March 9, 2023 • 21 mins
The Mexican torta is a sandwich stuffed with some of the most delicious ingredients Mexico has to offer including beans, avocado, queso, jalapeños, and of course meat. Although the history of its origin is debated, the result of its influence is clear. In this episode, Eva and Maite dive into the history of this Mexican staple. Also, Chef Bryan Ford whose new podcast, The Flaky Biscuit, launches on April 11th sends us his thoughts on the luscious torta!
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The introduction of European crops was a natural step in
the conquest of America, and wheat was one of the
first foods introduced into Mexico. And where there is wheat,
there is to This episode is all about tortas. My
name is Eva Longoria and I am and welcome to
(00:23):
Hungry for History, a podcast that explores our past and
present through food. On every episode, we'll talk about the
history of some of our favorite dishes, ingredients, and beverages.
So make yourself at home. Rachel, Mexican sandwiches take the
(00:44):
sandwich game to a whole other level. And look, let's
dive in, let's dissect. Okay, wheat is not native to
meso America. It's not endemic to messo America. No, no,
it's not. Jeffrey Pilcher, he's a food history and who's amazing.
He wrote this book called Food and the Making of
Mexican Identity, and he goes into wheat. You know, in Spain,
(01:08):
Iberian people had been cultivating we using methods developed in
Syria and Egypt for millennia before they were in Mexico.
And when Spain was part of the Roman Empire, they
valued white bread, so much that they added chock to
it to achieve purity. What I know, it's just so bizarre.
(01:30):
And during the reconquest of fourteen ninety two we took
on a prearticular religious significance. Right it became, you know,
the only grain suitable for the eucharistic wafer. I mean,
it was already being used for that, but it just
took on a very religious significance during this period. So
(01:54):
it was very important to the Spaniards to who had
migrated to America to the colonizer, and also Ferdinand and Isabella,
the Catholic monarch, so who were in charge of this
reconquest beginning in fifteen oh four. They had a bunch
of policies to foment work production. They allowed shepherds to
(02:17):
run their animals through fields, through wheat fields, and cut
down forests to provide pasture. So they were sort of
rethinking agriculture, and this resulted in famine and hunger. Yeah,
so a lot of these conquistadors remember this, Some of
them have been through hunger in Spain. What are they
(02:38):
going to do in this new land? So let's bring
this wheat, which I find super interesting that aspect of
wheat that we didn't really talk about when we talked
when we did our corn and flower episode. Yeah, we
didn't talk about that because I didn't really Yeah, I
was like where where did wheat come from? Anyway? And
then and then like how did it end up in France?
And like all the other bread staples of Europe. I mean,
(03:02):
we could do a whole bread breads around the world.
Of all the products that were brought to Mexico during
the conquest, the one that symbolized European culture and sustenance
(03:24):
was wheat, right, and so this wheat farm served as
a foundation for Spanish user patient of native lands in
central Mexico. We think, we're not one hundred percent sure.
But Juangari, though he was an African who was a
member of Ernan Cortes's expedition, was said to have found
three grains of wheat in a bag of rice, and
(03:46):
he planted them and became the first person to cultivate
wheat in America. So this guy, Juangario was given property
in fifteen twenty two for in exchange for his service,
and he became a farmer by fifteen twenty four. A
message that at Nan Cortez sent to Charles. The fifth
mentions cultivation of wheat in Carya Gan you know, Mexico City,
(04:09):
and that's when bread became a big part of the
of the culture clash of the two different worlds because
you again, because of the religious history of the Communion wafer,
Spanish missionaries really preached the goodness of wheat as part
of their like message that it was religious necessity and
(04:33):
that wasn't bread. Isn't a food that you know, the
indigenous people ate, you know, and so they found the
taste kind of bland, and they preferred their corn, which
I agreed to, I prefer corn to wheat. But they
were forced to eat it. They were forced to eat it,
and they said that it tasted like famine food. I mean,
it was like a horrible Yeah, they didn't they were,
(04:55):
but they were forced to eat it. And it was
one of the ultimate you know, f you were to
plant the wheat where your corners, and we're gonna make
you eat this. By fifteen eighty seven, Puebla had become
the granary of New Spain and they were shipping sending
regular shipments of wheat to the ports of Vera Cruz,
(05:15):
to Yucatan, and as far as the Caribbean, so you
know it took off. It took off, but it didn't
take off naturally. They were forced to incorporate wheat into
the diet. What are some of the colonial breads that
this would be, Oh, Claudia, Claudia would hate these colonial breads.
A bun especial, which was made with refined flour Florida Arena.
(05:40):
It was soft, white, expensive and by the end of
the seventeen hundreds only two bakeries made bun especial and
they were really made for religious higher ups. Now yep,
and this part doesn't exist anymore. I must say fun
especial no longer, no longer. Another colonial bread was spun floriado,
which was the second best in quality and it was
(06:01):
also made with high quality flour. It was shaped into
round buns. That also no longer exists. Oh, doesn't exist. Buncommune,
which is similar to bolios. That's that's that exists. They're
sold everywhere. So the common bread buncommun the common bread
is that sold everywhere, that survived, that survived. Bambajo with
(06:24):
an X became bambaso, which was a bread made with
leftover and discarded ingredients including weevil riddled flour. Um. It
came from the words bun bajo because it was a
bread for the poor. Um. So this exists in Veracrus.
It's filled with beans and mayo and ham and chicken
torrisa lettuce Mexico City. It's a street food and it's
(06:46):
stuffed with potatoes and torriso and drenched in chile wahilo sauce.
So this is from the colonial bambajo with an exe
that was reserved for the for the poor. So the
lower class bread there. Class breads are basically yeah. And
then this one, the a semita is another bread that survived.
That's a reference to a popular bread made in medieval
(07:09):
Spain by the Sephardic Jews that live there. And it's
sort of a crunchy bread that's topped with sesame seeds
and a mixt of flowers. And now there's a semita
uses that particular bread that survives as well. So under
Mexico's French occupation in the nineteenth century, after that, the
(07:32):
country was inundated with bakeries and that again that's where
we get the bread in Halisco to make torta rada
because that was a French, a French baker that taught
them how to do that. So most of the bakeries
were Spanish or French owned. They were owned by French
and Spanish, but ninety percent of the bakers that worked
there were native artisans who developed innovative, unique pastries based
(07:58):
on European trends, but really, you know, with their native
dna um. And I think that's why we see, you know,
some of these breads having like a hybrid of what
it is. Don't go anywhere hungry for history, We'll be
right back. Do you make? It's so funny because I'm
(08:25):
not a bread eater, but I like to bake bread.
During the pandemic, I was a croissant maker because that
takes like three days to make one croissant, and so
I that was my jam during the pandemic. But I
like I do. I'd like to figure out how to
bake that. The bread for the tortas in Jali school,
that would be very interesting to try to recreate that.
(08:46):
We should go to Jalisco and do a tort or class.
That would be amazing. We should, we should do it.
I took a class, actually a bunch of classes with
Elisa Lada, who we had on u Bandul episode early on,
and I took up Boli class. It was during the pandemic.
It was a virtual class. I couldn't believe, like at
(09:10):
the end of class, I had perfect bread to make
like it was just it was amazing. I was just
in Mexico City a couple of weeks ago and my
mom is from there, and she was like, bring back
boli jos. It was like, I fee like bring back balios.
She's like, bring back baliyas. It's not the same. So
I have a bunch of from Mexico City in my
(09:33):
freezer for when she comes to visit, so that we
could have bliyos. Well. This is why I love our
podcast is because we like to weave in how history
made food evolve and for the for the torta in particular,
(09:56):
after Mexican independence in a eighteen twenty one, the country
was searching for a new identity and the torta was
born out of that revolution and the way bread was
really understood in Mexico, and so I love that. According
to historian Jeffrey Pilcher, that there was a street taco
vendor that would make street tacos, and he just had
(10:19):
the idea of using bread instead instead of a torthea
in Mexico City. And that's kind of the first time
that the torta appears right. It was in this newspaper
in eighteen sixty four. And then by the nineteenth century
it was no longer tortilla versus bread, like we didn't
have to choose, like the colonists made us right, Like
(10:40):
the colonists were like, no more tetilla, you must eat bread.
Now in the nineteenth century it was tortilla and bread,
and that was like, finally the harmony had settled in
into Mexico. Have the choice, it was changed. We have
the choice. We have the choice. Do you want your
pork with a torthia or do you want your pork
on a sandwich? Exactly, you have the choice. And in
(11:04):
eighteen ninety two, a man named Armando Martinez Centurion opened
the first torteia in downtown Mexico City, and his tortas
were considered a Baroque creation, and they were referred to
as La las tortu Santo the tortez of the Holy Spirit,
because they were so delicious. Um he sold tortas with
(11:27):
chicken with pork with milanesa with sardines, which I don't
know about that, but they had avocado and lettuce and
chile chipotle fresco, and it was such a popular tortia.
The people, like the after cantine Flas used to visit
musician I was in Lada, like it was super popular
(11:48):
and he always accompanied the tortas that he sold with
an orange, pineapple and lime wafresca. UM. So this was
the first torteia. But then we have regional of the variations.
You know, all over the country. You have the Tortasauga
that's that you mentioned from Jalisco. We mentioned briefly the
semitas from Puebla that has string cheese and milanesa um.
(12:13):
But every region has a different torta. But it's basically,
you know, it's an interesting use. Sandwich is the bolio
the only one, the only bread used for they're different breads,
they're different breads, but the most common breads for tortas
or the andra, and they're basically a similar type of bread.
The bolio is a little rounder um sort of oval
(12:34):
and a little just sort of more you know, chubby.
It's crunchy on the outside and soft and spongee on
the inside. Um. And then the the leta is a
similar dough, but it's flat um, so it's a little
bit flat. It's oval that has these two incisions on top.
But these are the two most popular ones. The lettras
sometimes used in place of the tortilla um, but it's
(12:58):
essentially the same thing that the lera. As origin comes
from an inferior wheat bread consumed by Andalusian workers in Spain,
so the recipe was modified in Mexico, but it's essentially
the same dough used for the for the rolillo's just
a different shape. Yeah. Well, the bot is my favorite.
I've never never had one. I've never had that is
(13:19):
life changing. That will say, yeah, it's French influence, but
it's much. It was perfected in Gua Lacara because it
has a crispy outside that endures the salsa the drowning
of and a soft baguette inside that lets the meat
and pork lay beautifully on it. It's the perfect bread.
(13:41):
So for me, I love. Let me ask you a
question about have you had it anywhere outside of No?
Just because I can't, you can't go. There are a
bunch of place possible. You can't because of the bread
is not the same, right, you can't bread that cannot
You can't recreate the bread because of the altitude and
(14:02):
the water and the soil, like it's a whole thing
with the so it. People have tried, they believe me,
everybody has tried to replicate it outside of Jalisco and
it's impossible, you know, like they can't get it right, Okay,
because I know there are a bunch of places in
La that have I haven't tried, but I wonder I
(14:24):
have to try. But I feel like I have to
go to Jalisco and taste the original, and then I
can and then I can have a bar of reference.
Do you know the beetle thing is named after was
named after Camille Beatlet, a Belgian baker for the French
army and la under Emper Maximlian. Yep, it's so cool.
So the bread is a little bit more acidic. It's
(14:44):
a little more sour than um than a traditional sour dough.
Is the is the sauce that goes on? Is it
like a spicy sauce? Is it like a tomato? That's
the thing that's the interesting thing. It's obviously tomato chili base.
It's red, but you you can the sauce. They pour
the sauce on it, and then they go, do you
want spicy? And you say yeah, And there's a different
(15:05):
red sauce that they put on top of that. Yeah.
So the sauce that goes on is actually a sweet sauce,
considerably less spicy. It's made of tomatoes and chiles. You
can have media algada, which is half drowned, or biann algada,
which is well drowned. So do you eat it with
your hands? Yes, and a fork in? And I like
(15:25):
it all falls apart. That sounds so good. I want.
It's usually made of portarnitas, that's what this. It's usually
made of pork, pork garnitas with the pickled the pickled
red onions. Okay, oh my god, that sounds delicious. I'm hungry.
I love that. The beetlete is basically a Mexican baggett.
That's what they call it. Yeah, Mexican baggett, but with chile.
(15:47):
So it's so not with a chila sauce. It's so
not a baggette. When we come back. Brian Ford, an
award winning bread baker with Hondura Roots is joining the
show from his kitchen, and he's got a new cookbook
called New World Baking that is set for release later
this year in October. You can pre order that now
(16:10):
and guess what. Brian's sharing his thoughts on thorpas Welcome
back everyone. I had a chance to hang out with
Brian Ford for his new show he's working on with
Shonda Land and iHeartRadio. It's a podcast called Flaky Biscuit
(16:34):
and it launches on April eleventh. Here he is sharing
his thoughts on My name is Brian Ford. I'm a baker,
author and TV host, and I'm working on a really
amazing new podcast on Flaky Biscuit. We welcome our guests
onto the show and I cook their most nostalgic meal,
(16:57):
I mean, and it could be anything from apple pie
from the gas station or vending machine, or it could
be their grandmother's most signature dish. Whatever it is. Whatever
that nostalgic meal is, I'm going to try to recreate
it for them to enable us to have a conversation
about whether or not I delivered what's called the Proust effect,
where food is a vehicle for these nostalgic memories. That's
(17:21):
flaky biscuit, and I'm super excited about it. I don't
really eat tortas often, um, and the reasoning behind that
is because if I'm gonna eat, it has to be
a really, really great torta. I'm very particular about it.
(17:45):
I live in New York City, so there are definitely
lots of great tortas there. And my favorite type of
torta is the tort I mean, it's absolutely a phenomenal torta.
It is, uh, you know, Karmita's stuff into a freshly
baked beatote bread, which is a sour dough bread made
specifically in Wadalajara, and this torta is then drowned in
(18:09):
two different types of salsa, and one of them is
very spicy. And of course we've got some red onions
that kind of go on there as well, pickled red onions,
maybe maybe even a little bit of a crumble cheese.
I really recommend everyone try. I think that the soul
(18:29):
of the torta at the end of the day, the
core of a torta is Mexican cooking and the flavors, spices,
and ingredients that are associated with Mexican cuisine. If you
really think about what a torta is at the end
of the day, you know, is it a sandwich? You know,
it's bread with filling. But to simplify it torta and
(18:51):
call it a sand which is not really doing it
justice because of how unique these fillings and flavors and
textures and ingredients really are. I mean, when you're eating
a torta, you're gonna know distinctly that you're eating something
with that Mexican soul in it. And you know, there's
so many different types. You got to get the bread right,
of course, you know, you've got to get the meat right,
(19:13):
and the way the meat is prepared is very important.
So I think the soul of the at the end
of the day comes from the techniques and traditions from
the cooks of Mexico. There's one torta restaurant right near
(19:37):
our house in Mexico City, and we walk to it
a lot, and it's it's one of Peppa's favorites. I mean,
Peppa loves tortas. We don't make them at home, but
he loves he loves tortas. I make tortas when I
go to my Mexican markets. I'll always buy the letras
and I'll just put like a little schmir of black beans, hams,
some cheese and cheap or plant avocado and that's it.
(19:59):
And I love them. Beppo was saying, he just said,
in Mexico City, it's called Torta's Royalty. That's the place
to go in Mexico City. All right, that's the place
to go in Mexico City. Well, I think of anybody,
anybody listening in the La area, let us know where
the best tortas are, because I'm I'm game. I'm game
to have my mind convinced that it's more than a sandwich.
(20:20):
It's a it's a special sense, it's a special sandwich.
It's a sandwich on steroids. I do love, I do love.
Thanks everybody for listening to our Torta episode. If you
have any great recipes or places, please leave them in
the comments section below, and thank you so much for listening.
(20:46):
Don't forget to tune in. Next week we have an
episode all about beer. Did you know that humans have
been drinking beer for well over seven thousand years and
that the original brewers were women? For millennia, beer provided
an import source of nutrients and was a part of
the average person's diet. Making beer was a household task,
(21:06):
so naturally it fell into the hands of women. So
when did brewing move out of the home and become
a commercial activity associated with men. It's a good story
that involves witchcraft, so tune in next week to find out.
Hungry for History is an unbelievable entertainment production in partnership
(21:28):
with Ihearts my Kultura podcast network. For more of your
favorite shows, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
The introduction of European crops was a natural step in
the conquest of America, and wheat was one of the
first foods introduced into Mexico. And where there is wheat,
there is to This episode is all about tortas. My
name is Eva Longoria and I am and welcome to
(00:23):
Hungry for History, a podcast that explores our past and
present through food. On every episode, we'll talk about the
history of some of our favorite dishes, ingredients, and beverages.
So make yourself at home. Rachel, Mexican sandwiches take the
(00:44):
sandwich game to a whole other level. And look, let's
dive in, let's dissect. Okay, wheat is not native to
meso America. It's not endemic to messo America. No, no,
it's not. Jeffrey Pilcher, he's a food history and who's amazing.
He wrote this book called Food and the Making of
Mexican Identity, and he goes into wheat. You know, in Spain,
(01:08):
Iberian people had been cultivating we using methods developed in
Syria and Egypt for millennia before they were in Mexico.
And when Spain was part of the Roman Empire, they
valued white bread, so much that they added chock to
it to achieve purity. What I know, it's just so bizarre.
(01:30):
And during the reconquest of fourteen ninety two we took
on a prearticular religious significance. Right it became, you know,
the only grain suitable for the eucharistic wafer. I mean,
it was already being used for that, but it just
took on a very religious significance during this period. So
(01:54):
it was very important to the Spaniards to who had
migrated to America to the colonizer, and also Ferdinand and Isabella,
the Catholic monarch, so who were in charge of this
reconquest beginning in fifteen oh four. They had a bunch
of policies to foment work production. They allowed shepherds to
(02:17):
run their animals through fields, through wheat fields, and cut
down forests to provide pasture. So they were sort of
rethinking agriculture, and this resulted in famine and hunger. Yeah,
so a lot of these conquistadors remember this, Some of
them have been through hunger in Spain. What are they
(02:38):
going to do in this new land? So let's bring
this wheat, which I find super interesting that aspect of
wheat that we didn't really talk about when we talked
when we did our corn and flower episode. Yeah, we
didn't talk about that because I didn't really Yeah, I
was like where where did wheat come from? Anyway? And
then and then like how did it end up in France?
And like all the other bread staples of Europe. I mean,
(03:02):
we could do a whole bread breads around the world.
Of all the products that were brought to Mexico during
the conquest, the one that symbolized European culture and sustenance
(03:24):
was wheat, right, and so this wheat farm served as
a foundation for Spanish user patient of native lands in
central Mexico. We think, we're not one hundred percent sure.
But Juangari, though he was an African who was a
member of Ernan Cortes's expedition, was said to have found
three grains of wheat in a bag of rice, and
(03:46):
he planted them and became the first person to cultivate
wheat in America. So this guy, Juangario was given property
in fifteen twenty two for in exchange for his service,
and he became a farmer by fifteen twenty four. A
message that at Nan Cortez sent to Charles. The fifth
mentions cultivation of wheat in Carya Gan you know, Mexico City,
(04:09):
and that's when bread became a big part of the
of the culture clash of the two different worlds because
you again, because of the religious history of the Communion wafer,
Spanish missionaries really preached the goodness of wheat as part
of their like message that it was religious necessity and
(04:33):
that wasn't bread. Isn't a food that you know, the
indigenous people ate, you know, and so they found the
taste kind of bland, and they preferred their corn, which
I agreed to, I prefer corn to wheat. But they
were forced to eat it. They were forced to eat it,
and they said that it tasted like famine food. I mean,
it was like a horrible Yeah, they didn't they were,
(04:55):
but they were forced to eat it. And it was
one of the ultimate you know, f you were to
plant the wheat where your corners, and we're gonna make
you eat this. By fifteen eighty seven, Puebla had become
the granary of New Spain and they were shipping sending
regular shipments of wheat to the ports of Vera Cruz,
(05:15):
to Yucatan, and as far as the Caribbean, so you
know it took off. It took off, but it didn't
take off naturally. They were forced to incorporate wheat into
the diet. What are some of the colonial breads that
this would be, Oh, Claudia, Claudia would hate these colonial breads.
A bun especial, which was made with refined flour Florida Arena.
(05:40):
It was soft, white, expensive and by the end of
the seventeen hundreds only two bakeries made bun especial and
they were really made for religious higher ups. Now yep,
and this part doesn't exist anymore. I must say fun
especial no longer, no longer. Another colonial bread was spun floriado,
which was the second best in quality and it was
(06:01):
also made with high quality flour. It was shaped into
round buns. That also no longer exists. Oh, doesn't exist. Buncommune,
which is similar to bolios. That's that's that exists. They're
sold everywhere. So the common bread buncommun the common bread
is that sold everywhere, that survived, that survived. Bambajo with
(06:24):
an X became bambaso, which was a bread made with
leftover and discarded ingredients including weevil riddled flour. Um. It
came from the words bun bajo because it was a
bread for the poor. Um. So this exists in Veracrus.
It's filled with beans and mayo and ham and chicken
torrisa lettuce Mexico City. It's a street food and it's
(06:46):
stuffed with potatoes and torriso and drenched in chile wahilo sauce.
So this is from the colonial bambajo with an exe
that was reserved for the for the poor. So the
lower class bread there. Class breads are basically yeah. And
then this one, the a semita is another bread that survived.
That's a reference to a popular bread made in medieval
(07:09):
Spain by the Sephardic Jews that live there. And it's
sort of a crunchy bread that's topped with sesame seeds
and a mixt of flowers. And now there's a semita
uses that particular bread that survives as well. So under
Mexico's French occupation in the nineteenth century, after that, the
(07:32):
country was inundated with bakeries and that again that's where
we get the bread in Halisco to make torta rada
because that was a French, a French baker that taught
them how to do that. So most of the bakeries
were Spanish or French owned. They were owned by French
and Spanish, but ninety percent of the bakers that worked
there were native artisans who developed innovative, unique pastries based
(07:58):
on European trends, but really, you know, with their native
dna um. And I think that's why we see, you know,
some of these breads having like a hybrid of what
it is. Don't go anywhere hungry for history, We'll be
right back. Do you make? It's so funny because I'm
(08:25):
not a bread eater, but I like to bake bread.
During the pandemic, I was a croissant maker because that
takes like three days to make one croissant, and so
I that was my jam during the pandemic. But I
like I do. I'd like to figure out how to
bake that. The bread for the tortas in Jali school,
that would be very interesting to try to recreate that.
(08:46):
We should go to Jalisco and do a tort or class.
That would be amazing. We should, we should do it.
I took a class, actually a bunch of classes with
Elisa Lada, who we had on u Bandul episode early on,
and I took up Boli class. It was during the pandemic.
It was a virtual class. I couldn't believe, like at
(09:10):
the end of class, I had perfect bread to make
like it was just it was amazing. I was just
in Mexico City a couple of weeks ago and my
mom is from there, and she was like, bring back
boli jos. It was like, I fee like bring back balios.
She's like, bring back baliyas. It's not the same. So
I have a bunch of from Mexico City in my
(09:33):
freezer for when she comes to visit, so that we
could have bliyos. Well. This is why I love our
podcast is because we like to weave in how history
made food evolve and for the for the torta in particular,
(09:56):
after Mexican independence in a eighteen twenty one, the country
was searching for a new identity and the torta was
born out of that revolution and the way bread was
really understood in Mexico, and so I love that. According
to historian Jeffrey Pilcher, that there was a street taco
vendor that would make street tacos, and he just had
(10:19):
the idea of using bread instead instead of a torthea
in Mexico City. And that's kind of the first time
that the torta appears right. It was in this newspaper
in eighteen sixty four. And then by the nineteenth century
it was no longer tortilla versus bread, like we didn't
have to choose, like the colonists made us right, Like
(10:40):
the colonists were like, no more tetilla, you must eat bread.
Now in the nineteenth century it was tortilla and bread,
and that was like, finally the harmony had settled in
into Mexico. Have the choice, it was changed. We have
the choice. We have the choice. Do you want your
pork with a torthia or do you want your pork
on a sandwich? Exactly, you have the choice. And in
(11:04):
eighteen ninety two, a man named Armando Martinez Centurion opened
the first torteia in downtown Mexico City, and his tortas
were considered a Baroque creation, and they were referred to
as La las tortu Santo the tortez of the Holy Spirit,
because they were so delicious. Um he sold tortas with
(11:27):
chicken with pork with milanesa with sardines, which I don't
know about that, but they had avocado and lettuce and
chile chipotle fresco, and it was such a popular tortia.
The people, like the after cantine Flas used to visit
musician I was in Lada, like it was super popular
(11:48):
and he always accompanied the tortas that he sold with
an orange, pineapple and lime wafresca. UM. So this was
the first torteia. But then we have regional of the variations.
You know, all over the country. You have the Tortasauga
that's that you mentioned from Jalisco. We mentioned briefly the
semitas from Puebla that has string cheese and milanesa um.
(12:13):
But every region has a different torta. But it's basically,
you know, it's an interesting use. Sandwich is the bolio
the only one, the only bread used for they're different breads,
they're different breads, but the most common breads for tortas
or the andra, and they're basically a similar type of bread.
The bolio is a little rounder um sort of oval
(12:34):
and a little just sort of more you know, chubby.
It's crunchy on the outside and soft and spongee on
the inside. Um. And then the the leta is a
similar dough, but it's flat um, so it's a little
bit flat. It's oval that has these two incisions on top.
But these are the two most popular ones. The lettras
sometimes used in place of the tortilla um, but it's
(12:58):
essentially the same thing that the lera. As origin comes
from an inferior wheat bread consumed by Andalusian workers in Spain,
so the recipe was modified in Mexico, but it's essentially
the same dough used for the for the rolillo's just
a different shape. Yeah. Well, the bot is my favorite.
I've never never had one. I've never had that is
(13:19):
life changing. That will say, yeah, it's French influence, but
it's much. It was perfected in Gua Lacara because it
has a crispy outside that endures the salsa the drowning
of and a soft baguette inside that lets the meat
and pork lay beautifully on it. It's the perfect bread.
(13:41):
So for me, I love. Let me ask you a
question about have you had it anywhere outside of No?
Just because I can't, you can't go. There are a
bunch of place possible. You can't because of the bread
is not the same, right, you can't bread that cannot
You can't recreate the bread because of the altitude and
(14:02):
the water and the soil, like it's a whole thing
with the so it. People have tried, they believe me,
everybody has tried to replicate it outside of Jalisco and
it's impossible, you know, like they can't get it right, Okay,
because I know there are a bunch of places in
La that have I haven't tried, but I wonder I
(14:24):
have to try. But I feel like I have to
go to Jalisco and taste the original, and then I
can and then I can have a bar of reference.
Do you know the beetle thing is named after was
named after Camille Beatlet, a Belgian baker for the French
army and la under Emper Maximlian. Yep, it's so cool.
So the bread is a little bit more acidic. It's
(14:44):
a little more sour than um than a traditional sour dough.
Is the is the sauce that goes on? Is it
like a spicy sauce? Is it like a tomato? That's
the thing that's the interesting thing. It's obviously tomato chili base.
It's red, but you you can the sauce. They pour
the sauce on it, and then they go, do you
want spicy? And you say yeah, And there's a different
(15:05):
red sauce that they put on top of that. Yeah.
So the sauce that goes on is actually a sweet sauce,
considerably less spicy. It's made of tomatoes and chiles. You
can have media algada, which is half drowned, or biann algada,
which is well drowned. So do you eat it with
your hands? Yes, and a fork in? And I like
(15:25):
it all falls apart. That sounds so good. I want.
It's usually made of portarnitas, that's what this. It's usually
made of pork, pork garnitas with the pickled the pickled
red onions. Okay, oh my god, that sounds delicious. I'm hungry.
I love that. The beetlete is basically a Mexican baggett.
That's what they call it. Yeah, Mexican baggett, but with chile.
(15:47):
So it's so not with a chila sauce. It's so
not a baggette. When we come back. Brian Ford, an
award winning bread baker with Hondura Roots is joining the
show from his kitchen, and he's got a new cookbook
called New World Baking that is set for release later
this year in October. You can pre order that now
(16:10):
and guess what. Brian's sharing his thoughts on thorpas Welcome
back everyone. I had a chance to hang out with
Brian Ford for his new show he's working on with
Shonda Land and iHeartRadio. It's a podcast called Flaky Biscuit
(16:34):
and it launches on April eleventh. Here he is sharing
his thoughts on My name is Brian Ford. I'm a baker,
author and TV host, and I'm working on a really
amazing new podcast on Flaky Biscuit. We welcome our guests
onto the show and I cook their most nostalgic meal,
(16:57):
I mean, and it could be anything from apple pie
from the gas station or vending machine, or it could
be their grandmother's most signature dish. Whatever it is. Whatever
that nostalgic meal is, I'm going to try to recreate
it for them to enable us to have a conversation
about whether or not I delivered what's called the Proust effect,
where food is a vehicle for these nostalgic memories. That's
(17:21):
flaky biscuit, and I'm super excited about it. I don't
really eat tortas often, um, and the reasoning behind that
is because if I'm gonna eat, it has to be
a really, really great torta. I'm very particular about it.
(17:45):
I live in New York City, so there are definitely
lots of great tortas there. And my favorite type of
torta is the tort I mean, it's absolutely a phenomenal torta.
It is, uh, you know, Karmita's stuff into a freshly
baked beatote bread, which is a sour dough bread made
specifically in Wadalajara, and this torta is then drowned in
(18:09):
two different types of salsa, and one of them is
very spicy. And of course we've got some red onions
that kind of go on there as well, pickled red onions,
maybe maybe even a little bit of a crumble cheese.
I really recommend everyone try. I think that the soul
(18:29):
of the torta at the end of the day, the
core of a torta is Mexican cooking and the flavors, spices,
and ingredients that are associated with Mexican cuisine. If you
really think about what a torta is at the end
of the day, you know, is it a sandwich? You know,
it's bread with filling. But to simplify it torta and
(18:51):
call it a sand which is not really doing it
justice because of how unique these fillings and flavors and
textures and ingredients really are. I mean, when you're eating
a torta, you're gonna know distinctly that you're eating something
with that Mexican soul in it. And you know, there's
so many different types. You got to get the bread right,
of course, you know, you've got to get the meat right,
(19:13):
and the way the meat is prepared is very important.
So I think the soul of the at the end
of the day comes from the techniques and traditions from
the cooks of Mexico. There's one torta restaurant right near
(19:37):
our house in Mexico City, and we walk to it
a lot, and it's it's one of Peppa's favorites. I mean,
Peppa loves tortas. We don't make them at home, but
he loves he loves tortas. I make tortas when I
go to my Mexican markets. I'll always buy the letras
and I'll just put like a little schmir of black beans, hams,
some cheese and cheap or plant avocado and that's it.
(19:59):
And I love them. Beppo was saying, he just said,
in Mexico City, it's called Torta's Royalty. That's the place
to go in Mexico City. All right, that's the place
to go in Mexico City. Well, I think of anybody,
anybody listening in the La area, let us know where
the best tortas are, because I'm I'm game. I'm game
to have my mind convinced that it's more than a sandwich.
(20:20):
It's a it's a special sense, it's a special sandwich.
It's a sandwich on steroids. I do love, I do love.
Thanks everybody for listening to our Torta episode. If you
have any great recipes or places, please leave them in
the comments section below, and thank you so much for listening.
(20:46):
Don't forget to tune in. Next week we have an
episode all about beer. Did you know that humans have
been drinking beer for well over seven thousand years and
that the original brewers were women? For millennia, beer provided
an import source of nutrients and was a part of
the average person's diet. Making beer was a household task,
(21:06):
so naturally it fell into the hands of women. So
when did brewing move out of the home and become
a commercial activity associated with men. It's a good story
that involves witchcraft, so tune in next week to find out.
Hungry for History is an unbelievable entertainment production in partnership
(21:28):
with Ihearts my Kultura podcast network. For more of your
favorite shows, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
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