaxaca de Juarez, scooped into plastic bags by women who know exactly what it's worth. Because it is worth knowing. Asiento carries a deeper, more roasted pork flavor than clean lard. It's the foundation of tlayudas, memelas, and these chilaquiles. If you can't find asiento, use manteca de cerdo. It's a compromise, but an honest one.
The beans themselves tell you where you are on the map. Oaxacan black beans are cooked with hoja de aguacate, the anise-scented leaf of the native criollo avocado tree, and with fresh epazote. Those two herbs in the pot are what make Oaxacan frijol negro taste like Oaxaca and not like any other state's black beans. Cada estado, su propia cocina, and this kitchen smells like avocado leaf and epazote before the sun is fully up.
I learned this version from a senora named Dona Celia at a comedor near the Central de Abastos in Oaxaca. She made chilaquiles every morning starting at six. The tortillas were always from the day before, cut by hand, fried in asiento until they crackled. The bean sauce was already on the stove when she arrived, made from the pot of frijoles she'd cooked the night before. She topped each plate with a fried egg, a fistful of quesillo pulled into threads, a drizzle of crema, and raw white onion sliced thin. No lettuce. No sour cream. No cheddar. Chilaquiles are breakfast, not nachos. Asi se hace y punto.
The word 'chilaquiles' derives from the Nahuatl 'chilaquilitl,' combining 'chilli' (chile) and 'aquilitl' (greens or herbs in a broth), indicating that the original preparation was a practical method of using stale tortillas in a sauced, herbed dish rather than a fixed recipe. Black bean-sauced chilaquiles are particular to Oaxaca and parts of southern Mexico, where frijol negro has been the dominant cultivated bean variety since pre-Columbian agriculture along the Sierra Madre del Sur. The use of asiento as a cooking fat, the dark pork-lard sediment rendered from manteca, is a distinctly Oaxacan market product that emerged after the Spanish introduction of pigs in the 16th century and became so central to the state's daily cooking that it is sold separately from clean lard, priced differently, and considered by Oaxacan cooks to be the more valuable of the two.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
cooked black beans with their cooking broth
Quantity
3 cups beans plus 1 cup broth
asiento (Oaxacan pork lard sediment)
Quantity
3 tablespoons, divided
white onion (for bean sauce)
Quantity
1/2
roughly chopped
garlic cloves
Quantity
2
peeled
dried avocado leaf (hoja de aguacate)
Quantity
1
fresh epazote
Quantity
2 sprigs
kosher salt
Quantity
to taste
day-old corn tortillas
Quantity
12
cut into sixths
vegetable oil
Quantity
1/2 cup
for frying tortillas
large eggs
Quantity
4
quesillo (Oaxacan string cheese)
Quantity
6 ounces
pulled into thin threads
crema mexicana
Quantity
1/4 cup
white onion (for topping)
Quantity
1/2
sliced into thin rings
fresh epazote leaves (optional)
Quantity
for garnish
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| cooked black beans with their cooking broth | 3 cups beans plus 1 cup broth |
| asiento (Oaxacan pork lard sediment) | 3 tablespoons, divided |
| white onion (for bean sauce)roughly chopped | 1/2 |
| garlic clovespeeled | 2 |
| dried avocado leaf (hoja de aguacate) | 1 |
| fresh epazote | 2 sprigs |
| kosher salt | to taste |
| day-old corn tortillascut into sixths | 12 |
| vegetable oilfor frying tortillas | 1/2 cup |
| large eggs | 4 |
| quesillo (Oaxacan string cheese)pulled into thin threads | 6 ounces |
| crema mexicana | 1/4 cup |
| white onion (for topping)sliced into thin rings | 1/2 |
| fresh epazote leaves (optional) | for garnish |
Equipment Needed
- •Heavy 12-inch skillet for frying tortillas
- •Wide clay cazuela or deep skillet for the bean sauce
- •High-powered blender
- •Slotted spoon or kitchen spider
- •Separate skillet for frying eggs
Instructions
- 1
Fry the tortilla pieces
Line a sheet pan with paper towels. Heat the vegetable oil in a heavy skillet over medium-high until it shimmers. Fry the tortilla pieces in batches, spreading them in a single layer. Do not crowd the pan. They need about two minutes per side, until golden and rigid. Lift them out with a slotted spoon and drain on the paper towels. They should snap when you break one, not bend. If they bend, they are not ready. Day-old tortillas fry better than fresh ones because the surface moisture is gone. This is not a flaw in stale tortillas. It is their purpose.
If you only have fresh tortillas, spread them on a wire rack and leave them uncovered for a few hours, or dry them in a low oven (250F) for ten minutes. The surface needs to be dry before it hits the oil, or they will soak grease instead of crisping. - 2
Blend the bean sauce
Add the cooked black beans, one cup of their broth, the roughly chopped onion, and the garlic to a blender. Blend until smooth. It should pour like thick cream, not like paste. If it's too thick, add broth a tablespoon at a time. If you cooked your beans well, with enough water and enough time, the broth will be dark and silky and that flavor goes straight into the sauce. Don't discard it. The broth is half the recipe.
- 3
Fry the bean sauce in asiento
Heat two tablespoons of asiento in a wide, deep skillet or clay cazuela over medium heat. When the fat is hot, drop in the dried avocado leaf and let it sizzle for ten seconds. You will smell anise. That smell is Oaxaca. Pour in the blended bean puree all at once. It will sputter, so stand back. Add the two sprigs of epazote and stir. Cook for eight to ten minutes, stirring often, until the sauce thickens and darkens and the fat begins to separate at the edges. You want a sauce that holds its shape on a spoon for a second before it slides off. Season with salt now. The beans need more salt than you think. Taste it twice.
The avocado leaf must be from the criollo Mexican avocado, not the Hass. The criollo leaf has the anise fragrance that defines Oaxacan beans. If you cannot find it, leave it out. Do not substitute bay leaf. A bay leaf will make it taste like something from a different country. - 4
Drown the tortillas
Remove the epazote sprigs and the avocado leaf from the sauce. Add the fried tortilla pieces to the cazuela and fold them gently into the bean sauce using a wide spoon. Do not stir aggressively or they will break into crumbs. Every piece should be coated. Let them sit in the sauce over low heat for two to three minutes. They should soften on the outside where the sauce touches them but keep structure at the center. That contrast between the yielding surface and the remaining crunch underneath is the whole point of chilaquiles. If you leave them too long, you have bean soup with tortilla mush. Pull them off the heat before you think they are ready.
- 5
Fry the eggs
In a separate skillet, heat the remaining tablespoon of asiento over medium-high heat. Crack in the eggs one at a time. The asiento will make the edges crisp and lacy and give the whites a faint pork richness you cannot get from vegetable oil. Fry until the whites are fully set and the edges are golden brown, but leave the yolks runny. About three minutes. The yolk breaks over the chilaquiles at the table and becomes part of the sauce. That is the design.
If asiento is too strong for you, fry the eggs in manteca de cerdo. If you have neither, use a neutral oil. But know what you are trading away. La manteca es el sabor. - 6
Plate and serve immediately
Spoon the bean-coated chilaquiles onto plates. Set a fried egg on top of each serving. Scatter the quesillo threads generously over everything. Drizzle the crema in thin lines across the plate. Lay the raw white onion rings on top and tear a few fresh epazote leaves over the dish if you have them. Serve the moment it's plated. Chilaquiles do not wait. They do not reheat. They are built to be eaten now, standing at the counter or sitting at the table with a cup of cafe de olla beside them. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.
Chef Tips
- •Asiento is sold at mercados across Oaxaca by the same vendors who sell manteca de cerdo. Outside Oaxaca, some Mexican specialty stores carry it, or you can ask a carniceria that renders its own lard to save you the dark sediment at the bottom of the pot. If you truly cannot find it, use manteca de cerdo. It is a step down in depth and color, but the dish will still work. Do not use vegetable oil for the bean sauce. That is not a substitution, that is a different dish.
- •Quesillo is Oaxaca's string cheese, pulled and wound into balls at the market. It melts into soft, stretchy threads when it hits the warm sauce. If you cannot source quesillo, use a fresh mozzarella pulled into strips. It is not the same, but the texture is closer than anything else. Do not use cheddar. Do not use Monterey Jack. Do not use Oaxacan 'queso' labeled in English at the supermarket that is actually Chihuahua cheese. Preguntale a las senoras del mercado.
- •The best chilaquiles come from the worst tortillas. Day-old, slightly dried out, starting to stiffen. Fresh tortillas absorb too much oil and go limp too fast in the sauce. If a Mexican grandmother saved yesterday's tortillas, it was not because she was wasteful. It was because she was planning tomorrow's breakfast.
- •If you want to add smoke and heat to the bean sauce, toast one chile pasilla oaxaqueno on a dry comal for 15 seconds per side, stem and seed it, soak it in hot water for 10 minutes, and blend it with the beans. This is a variation I've seen from cooks in the Valles Centrales. It deepens the sauce without changing its character.
Advance Preparation
- •To cook the black beans from dried: Rinse 1 1/2 cups dried black beans and soak overnight. Drain, place in a pot with fresh water covering the beans by two inches, one dried avocado leaf, one sprig of epazote, a quarter white onion, and one tablespoon of manteca de cerdo or asiento. Simmer partially covered for two hours or until the beans are completely soft and the broth is dark and thick. Add salt only in the last fifteen minutes. Salt too early toughens the skins. This pot of beans keeps refrigerated for five days and is the starting point for the chilaquiles, for enfrijoladas, for a bowl of frijoles with tortillas and nothing else.
- •The bean sauce can be blended and fried in asiento the night before. Refrigerate it and reheat gently the next morning, adding a splash of bean broth to loosen it. The tortillas must be fried and the eggs cooked fresh. There is no making chilaquiles entirely ahead. The dish lives in the contrast between the crisp tortilla and the warm sauce, and that contrast lasts about five minutes.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 400g)
Calories
800 calories
Total Fat
44 g
Saturated Fat
15 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
28 g
Cholesterol
235 mg
Sodium
1020 mg
Total Carbohydrates
73 g
Dietary Fiber
16 g
Sugars
3 g
Protein
33 g
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