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Puebla's torpedo-shaped masa croquettes stuffed with chipotle-braised chicken tinga, fried in lard until the shell cracks under the spoon, finished with crema and crumbled queso fresco.
Molotes are from Puebla. Specifically from the antojito stalls in the portales around the Zocalo of the capital, and from the home kitchens of the surrounding towns where women have been shaping masa into these little torpedoes for as long as anyone remembers. They are antojitos, the family of masa-and-lard street food that Puebla and Oaxaca both claim, and there is no use in trying to settle that argument here.
The shape matters. A molote is a torpedo: pointed at both ends, fat in the middle, sealed shut around its filling so the masa goes into the lard like a closed envelope. If you flatten it, you have made a sope. If you round it, you have made a tlacoyo. The torpedo is Puebla's signature and the reason the masa holds a generous spoonful of tinga without bursting in the oil.
The tinga inside is its own dish. Chicken poached with onion and bay, shredded by hand, simmered into a sauce of roasted tomato and chipotles en adobo until the fat separates and the meat turns mahogany. This is the tinga of Puebla, smoky, glossy, just spicy enough that you notice but not so spicy it punishes you. Tinga in a taco, tinga on a tostada, tinga over rice, all good. Tinga sealed inside a fried masa torpedo and finished with crema and queso fresco? That is the antojito the poblanas built.
My mother did not make molotes. She was from Jalisco and Jalisco does not have this antojito. I learned them from a senora named Dona Bertha at a stall in the Mercado El Carmen in the city of Puebla, who showed me how to pinch the ends with two fingers and a thumb until the points stayed sealed. She said the test of a molote cook is whether the shell cracks under the spoon and steams from inside without spilling its tinga onto the plate. La cocina no es decoracion, es trabajo.
The word molote comes from the Nahuatl 'molotic,' meaning something soft or yielding, and the dish belongs to the broad family of pre-Columbian masa antojitos that survived the conquest by being too useful and too cheap to displace. Puebla and Oaxaca both claim the molote, with the Puebla version distinguished by its torpedo shape and savory fillings (tinga, papa con chorizo, picadillo), while the Oaxacan molote is often longer, thinner, and sometimes sweet. Tinga itself is a 19th-century poblana invention, born from the convergence of indigenous shredded-meat traditions with the Spanish-introduced chipotle (smoked, dried jalapeno) preserved in adobo, a Mexican preservation technique that turned a glut of summer chiles into a year-round pantry staple.
Quantity
1 1/2 pounds
Quantity
1/2 medium
Quantity
1 medium
sliced thin
Quantity
3
Quantity
2
finely chopped
Quantity
2
Quantity
1 teaspoon, plus more to taste
Quantity
1 1/2 pounds
Quantity
3 to 4, plus 2 tablespoons of the adobo sauce
Quantity
1 teaspoon
Quantity
1/4 teaspoon
Quantity
3 tablespoons, plus more for frying
Quantity
2 cups
Maseca, or freshly ground nixtamal masa if you can get it
Quantity
1 1/4 cups, plus more as needed
Quantity
1/2 teaspoon
Quantity
about 4 cups
for frying
Quantity
for serving
Quantity
for serving
Quantity
for serving
Quantity
for serving
Quantity
for serving
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs | 1 1/2 pounds |
| white onion (for poaching) | 1/2 medium |
| white onion (for the tinga)sliced thin | 1 medium |
| garlic cloves (for poaching) | 3 |
| garlic cloves (for the tinga)finely chopped | 2 |
| bay leaves | 2 |
| kosher salt | 1 teaspoon, plus more to taste |
| ripe Roma tomatoes | 1 1/2 pounds |
| chiles chipotles en adobo | 3 to 4, plus 2 tablespoons of the adobo sauce |
| dried Mexican oregano | 1 teaspoon |
| ground cumin | 1/4 teaspoon |
| manteca de cerdo (pork lard) | 3 tablespoons, plus more for frying |
| masa harina for tortillasMaseca, or freshly ground nixtamal masa if you can get it | 2 cups |
| warm water | 1 1/4 cups, plus more as needed |
| fine sea salt | 1/2 teaspoon |
| manteca de cerdo or neutral oilfor frying | about 4 cups |
| crema mexicana (optional) | for serving |
| crumbled queso fresco or queso ranchero (optional) | for serving |
| shredded crisp lettuce (optional) | for serving |
| salsa verde cruda or salsa roja de molcajete (optional) | for serving |
| pickled red onion with chile de arbol (optional) | for serving |
Place the chicken thighs in a saucepan with the half onion, the three whole garlic cloves, the bay leaves, the kosher salt, and enough cold water to cover by an inch. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Skim the gray foam that rises in the first ten minutes. Cook at a low, lazy simmer for 25 minutes, until the meat pulls cleanly off the bone. Lift the chicken out, reserve one cup of the broth, and let the meat cool until you can handle it. Discard the skin and bones. Shred the meat by hand into rough threads, not cubes. Tinga is shredded, not chopped. Así se hace y punto.
Heat a dry comal or heavy skillet over medium-high. Lay the Roma tomatoes on it whole. Turn them every couple of minutes until the skins are blistered and blackened in patches on all sides, about 8 to 10 minutes. The skins should split. The flesh should soften. This is where the tinga gets its smoky backbone. Boiled tomatoes give you a flat sauce. Roasted tomatoes give you tinga.
Transfer the roasted tomatoes, with all their juice, to a blender. Add the chiles chipotles en adobo, the adobo sauce, the oregano, and the cumin. Blend until smooth. Three chipotles gives you the Puebla balance: smoke first, heat second. Four if your guests are accustomed to it. No me vengas con atajos, do not skip the adobo, that syrup is half the flavor.
Melt the three tablespoons of lard in a wide skillet over medium heat. Add the sliced onion and cook, stirring, until soft and the edges turn golden, about 8 minutes. Add the chopped garlic and cook one minute more. Pour in the chipotle-tomato puree. It will sputter. Cook for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring often, until the sauce darkens and the fat starts to separate at the edges. La manteca es el sabor and you can see it working here. Add the shredded chicken and a half cup of the reserved broth. Simmer 10 minutes more, until the tinga is glossy and barely saucy. The mixture should hold its shape on a spoon, not pool. Taste for salt. Cool completely before filling the molotes. Wet filling tears the masa.
In a wide bowl, combine the masa harina and the half teaspoon of sea salt. Pour in the warm water and work it in with your hand until a soft, pliable dough forms. Knead for two minutes. The masa should feel like fresh play-doh: soft, smooth, not sticky, not dry. Press a piece between your palms. If the edges crack, the masa is dry and needs a teaspoon more water. If it sticks to your palm, it needs a tablespoon more masa harina. Cover the bowl with a damp cloth and let it rest 10 minutes.
Divide the masa into 12 equal balls, about the size of a small lime. Working one at a time, flatten a ball between two squares of plastic into an oval roughly 4 inches long and 1/8 inch thick. Peel back the top plastic. Place a heaping tablespoon of cooled tinga down the center, leaving a half-inch border at each end. Using the bottom plastic to help you, lift one long edge over the filling and seal it against the other edge, then pinch the two ends shut into points. You are building a small torpedo, fat in the middle, pointed at the ends. That shape is the molote. A molote that is round is a tlacoyo. A molote that is flat is a sope. Cada estado, su propia cocina, and Puebla wants the torpedo.
Pour enough lard or oil into a deep, heavy skillet to come up two inches. Heat over medium-high until a small piece of masa dropped in sizzles steadily and rises to the surface within five seconds. That is about 350F if you are using a thermometer. Lower the molotes into the fat seam-side down, three or four at a time, do not crowd the pan. Fry for 4 to 5 minutes per side, turning once, until deep golden and crisp. The outside should crack lightly when you press a spoon against it. The inside should be hot through. Lift them out with a slotted spoon and drain on a wire rack. Salt them while they are still glossy with fat.
Arrange the hot molotes on a warm platter. Drizzle crema mexicana over the tops in a back-and-forth motion. Scatter crumbled queso fresco generously over everything. Tuck a small handful of shredded lettuce around them. Set the salsa verde or salsa roja and the pickled onions on the side. Eat them with your hands while the masa is still crisp. A molote that has waited fifteen minutes is no longer a molote, it is a lesson about why this dish must be served the moment it leaves the oil.
1 serving (about 320g)
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