Gorditas Guisadas de Horno Potosinas

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Wood-fired clay or brick horno, or a home oven with a baking stone or baking steel
• •Cast iron comal
• •Tortilla press lined with plastic
• •Clay cazuelas or heavy skillets for the guisos
• •Clean woven cotton servilleta

Instructions

1. 1

   Heat the horno

   If you have a wood-fired clay or brick horno, build the fire 45 minutes before baking. Let the floor and walls get fully hot, then rake the coals to the side. For a home kitchen, heat the oven to 500F with a baking stone or baking steel inside for at least 45 minutes. It is a compromise, not an upgrade, but it gives the masa the hard heat it needs.

   A weak oven makes pale, dry gorditas. You want quick browning outside while the inside stays tender enough to split.
2. 2

   Blend salsa verde

   Put the tomatillos and 4 serranos in a saucepan and cover with water. Simmer 8 to 10 minutes, until the tomatillos turn olive green and soften. Blend them with the garlic, the 1/4 onion, cilantro, and 1 teaspoon salt until smooth. This is for the chicharrón, so do not make it watery.

3. 3

   Guisar the chicharrón

   Melt 1 tablespoon manteca in a clay cazuela or heavy skillet over medium heat. Pour in the salsa verde and cook 5 minutes, stirring, until the color deepens and the salsa thickens. Add the chicharrón quebrado and 2 sprigs epazote. Simmer 6 to 8 minutes, just until the chicharrón softens but still has coarse pieces. A gordita filling must hold itself. Soup belongs in a bowl.

4. 4

   Cook the nopales

   Put the diced nopales in a wide skillet with a pinch of salt and cook over medium heat for 8 minutes, stirring often, until their liquid cooks off and the green turns darker. Add 1 tablespoon manteca, the 1/2 diced onion, 2 chopped serranos, diced jitomates, and 1 sprig epazote. Cook 10 to 12 minutes more, until the nopales are tender and the guiso is thick. Stir in the chopped cilantro at the end.

5. 5

   Make the rajas

   Roast the poblanos directly over a flame or on a hot comal until the skins blister and blacken in patches. Cover them in a bowl for 10 minutes, then peel, seed, and slice into strips. Do not rinse them under water. You worked for that roasted flavor, so do not wash it down the drain. Melt 1 tablespoon manteca in a skillet, cook the sliced onion until soft, add the rajas and salt, then fold in the queso ranchero until it softens.

6. 6

   Season the masa

   In a large bowl, knead the fresh masa with 1/2 cup manteca and 2 teaspoons salt. Add warm water a few tablespoons at a time only if the masa feels stiff. It should feel soft and alive, not sticky, and the edge should not crack when you press it. If it cracks, it needs water. If it smears, it needs a little more masa. This is why the señora presses before she cooks.

7. 7

   Shape thick disks

   Divide the masa into 12 balls. Press each one by hand or in a tortilla press lined with plastic into a thick disk about 4 inches wide and 1/2 inch thick. Keep the edges a little rounded, not thin. Thin edges bake hard and break when you split them.

8. 8

   Bake the gorditas

   Place the gorditas directly on the hot horno floor or on the preheated baking stone. Bake 8 to 12 minutes, turning once, until they have browned freckles, dry matte patches, and a firm outside. They should puff slightly but they will not balloon like a tortilla. Pull them before they turn hard all the way through.

   If using a home oven, work in batches and close the door quickly. Every long pause steals the heat from the stone.
9. 9

   Split while warm

   Wrap the baked gorditas in a clean cotton servilleta for 5 minutes. While still warm, cut a slit halfway around the edge with a small knife and open the pocket gently with your thumb. Do not cut all the way through. You need a hinge, not two separate tortillas.

10. 10

    Fill and finish

    Fill some gorditas with nopales, some with chicharrón en salsa verde, and some with rajas con queso. Wipe a comal with the remaining manteca and warm the filled gorditas 1 minute per side, just enough to gloss the outside and settle the filling into the masa. La manteca es el sabor.

11. 11

    Serve market style

    Pile the gorditas on a clay platter and set out chiles jalapeños en escabeche, lime halves, and salsa de molcajete. Serve them wrapped in paper or a servilleta, the way they hand them across a market counter. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.

Chef Tips

• •Buy fresh nixtamal masa from a tortillería and ask for masa para gordita or masa martajada if they have it. Masa for machine tortillas is finer and tighter. It works, but the crumb will be less tender.
• •Masa harina is a compromise. If that is all you can get, use 4 cups masa harina, 3 cups warm water, 1/2 cup manteca de cerdo, and 2 teaspoons salt. Rest it 30 minutes before shaping so the corn hydrates properly.
• •The guisos must be thick. Wet chicharrón salsa or loose nopales will soak the pocket and tear the gordita before it reaches the table.
• •Do not replace the lard with vegetable oil and then wonder why the crumb tastes flat. Manteca gives tenderness, flavor, and the right surface when the gordita hits the comal.
• •If the tomatillos are pale, hard, and sour in the wrong way, skip the chicharrón verde that day and make more rajas. Cook what the mercado is selling today. Saber cocinar es saber vivir.

Advance Preparation

• •The chicharrón en salsa verde, nopales, and rajas can be made up to 2 days ahead. Reheat them gently and thicken any loose liquid before filling.
• •The masa can be mixed up to 2 hours ahead and kept covered at room temperature with a damp towel. Do not refrigerate it unless you want stiff dough.
• •Bake the gorditas the day you serve them. If needed, baked unfilled gorditas can be wrapped in a servilleta for a few hours and refreshed on a hot comal before splitting.
• •For a market-style service, keep the guisos warm in separate cazuelas and fill each gordita to order.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 600g)