Tostadas de Tinga Poblana

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy 6-quart pot for poaching the chicken
• •Cast iron comal or heavy skillet for roasting tomatoes
• •High-powered blender
• •Wide, heavy skillet or clay cazuela for the tinga
• •Fine-mesh strainer for the broth

Instructions

1. 1

   Poach the chicken

   Place the chicken pieces in a heavy pot and cover with cold water by two inches. Add the halved onion, the two whole garlic cloves, the bay leaves, the cilantro stems, and the tablespoon of salt. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Skim the gray foam that rises in the first ten minutes. Cook at a lazy bubble for 25 minutes, until the chicken is just cooked through. Cold water draws the flavor out into the broth. A rolling boil tightens the meat and makes it dry. The broth you build here is part of the tinga.

   Skin-on, bone-in chicken is not optional. The skin and bones give the broth body, and that broth goes back into the tinga at the end. Boneless skinless breast gives you sad, dry shreds.
2. 2

   Shred the chicken and save the broth

   Lift the chicken out of the pot and let it rest until cool enough to handle. Strain the broth through a fine-mesh sieve and reserve one and a half cups. Pull the skin off, separate the meat from the bones, and shred it by hand into pieces the width of your finger. Hand-shredded, not chopped. The irregular edges hold the sauce. The chicken from a single grocery rotisserie will not do this work the same way. Do not skip the poach.

3. 3

   Roast the tomatoes

   Heat a dry comal or heavy skillet over medium-high. Lay the whole Roma tomatoes on the comal and roast them, turning every few minutes, until the skins blacken in patches and the flesh collapses, about 10 to 12 minutes. The blistered char is what gives tinga its deep, smoky-sweet base. Boiling the tomatoes is a shortcut and you will taste the absence. No me vengas con atajos.

4. 4

   Blend the tomato-chipotle base

   Transfer the roasted tomatoes, skins and all, to a blender. Add the chiles chipotles en adobo, the adobo sauce, the oregano, and the cumin. Blend until smooth. Taste it. It should be smoky, slightly sweet from the roasted tomato, and assertive with the chipotle. If you want more heat, add another chipotle. If you want less, hold back. The chipotle is what makes a tinga a tinga. Without it, you have shredded chicken in tomato sauce, which is not the same dish.

5. 5

   Sweat the onions in lard

   Melt the lard in a wide, heavy skillet or a clay cazuela over medium heat. Add the sliced onion and a pinch of salt. Cook for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring often, until the onions are soft and translucent with golden edges. Add the sliced garlic and cook one more minute, just until fragrant. The onion in tinga is not background. It is half the dish. La manteca es el sabor and the onions need the fat to soften the right way.

   If you do not have lard, use a neutral oil with a tablespoon of bacon fat stirred in. Vegetable oil alone gives you a flat onion. Olive oil belongs to a different cuisine.
6. 6

   Fry the tomato-chipotle sauce

   Pour the blended tomato-chipotle puree into the skillet with the onions. It will sputter. Stir to combine and let it cook at a brisk simmer for 8 to 10 minutes. The color will darken from bright red to a deep brick, and the fat will start to separate at the edges. This step is non-negotiable. Frying the sauce in fat is what concentrates the flavor. A raw blended sauce poured over chicken is not tinga. Así se hace y punto.

7. 7

   Simmer the tinga

   Add the shredded chicken and the fresh thyme or marjoram if using. Pour in one cup of the reserved chicken broth. Stir to coat every shred. Lower the heat and simmer for 12 to 15 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the sauce has thickened and clings to the meat. If it gets too dry, add a splash more broth. The tinga should be saucy enough to spoon, never soupy. Taste for salt. Pull out the herb sprigs before serving.

8. 8

   Build the tostadas

   Spread a generous layer of warm refried black beans across each tostada, all the way to the edges. The beans are the glue that holds the tostada together and they belong here, not as an afterthought. Pile a heap of tinga over the beans. Top with shredded lettuce, sliced avocado, a spoonful of crema, and a shower of crumbled queso fresco. Finish with cilantro leaves. Serve with lime and pickled jalapeños at the table. Eat with two hands and accept that the tostada will crack on the second bite. That crack is the dish. Saber cocinar es saber vivir.

Chef Tips

• •Use bone-in, skin-on chicken and poach it yourself. The broth you build is part of the tinga. A grocery rotisserie chicken will work in an emergency, but you lose the broth and you taste the difference.
• •Chiles chipotles en adobo from a can are correct here. Look for a Mexican brand like La Costeña or San Marcos. The adobo is part of the flavor, do not rinse or drain the chiles.
• •Roast the tomatoes on a comal, do not boil them. Boiling gives you a thin, watery sauce. Roasting gives you the smoky-sweet base that pairs with the chipotle. This is not the step to shortcut.
• •If you fry your own tostadas, use day-old corn tortillas and fry them in lard or a neutral oil until they are deep gold and rigid. They should snap when you tap them. Soft tostadas are not tostadas, they are disappointment.
• •Tinga is even better the next day. Make it in the morning, refrigerate it, and reheat gently with a splash of broth before serving. The chipotle deepens overnight.

Advance Preparation

• •The chicken can be poached and shredded one day ahead. Refrigerate the meat and the broth separately.
• •The full tinga can be made up to two days ahead and reheated gently with a splash of broth. The chipotle deepens with rest.
• •Tostadas should be fried the day of serving so they stay crisp. If you fry them ahead, store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to one day, never refrigerate.
• •Beans, crema, queso fresco, lettuce, and avocado should be prepared at serving time. Build the tostadas at the table or in the moment they are eaten. A pre-assembled tostada is a soggy tostada.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 510g)