Chef Lupita
Aporreadillo Michoacano con Huevo
Michoacán's Tierra Caliente almuerzo, where salted beef is softened, pounded, fried in lard, folded with egg and chile perón salsa, then served beside morisqueta like a proper working table.
Culinary Explorer
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Pan Francés con Piloncillo y Canela
Created by
The Ciudad de México fonda breakfast standard. Day-old bolillo soaked in a custard of egg, milk, and canela, fried in butter, drowned in piloncillo syrup. Cheap, generous, and the right way to start a working morning.
Breakfast & Brunch
Mexican
Weeknight
Quick Meal
Comfort Food
15 min
Active Time
25 min cook•40 min total
Yield4 servings
This is fonda food from Ciudad de México. Not the version they serve in hotel buffets. The one in the working-class fondas of the Centro, in the small kitchens along Donceles and República de Cuba, where the cook has been awake since five and the regulars come in for the same plate every Tuesday.
The bread is bolillo. Not brioche, not challah, not pan de caja. Bolillo is the crusty white roll that every panadería in Mexico bakes by the thousands every morning, and a day-old bolillo is what you use here. Fresh bolillo collapses. Stale bolillo holds. That is the rule.
The syrup is piloncillo, not maple. Piloncillo is unrefined cane sugar pressed into a cone, dark and smoky, with a mineral depth that comes from being boiled down without bleaching or filtering. Cook it with a stick of true canela, two cloves, and a strip of orange peel until it runs off the spoon in a slow ribbon. That syrup is not optional. That syrup is the dish.
My mother made this for me when I was sick. The condensed milk in the custard, that little spoonful of la lechera, is the fonda trick that makes it richer than it has any right to be. Cada estado, su propia cocina, and this one belongs to the chilangos who eat it standing at the counter before they catch the metro.
Pan francés in Mexico descends from the French culinary influence that arrived during the 19th-century reign of Maximilian I and the broader Porfiriato-era French cultural orientation, though the dish was rapidly Mexicanized through the substitution of bolillo for stale brioche and piloncillo syrup for maple. The bolillo itself, despite its French-bread silhouette, is a Mexican adaptation of the French petit pain that emerged during the same period and has since become an entirely domestic staple. The fonda tradition of serving pan francés as part of an inexpensive desayuno corrido, the multi-course set breakfast, dates to the early 20th century, when fondas served as affordable canteens for office workers and laborers in central Ciudad de México.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
day-old bolillos
Quantity
2
sliced on the bias into 1-inch thick pieces (about 8 slices)
large eggs
Quantity
4
whole milk
Quantity
1 cup
sweetened condensed milk (la lechera)
Quantity
1/4 cup
ground canela (Mexican cinnamon, Ceylon)
Quantity
1 teaspoon
pure vanilla extract
Quantity
1 teaspoon
fine salt
Quantity
a pinch
unsalted butter
Quantity
4 tablespoons
for frying
piloncillo
Quantity
8 ounces (about 1 cone)
chopped
water
Quantity
1 1/2 cups
stick canela (Mexican cinnamon, Ceylon)
Quantity
1
about 3 inches
whole cloves
Quantity
2
strip of orange peel
Quantity
1
no white pith
Mexican crema (optional)
Quantity
for serving
ground canela for dusting (optional)
Quantity
for serving
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| day-old bolillossliced on the bias into 1-inch thick pieces (about 8 slices) | 2 |
| large eggs | 4 |
| whole milk | 1 cup |
| sweetened condensed milk (la lechera) | 1/4 cup |
| ground canela (Mexican cinnamon, Ceylon) | 1 teaspoon |
| pure vanilla extract | 1 teaspoon |
| fine salt | a pinch |
| unsalted butterfor frying | 4 tablespoons |
| piloncillochopped | 8 ounces (about 1 cone) |
| water | 1 1/2 cups |
| stick canela (Mexican cinnamon, Ceylon)about 3 inches | 1 |
| whole cloves | 2 |
| strip of orange peelno white pith | 1 |
| Mexican crema (optional) | for serving |
| ground canela for dusting (optional) | for serving |
Equipment Needed
- •Wide shallow bowl for soaking the bread
- •Small heavy saucepan for the syrup
- •10-inch heavy skillet or cast iron pan
- •Wide spatula
Instructions
- 1
Start the piloncillo syrup
In a small saucepan, combine the chopped piloncillo, water, canela stick, cloves, and orange peel. Set over medium heat and stir occasionally until the piloncillo dissolves completely. This takes about 8 minutes. Piloncillo is hard. Cut it small or it will sit at the bottom of the pan forever.
Wrap the cone in a clean kitchen towel and crack it with a hammer or the back of a heavy knife. That is how the señoras break it down in the fonda kitchens. No me vengas con atajos like brown sugar. Piloncillo has a smoky, mineral depth that white or brown sugar does not. - 2
Reduce the syrup
Once the piloncillo has dissolved, lower the heat to keep it at a steady simmer. Cook for 12 to 15 minutes more, until the syrup coats the back of a spoon and runs off in a thin, lazy ribbon. Pull the canela, cloves, and orange peel out. The syrup will thicken further as it cools, so do not reduce it past the ribbon stage or you will end up with candy.
- 3
Mix the custard
In a wide, shallow bowl, whisk the eggs until completely uniform, no streaks of white. Add the whole milk, la lechera, ground canela, vanilla, and the pinch of salt. Whisk again until smooth. The condensed milk is what makes this fonda-style and not a French recipe. It sweetens the custard and gives the soaked bread a richness you cannot get with milk and sugar alone.
- 4
Soak the bolillo
The bread has to be day-old. Fresh bolillo turns to mush. Stale bolillo has the structure to drink up the custard and hold its shape in the pan. Lay the slices in the custard in a single layer. Let them soak for about 45 seconds per side. They should be saturated but not falling apart. If a slice feels limp when you lift it, you have soaked it too long.
If your bolillo is fresh, cut it the night before and leave the slices uncovered on a rack so the air can dry them out. Or toast them lightly in a low oven for 10 minutes. Dry bread is the foundation of the dish. - 5
Fry in butter
Heat 2 tablespoons of butter in a wide skillet over medium heat until the foam subsides and the butter starts to smell nutty. Lay 3 or 4 soaked slices in the pan without crowding. Fry for 2 to 3 minutes per side. You want a deep golden crust, almost brown at the edges. The custard inside should set into something tender and creamy, never wet. Add the remaining butter for the second batch.
- 6
Plate and finish
Stack 2 slices on each plate, slightly overlapping. Drizzle the warm piloncillo syrup generously over the top so it pools at the base. Dust with a little more ground canela. Add a spoonful of Mexican crema on the side. This is how it comes to the table in the fondas of the Centro, on a thick ceramic plate with a glass of café de olla beside it. Saber cocinar es saber vivir.
Chef Tips
- •Piloncillo is sold in two sizes, the small cone (about 1 ounce) and the large cone (about 8 ounces). For this recipe use one large or eight small. Brown sugar is a compromise, not a substitute. It has none of the smoky molasses depth.
- •True Mexican canela is Ceylon cinnamon. It is the soft, papery, brittle stick that crumbles between your fingers. The hard, rolled-up bark sold as cinnamon in most American supermarkets is cassia, which is harsher and more bitter. If your canela does not crumble, find a Latin market.
- •La lechera in the custard is the fonda fingerprint. Without it, you have made a respectable pain perdu. With it, you have made what they serve on Avenida Hidalgo at seven in the morning.
Advance Preparation
- •The piloncillo syrup can be made up to two weeks ahead and stored in a jar in the refrigerator. Warm it gently before serving so it pours.
- •The custard can be whisked together the night before and held in the refrigerator. Whisk again before soaking the bread.
- •Do not soak or fry the bread ahead. Pan francés has to come straight from the pan to the plate. Reheated, the crust softens and the texture is lost.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 250g)
Calories
625 calories
Total Fat
22 g
Saturated Fat
12 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
9 g
Cholesterol
225 mg
Sodium
375 mg
Total Carbohydrates
92 g
Dietary Fiber
1 g
Sugars
65 g
Protein
14 g
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