The Breakfast Taco

[rancho_gordo]

A taco is a tortilla rolled, or folded, over any kind of food. The burrito is a special type of taco that was invented in Sonora and consists of a rolled flour tortilla...

Burritos (by West Coast standards) are steamed or grilled white flour tortillas. We don't have anything called a burro that I've ever seen.

An enchilada is dipped in fat and then dipped in a chile sauce (hence enchilada), or sometimes in the reverse order. It is then stuffed (or not) and rolled. Has anyone done this with a flour tortilla?

[Mudpuppie]

An enchilada is dipped in fat and then dipped in a chile sauce (hence enchilada), or sometimes in the reverse order. It is then stuffed (or not) and rolled. Has anyone done this with a flour tortilla?

Yes, unfortunately. A coworker of mine makes enchiladas this way (with canned sauce).

Nothing like gummy flour in canned red sauce.

[Jaymes]

An enchilada is dipped in fat and then dipped in a chile sauce (hence enchilada), or sometimes in the reverse order. It is then stuffed (or not) and rolled. Has anyone done this with a flour tortilla?

The corn tortilla is dipped into fat and chile sauce in order to soften it and make it easier to roll, in addition to adding flavor.

I have a great many burro/burrito recipes. It is not usually necessary to dip the flour tortilla into fat to soften it, so that step is skipped. Many of my burro recipes do, in fact, call for the flour tortilla to be dipped into a chile sauce of some kind to add flavor. And those that don't call for said dipping invariably call for a chile sauce to either be folded into the filling, or spread over the top.

The point, though, was not that they are identical; but rather, that when a flour tortilla is stuffed and rolled in what is basically the manner of an enchilada, in the wheat-producing northern states of Mexico where it undoubtedly originated and remains popular, it's generally called a burro, and in the US Southwest, a burrito.

Or at least that's so in my experience, I should add.

Edited March 19, 2004 by Jaymes (log)

[ExtraMSG]

My dad makes enchiladas with flour tortillas. Has for a long time now (maybe 15 years). I really think they're inferior because of the texture, but I think they like them because it's easier (no frying required) and Americans seem to still be wheat eaters at their core, even those that have been eating Mexican for 30 years or more.

[hollywood]

My dad makes enchiladas with flour tortillas. Has for a long time now (maybe 15 years).

Is your dad Nick Hornby?

[lovebenton0]

The history of the breakfast taco is elusive. Calls to state universities, the Institute of Texan Cultures, Pace Foods, Texas historians, as well as the perusal of 100 Texas cookbooks, failed to turn up its origin. But the breakfast taco seems to have begun in Texas.

....

Still, he thinks it started in Texas....

Peyton says he's never seen anything like them in Mexico.

But, "many people in many places have been scrambling eggs and putting them into a tortilla."

WTF?

I've never gone to a place in Mexico where tacos weren't served at stands in the morning. And who does't get a basket full of tortillas with their huevos con chorizo?

I have to say that I hope this trend spreads because the breakfast taco is so much superior to the norm out here, the breakfast burrito, imo.

And do you suppose that the "researchers" at the Austin American Statesman ever considered that they might be looking in the wrong places (all TX institutes and companies ) for their data? Perhaps if they had broadened the search to include other sources they might have found something more useful, even direct in their connections? Can't find anything (in Texas) that doesn't say it was started here, but since we sell so many we must have started it?

And

...."The earliest recollections were the breakfast tacos sold by street vendors . . . historically, Mexican workers both in Texas and border cities." 

WTF indeed!

[Mabelline]

Holy mas harina!! Such a debate! I am in agreement with Jaymes, as a kid -not cabrito-in Arizona. But I spent a lot of time in Puerto Penasco, Nogales, and on the other sites, New Mexico, Albe., and Crystal City and Carrizo Springs, Texas. I ate burros in Arizona, flat corn enchiladas in New Mexico, and breakfast tacos-papas con huevos y chorizos in Texas. I always have preferred corn tortillas, but when the flour ones were noticibly better(as in Tucson),then go for it!

Breakfast tacos are probably as fundimental as a Mestizo going out to work in the morning.

[ExtraMSG]

My dad makes enchiladas with flour tortillas.  Has for a long time now (maybe 15 years).

Is your dad Nick Hornby?

The author of High Fidelity?

[ExtraMSG]

And do you suppose that the "researchers" at the Austin American Statesman ever considered that they might be looking in the wrong places (all TX institutes and companies ) for their data? Perhaps if they had broadened the search to include other sources they might have found something more useful, even direct in their connections? Can't find anything (in Texas) that doesn't say it was started here, but since we sell so many we must have started it?

And

...."The earliest recollections were the breakfast tacos sold by street vendors . . . historically, Mexican workers both in Texas and border cities."  

WTF indeed!

Peyton should at least know better. I still want to know if these are closer to tacos or burritos. Either way doesn't avoid the problem. If they're tacos, then Mexico has been doing them for a long time. If they're burritos, it's more likely that Sonoran influenced Mexican would be the origin.

[caroline]

This seems a pretty open ended discussion. But to add my south of the border comments, this is what I'd say about central Mexico.

Flour tortillas are getting very popular especially with school children (quick in the microwave). They are thought of as exotic and foreign. I've never seen them on a breakfast menu.

THE breakfast tortilla dish is chilaquiles. Like French toast, this uses leftovers and stuff in the fridge: yesterday's fresh corn tortillas, red or green salsa, crema, and a bit of cheese or shredded chicken. Really good stuff.

Rachel

[theabroma]

If they're tacos, then Mexico has been doing them for a long time. If they're burritos, it's more likely that Sonoran influenced Mexican would be the origin.

In the mid to late '70's I lived outside of San Juan, Texas, close to McAllen and Edinburg, and about 15 miles from the Hidalgo/Reynosa international bridge. Corn tortillas, even along the Frontera were still the thing - but at home on the Texas side, most of the ladies made flour tortillas. The style was about an 8-9 inch round, rolled out pretty thin, using a sawed off broom handle for a rolling pin (they are the bomb).

If you went to someone's house to eat, there would be - depending on what was being served - both flour and corn tortillas. However, everyone used to go 'to the other side' to buy the corn tortillas from the tortillerias. I don't know what it is about US tortillerias, but they just don't have the same texture, aroma, or taste. Anyway. The same was true of restaurants - you would get both flour and corn in the little basket when it came to the table.

Enchiladas, migas, chilaquiles, gorditas, etc were ALWAYS made from corn masa. The same is true for tacos - unless, of course, you asked for 'soft tacos,' which used flour tortillas. There were two restaurants there that I especially liked - one called Patos, which was a taqueria specializing in the standard array of taco fillings, but using 4" flour tortillas as wraps. The other place, Cuevas, was famous for its burritos. They were the size of one's forearm. The basic filling was refried beans and queso fresco or queso quesilla (like mozzarella), and chiles, but you could get fancy with carne guisada or shredded fajita, etc. The kicker was the tortillas: flour, and tissue thin, and 18 to 20 something inches across. Although I did not have the point of reference at the time, they are very like the enormous, thin corn tortillas, clayudas or tlayudas, for which Oaxaca is famous. These come from Sonora-Durango, and they are actually rolled out as thinly as possible, then stretched either much like strudel dough is stretched (over the backs of the hands) or rolled and slapped and stretched as traditionally pasta dough is rolled out.

Everyone I worked with brown-bagged it every day: flour tortilla tacos filled with potato & egg, chorizo & egg, refried beans & cheese, etc. Since these people were largely earning their living picking crops along the migrant stream, this food was easy to take along, and there were always beans, potatoes, eggs, etc around. Often the cheese was American slices. The tortillas were always freshly made, and many carried 'Bama jelly jars full of chile pequines (the plant grows wild throughout much of Texas), pickled in vinegar.

The same for the burritos, especially since they are rolled up rather like a spring roll - closing the ends, thereby stopping leakage.

Northern Mexico is where the Spanish planted wheat, and so wheat flour and its products has always figured more heavily in the northern part of the country than elsewhere.

It is a very rural area with lots of little ranchitos scattered around. People go out for the day to work the land, and generally don't come home until late afternoon. Turning the staples of corn, flour, beans, chile, etc. into portable food is very desirable.

I think as these people crossed the border working the crops or moving into and through Texas to other states, they took this type of quick and easy food with them. I do believe that the elaborated taco and burrito, as we know them here in the Southwest, are largely American constructions. I have seen and eaten tacos in Mexico, and burritos in the northern parts of the country, but I have never seen burritos and tacos like we find up here in places like On the Border or Chipotle, etc. in Mexico. It's just our take on them I think.

Theabroma

[ExtraMSG]

I can remember seeing things called burros in Puerto Vallarta actually being served by locals to locals. But PV has places called Fajita Republic, too. Ironically, they were smaller than our burritos, even the average taco bell variety.

I was just in San Diego a couple months ago and was talking with my uncle there. He's been buying a burrito for breakfast every day on his way to work for over a decade, he said. My dad, who went to UCLA, used to get them for breakfast in college.

I wish there were better sources for understanding the history of Mexican-American food. I've even searched academic libraries and can't really find much.

[Mabelline]

Ah, what a reminisce that theabroma's post made. She described with eloquence the much-loved cartwheel tortillas of Arizona and its border towns. They are big and translucent, and once heated, they are perfect with nothing more than butter or some cheese. I could gnaw on wood -almost- just picturing them! In Arizona, they are quite available at a Basha's or a Fry's, but way better at a small maker.

We used to buy those mini-sized tacos she also mentioned down in Nogales when they were three for a peso (.08 at that time). At the same stand we got them they served a plate of roasted doves for $1.50 equivalent. God, we would scarf.

[theabroma]

At the same stand we got them they served a plate of roasted doves for $1.50 equivalent. God, we would scarf.

You are making me crave the border like I haven't in so long a time. The cities like Reynosa, Brownsville, etc. are crazy. Juarez is so huge, and so sad a place now, a graveyard for young women. Ah, but the little towns and pueblos just on the other side are heaven! The best bolillos, no the best pan frances I have ever eaten in my life came from the wood fired ovens of a tiny bakery, La Francesa, in Ojinaga. So I can only imagine what you encountered in Arizona.

I have to stop myself from regretting how little my head knew about those foods, or about regional variation and diversity when I worked and lived in South Texas. I was too happy just encountering all this fabulous food and chunky liquid napalm you poured on it, to really stop and wonder about what part of the Republic it came from. But dollars to donas, the Cuevas people came from Sonora.

Is anyone out there familiar with the work of Les Blank (Flower Films) and Chris Strachwitz (Arhoolie Records)?. They did a documentary about '76 or '77 called "Chulas Fronteras." It is about the music culture along the Texas Mexico border in the part of the Valley where I lived. Find a great video store and get it. I lost it with the opening song, Cancion Mixteca ("Que lejos estoy del suelo donde nacido!"), got it together again just in time to see the spontaneous tardeada and barbeque going on in someone's yard with fajitas, and a musical trio singing rancheras, and the kids and dogs running around, and all the cold beer. But when the grill guy pulled the roasted chiles and tomatoes off the grill, tossed them into a 2 kilo empty plastic Hormel lard bucket for an impromptu molcajete, and then missing a tejolote, or mano, to grind the salsa with he grabbed his beer bottle and began to work the salsa, I lost it for the rest of the movie. The tacos they are eating at this little gathering look divine. This was what went on on Saturdays, and many Sundays the entire time I lived in the Valley. And yes, the beer bottle 'mano' happens rather more often than I would like to think.

It was here that I first learned what 'real' Mexican food could be, and these were the people who were my first hands-on teachers.

Theabroma

Edited March 20, 2004 by theabroma (log)

[Jay Francis]

For me, a taco was always a taco. The 'breakfast taco' name evolved I think when Mexican ladies began selling tacos to non Mexican office workers and making them with soft tortillas as opposed to crispy tortillas. Gringos started calling them breakfast tacos, so as not to confuse them with the traditional crispy taco, I think.

Taco: the roots of the word. A 'wad" as in the wadding one would stuff into a cannon before loading the cannonball.

[Mabelline]

I guess the wadding explaination is one I could definitely use for some of the explosive salsas I've had

[Richard Kilgore]

Upthread someone, Jaymes I think, said that flour tortillas were a recent thing here in Texas. But I believe I recall Tex-Mex restaurants in Austin in the 60s bringing both corn and flour to the table, your choice. Anyone else remember that?

[ExtraMSG]

When was the fajita invented and did/does it ever involve corn tortillas?

[lovebenton0]

I don't remember Austin in those days, but during the 60s up around Dallas one of my best friends, Yolande, in grade school lived close by. Her mother made the most delicious small 4" corn tortillas and large thin 6-8" flour tortillas at home. They were from MX, but as I was a kid I don't remember where they had lived down there. It seemed that the Mexican restaurant we used to go to in Irving had both flour and corn tortillas also. When I returned to Texas in the 70s both corn and flour tortillas were common at restaurants, taco stands, and in the stores in Houston.

As I said upthread somewhere, I ate both corn and flour tortillas, but flour was more prevalent, when in Central Mexico. But, when I was down south, on a survey on the Rio Balsa near a village, Papalutla, about 200 miles below Cuernevaca, the ladies there made corn tortillas that we bought every day. No flour tortillas there.

[Jaymes]

Upthread someone, Jaymes I think, said that flour tortillas were a recent thing here in Texas. But I believe I recall Tex-Mex restaurants in Austin in the 60s bringing both corn and flour to the table, your choice. Anyone else remember that?

I didn't mean to suggest that flour tortillas didn't exist in Texas in the 50's, 60s, etc., just that they weren't particularly popular among the general restaurant-going population. I, too, was eating in Mexican restaurants during that time and as I recall it, when they brought you tortillas, corn was the default. You could request flour, and they'd bring them, but somebody at the table would always ask, "You LIKE those?"

Edited March 22, 2004 by Jaymes (log)

[chefrodrigo]

I'd like to throw in my 2 cents on burritos vs tacos for what it's worth. I've always considered it a size issue. Small tortillas, corn or flour, have always been tacos to me. Large tortillas, flour only, have always been burritos to me.

My Mexican/American inlaws in California disagree though. They say flour, small or large, is a burrito and corn is a taco.

As for breakfast tacos being from Texas I'd like to throw this in. Ordering a plate of eggs with whatever and getting a basket of tortillas on the side is not the same as ordering breakfast tacos.

When I lived in Dallas I don't remember seeing many breakfast tacos. But it seems from Austin south they are everywhere.

Rodney

[theabroma]

Richard, was it Jaime's on Red River? That's what came to my mind.

I do remember the 1/2 and 1/2 tortilla basket being the norm there and in a few other places around town. Cisco's over on East 6th (Austin) always had both, and typically the waitress or waiter would ask your preference.

At Mi Tierra in the mercado in San Antonio, they would ask which variety you wanted.

I also just ran across a reference in Jim Douglas' little book from the '70's on New Mexican food to burritos which he describes as being enchiladas made from flour tortillas.

Speaking of which, I think the baking of enchiladas is a US thing - homes in the little towns scattered across Northern Mexico did not tend to have ovens.

I've seen some gone-to-the-dogs hybrids of Mexican food before, but have never commonly seen flour tortillas dipped into a sauce and rolled for enchiladas. I have no doubt, however, that in the regions where wheat flour tortillas are king, that there are homes that dispose of flour tortillas in some sort of enchilada/casserole fashion. But as corn tortillas end their life as tostadas, or in migas or chilaquiles, the most typical end for flour ones, at least along the Fronteras seems to be either bunuelos or quesadillas.

Theabroma

[rancho_gordo]

I've seen some gone-to-the-dogs hybrids of Mexican food before, but have never commonly seen flour tortillas dipped into a sauce and rolled for enchiladas.

That made me laugh!

I wonder if a flour "enchilada" isn't a point of reference rather than a literal dish. Both are folded and stuffed (normally). Maybe someone describing burritos used "enchiladas" to describe them. It doesn't sound very appealing to me.

On the other hand, I've noticed, the more I learn about Mexican food the more I realize there are very few, if any, absolutes. Mexican cooks love variations and I've learned to try and keep an open mind when I hear of something I feel is a mistake.

[ExtraMSG]

I don't think my dad dips his flour tortillas when making his flour tortillas enchiladas. He pours some sauce over the top and then bakes them.

I think in Mexican-American cooking, an enchilada is usually baked to melt all the cheese that is generally used in the Mexican-American version.

In Peyton's La Cocina de La Frontera, he breaks it down:

In Mexican-American cooking, an enchilada is almost always baked and served hot in contrast to authentic Mexican enchiladas which are are served without final heating and often as a street food. He mentions that this was probably the case also with the earliest Mexican-American enchiladas before the oven was common, but that now they are almost always baked. He offers a recipe for enchiladas in this older style based on the description of San Antonio market enchiladas of the late 1800s and early 1900s.

He offers a couple other types of enchiladas. One type, only found in New Mexico really, has the enchiladas stacked like pancakes. Another, referred to as a Sonoran enchilada involves making something like a large sope or round huarache, then covering in common Mexican-American enchilada fixings and then baking.

He offers a flour tortillas recipe which he refers to as encharitos de california. He doesn't give a timeline for them, but they're made exactly like most Mexican-American enchiladas, but with flour tortillas. Since my dad grew up in California, I'm sure this is where his idea for them came (even though when I was young we always had corn tortilla enchiladas and only after I was in college did he start making the flour kind, probably for my sisters who much prefer wheat to corn).

btw, one thing you find in a lot of his California recipes that was always a common ingredient of Mexican-American food when I was growing up is the black olive. Is it ever used in Tex-Mex?

[badthings]

I think in Mexican-American cooking, an enchilada is usually baked to melt all the cheese that is generally used in the Mexican-American version.

In Encarnacion Pinedo's 1898 El cocinero español (which was just delivered today -- Encarnacion was born in Santa Clara California in 1848) there are recipes for "spanish style" wheat tortillas as well as corn tortillas. Enchiladas are made with both (interestingly, corn are fried then dipped, flour dipped then fried). They are filled, folded or rolled, then baked. This should not, however be taken as a rule, since the name means only en-chile'd and is handled differently thoughout Mexico (as well as the part-of-the-US-formerly-known-as-Mexico). I think Bayless discusses some of these variations in Authentic Mex.

There is no mention of either tacos or burritos (at least in the index), which is not surprising since those are street food more than home cooking. Steingarten wrote a good article on flour tortillas, which I believe had some specific geography of origins, in the last year or two -- too recent, I think, to make it into the most recent book.

I hope we can all agree that, at least in the loose sense of tortillas served with eggs, "breakfast tacos" are pre-conquest.

EDIT to add that most towns must have had at least one forno which served a communal role much like the european baker's oven.

Edited March 22, 2004 by badthings (log)