Tacos de Chanfaina Chiapacorceña

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Wide clay cazuela or heavy skillet
• •Cast iron comal
• •High-powered blender
• •Fine-mesh strainer
• •Sharp chef's knife for chopping offal
• •Woven servilleta for holding tortillas

Instructions

1. 1

   Clean the asadura

   Put the pork liver, heart, and lung or shoulder in a large bowl. Rub with 1 tablespoon salt and the sour orange juice. Let stand 15 minutes, then rinse well under cold water. This is not perfume work. It cleans the offal and keeps the final stew from tasting harsh.

2. 2

   Simmer the offal

   Place the cleaned offal in a pot with the onion half, 4 garlic cloves, 1 bay leaf, 1 tablespoon salt, and enough water to cover by 2 inches. Bring to a simmer, skim the gray foam, then cook gently for 45 to 60 minutes, until the heart is tender and the liver is firm but not dry. Save 2 cups of the broth. Discard the onion, garlic, and bay leaf.

3. 3

   Chop it small

   Let the cooked offal cool until you can handle it. Dice it into small pieces, about 1/4 inch. A taco de chanfaina should eat like a stew tucked into a tortilla, not like chunks of boiled liver rolling around. The women who make this for fiesta chop patiently. That knife work matters.

4. 4

   Toast the chiles

   Heat a dry comal over medium. Toast the chile pasilla and chile ancho one or two at a time, about 20 to 30 seconds per side, pressing them flat with tongs. They should darken slightly and smell deep, not burn. Pasilla turns bitter fast. If a chile blackens, throw it out. Burned chile is not character, it is a mistake.

   The chile pasilla is the backbone here. It brings dark fruit, bitterness, and color. Chile ancho rounds it with sweetness. Do not replace both with guajillo and call it Chiapacorceña.
5. 5

   Soak and blend

   Cover the toasted chiles with hot water and soak 20 minutes. Drain them. Blend the softened chiles with the roasted tomatoes, roasted onion, roasted garlic, clove, cinnamon, thyme, Mexican oregano, black pepper, and 1 cup reserved offal broth. Blend until completely smooth. If the blender complains, add a little more broth. Strain through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl.

6. 6

   Fry the recado

   Melt the pork lard in a wide clay cazuela or heavy skillet over medium heat. Add the strained chile recado carefully. It will sputter. Cook 8 to 10 minutes, stirring often, until the color darkens, the raw tomato smell disappears, and a red-brown fat line starts to show at the edge. La manteca es el sabor. This is where the stew becomes chanfaina instead of boiled meat with sauce.

7. 7

   Stew the chanfaina

   Add the chopped offal and the remaining bay leaf to the fried recado. Stir until every piece is coated. Add 1/2 cup reserved broth, lower the heat, and cook uncovered for 25 to 30 minutes, stirring now and then. The sauce should cling to the meat, glossy and thick enough to spoon into a tortilla without flooding it. Taste for salt at the end.

8. 8

   Warm the tortillas

   Heat the corn tortillas on a comal until they puff in spots and get light brown freckles. Stack them in a woven servilleta so they stay flexible. Do not use cold tortillas. They break, and then everyone blames the taco when the cook was the problem.

9. 9

   Serve the tacos

   Spoon the chanfaina into warm corn tortillas. Add diced white onion, cilantro, lime, and a little salsa if you want it. Keep the cazuela on the table and let people build their own. Fiesta food is generous food. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.

Chef Tips

• •Ask a Mexican butcher for asadura de puerco: liver, heart, and lung. If lung is not available where you live, use a little pork shoulder. That is a compromise for access, not an improvement.
• •Do not skip the first simmer. Offal needs cleaning and control. The boil pulls out impurities and gives you the broth that ties the recado back to the meat.
• •Use manteca de cerdo, not vegetable oil. The lard rounds the bitterness of the pasilla and carries the spices. This dish was not built for neutral oil.
• •If your chile pasilla is dry enough to crack into dust, it is old. Good dried chiles should bend a little and smell like fruit, tobacco, and sun-warmed raisins. Pregúntale a las señoras del mercado.
• •Serve in small tacos. Chanfaina is rich and dark. A good corn tortilla, a spoonful of stew, a little onion, a squeeze of lime. Así se hace y punto.

Advance Preparation

• •The offal can be simmered, cooled, chopped, and refrigerated one day ahead. Save the broth separately.
• •The chile recado can be blended and strained up to one day ahead. Fry it in lard on the day you serve so the flavor wakes up properly.
• •Finished chanfaina keeps refrigerated for 3 days and reheats well in a cazuela with a splash of reserved broth. Warm it slowly so the sauce stays glossy.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 105g)