I have mentioned before that I am not religious, but this Lent season I have challenged myself to make more meatless dinners. Like my friend Peter would say, I will never go “veg”, I don’t wanna go “veg”. I love meat too much, but it is always good to eat less meat for many reasons, right?
So here I present another meatless dinner perfect for Lent, gorditas de papa (potato corn cakes) Forget everything you have learned about Mexican food from Taco Bell. I know they have an item called gordita in their menu, but it doesn’t come even close to Mexican gorditas. Gorditas are a kind of fritangas (fried street food) found everywhere in the streets of Mexican cities and towns.
Gorditas are made with corn flour (the same kind used to make corn tortillas), they are stuffed with different ingredients and fried. After being cooked, they are opened and stuffed with lettuce, salsa, cheese, sour cream and chopped onion.The most common kind are gorditas de chicharron (pork skin), but for these gorditas I used mashed potatoes and pinto beans (for proteins) and stuffed them with chopped onions, sour cream, cheese, cabbage and salsa verde.
To prepare them just hydrate the corn flour following the instructions in the package. Make several masa balls and flatten them with your hands. Spoon some mashed potatoes and beans and close the gordita. Fry them in hot canola or vegetable oil for about 5 minutes per side. Open them up using a table knife and stuffed them with lettuce, cream, cheese, salsa, etc. and enjoy this authentic Mexican fast food.
¡Buen provecho!
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16 Replies
Don’t know why I’ve never been able to bring myself to order these at my favorite Mexican place (maybe I’m stuck in a rut). Your give me the urge not just to eat them but to make them. Love that potato and beans! Many thanks.
Posted on March 12th, 2009 at 2:44 pm
Thanks for reminding us Taco Bell does not qualify as true Mexican cuisine. These gorditas are far better than what we’ve seen on TB’s commercials. Much, much better.
Posted on March 12th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
These sound so yummy! Thanks for the recipe!
Posted on March 12th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
Streetfood…….non, no this is street cuisine!!! I imafine eating this hot with the cold stuffing inside. Just geat!!!!
Posted on March 12th, 2009 at 10:24 pm
OMG! I’ve died and gone to heaven…these look so delicious! I love these Ben!
Posted on March 13th, 2009 at 12:37 am
That looks delicious Ben! I’ve never tried taco bell to be honest… Not even sure if they exist in Holland!! I do cook vegetarian on occasion as well, so this is perfect. Love the photos too!
Posted on March 13th, 2009 at 4:20 am
Hi Ben, this looks very yummy! I have to see where I can buy these packs. I have having fun playing and trial & error in the wordpress.org playground.
Posted on March 13th, 2009 at 8:04 am
I am vegetarian, so these are perfect for us. This is something I haven’t seen so far and it has me interested.
When you say hydrate the corn flour, do you mean make a dough by adding water and salt? I get fine corn flour here (no instructions on packages!) which we use to make rotis/ chappathis.
Thanks, Ben.
Posted on March 14th, 2009 at 1:19 am
I’m liking how the pork skin gorditas sound. Sad to say that the only gorditas I’ve ever had are from taco bell
Posted on March 14th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
Looks and sounds yummy!! But I don’t think my fiance can just eat this alone, he insists on having meat every meal!
Posted on March 14th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
A few years ago I started feeling really guilty eating meat but found if I ate vegetarian for a while I get these strange floaty sensation when I move. Nah, meat keeps me grounded, don’t think I’ll ever stop eating it; I just don’t need to eat it every meal. My knowledge of Mexican food is close to 0, so I always enjoy learning from your blog.
Posted on March 15th, 2009 at 4:22 am
ok, those look awesome. but is it wrong that all i kept thinking was how amazing those would be if they had meat in it? i’m sooooo going to vegan hell. taco bell single-handedly ruined mexican cuisine in this country! like “carne asada steak” – i’m sorry but they are saying steak twice. and gorditas…you’re so right how they ruined that one in the eyes of americans! but you’re doing it justice here. w/o the hormones, corn syrup or chemicals!
Posted on March 16th, 2009 at 6:52 pm
Hey there. I had to read your post on “gorditas”. When we were going through the publishing process and our publisher wanted us to translate every recipe title and we told her that there were just some recipes that didn’t translate well. We used this recipe as an example. We told her the name of the recipe was “Little Fat Girls”. She understood after that. :p
Posted on March 19th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
Great picture, this looks so yummy.
Posted on March 20th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
I love Mexican food and these gorditas look like a delicious alternative to the basic cheese quesadillas. Thanks so much for contributing the gorditas to the Bookmarked Recipes round-up.
Posted on March 23rd, 2009 at 9:45 am
Your recipes are always so interesting, these look fantastic!
Posted on April 8th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
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