I had my first pambazo one Sunday evening back in my twenties, at a street stall down in Coyoacan in southern Mexico City and it marred me. From the moment I’d learned of their existence, I’d dreamed of coming across a street stall proffering chile-dipped, crispy-seared buns filled with browned chorizo and potatoes, garnished with crunchy lettuce, thick crema, fresh cheese and spicy salsa verde. What was passed to me that night, wrapped in a napkin, was not that pambazo, but a concoction that had been sitting in a greasy puddle of fat for hours before being garnished with lettuce that was a whisper away from turning to liquid. I developed an aversion to ever stepping back into that street food stream.
One of our chefs in Xoco lives for pambazos. For him, the ideal pambazo is, truly, everything I’d imagined all those years ago, and, so, he set about to erase my pambazo phobia. He slathered the bun with red chile, then sprayed it with oil and baked–rather than fried–it to crispness. He stuffed it with everything fresh–freshly cooked chorizo with potatoes, crunchy lettuce and all the rest. And it was a revelation–or should I say the fulfillment of a long-lost dream? Today, I consider it one of the world’s greatest sandwiches. A sandwich that’s celebrated especially fervently in Mexico during Independence Day or any day in Veracruz (where fillings range well beyond chorizo and potatoes).
Traditionally, the bread is dipped in the chile marinade and then fried. If you go that route, you’ll need oil to a depth of at least ¼ inch (about ¾ cup for an extra large skillet) and you’ll need to fry it for 1 to 1 ½ minutes on each side until it crisps.
A note about bread: if you won’t be making the pambazo rolls, feel free to use teleras (lots of people in Mexico do). I’ve even made pambazos with sturdy hamburger buns and they were great.
INGREDIENTS
- For the red chile marinade:
- 3 garlic cloves
- 4 medium (1 ounce) guajillo chiles, stemmed, seeded and torn into smaller pieces
- A couple of árbol chiles stemmed and broken in half (if you’d like to add some heat)
- 1/4 teaspoon EACH cinnamon and black pepper, preferably freshly ground
- 1/8 teaspoon cloves, preferably freshly ground
- Salt
- For the pambazos
- 1 pound fresh Mexican chorizo sausage, casing removed
- 1 medium onion, cut into ¼-inch pieces
- 1 pound boiling potatoes (like the red-skin ones) or Yukon Gold-type, peeled (if you want) and cut into pieces a little smaller than ½ inch
- 6 pambazo rolls or teleras
- A few tablespoons vegetable oil to brush or spray on the bread
- 3 cups sliced (about ¼ inch) lettuce (a crunchy iceberg is common here, but I like romaine hearts for more flavor
- About 1 cup Mexican crema , sour cream or creme fraiche, thinned with a little milk if necessary to make it easily spoonable
- About 1/2 cup (about 2 ounces) crumbled Mexican queso fresco, or other garnishing cheese like salted pressed farmers cheese, mild goat cheese or feta
- About 1 cup salsa, I like roasted tomatillo salsa
INSTRUCTIONS
Make the red chile marinade. Collect the garlic and chiles in a blender jar and measure in ¾ cup of water. Add the cinnamon, black pepper and cloves. Blend to a smooth puree (this may take a couple of minutes). Taste and season highly with salt, usually about 2 teaspoons.
Make the chorizo-potato filling. In a very large (12-inch) skillet set over medium, break up the chorizo into smallish pieces. As soon as it starts rendering fat (if yours doesn't render much, add a little oil), stir in the onion. Cook, stirring regularly, until the chorizo is cooked through and beginning to brown, 8 to 10 minutes. While the chorizo is cooking, scoop the potatoes into a microwave-safe bowl, sprinkle generously with salt, add a splash of water and cover (if using plastic wrap, poke a few holes) and microwave until fully tender, 4 to 5 minutes. Uncover (beware of steam), tip off the water and stir in to the cooked chorizo. Cook about 5 minutes longer, stirring and breaking up the potatoes, until the mixture starts to hold together. Taste and season with salt if necessary.
Finish the pambazos. Heat the oven to 425. Cut the pambazos or teleras in half around the equator and lay them cut-side down on the baking sheet lined with parchment or a silicone baking mat. Brush the exposed side of each piece liberally with the red chile marinade (regrettably, a messy job), then slide into the oven to bake for about 8 minutes, until the chile is baked in and the buns are mostly dry to the touch. Remove the buns from the oven, then brush or spray liberally with oil. Slide back into the oven and toast for about 4 minutes more, until the bread is crisp. Remove from the oven and flip the bases over.
Reheat the chorizo filling if necessary, then top the bases with a portion of the chorizo, lettuce, cream (drizzle it all over), fresco cheese and spoonfuls of salsa. Set a red-chile crusted top on each one, press gently to compact everything and you’re ready to serve.
