For Miles & Brooklynne

At the request of my abovementioned friends, here is the recipe for picadas, aka sopes that Hubs & I made last week. I didn't use measuring cups or anything so if this is a little nonspecific please forgive me.

Ingredients:
Maseca brand corn meal mix
Warm water
1- 1.5 lb chicken for every 3-4 people (or any other meat)
Cooked pinto beans
Shredded lettuce
Salsa (homemade tastes best but you can use store-bought)
Mexican queso fresco cheese (can find at any Mexican store and some American grocery stores)

It is easiest to make the tortillas ahead of time & reheat them when it's dinnertime. Some Mexican stores may sell them premade but we don't know of any around here. Anyway...for the tortillas you will need the cornmeal mix & warm water.

Pour about 3-4 cups of Maseca into bowl & mix with warm water until the consistency is a little more watery than Play-doh but not like wet sand at the beach. Roll the dough between your hands so they're about the size of baseballs. Then either use a tortilla press (you can find them at Mexican stores) or you can press them by hand until they're about 1/2 inch thick and (if you're handpressing them) at least semi-round. Place them on a heated & greased (cooking spray is fine) griddle on medium-high heat until both sides are starting to turn golden brown & crack a little bit. When they've cooled a little pinch up the edges so it looks like there's a little wall running all the way around the tortilla. This is the base of the dish and the most labor-intensive part. If you make them ahead, you will need to reheat them on the griddle with just a little canola oil & then sprinkle them with a little salt when they're warm.

Put the pintos on to cook about 2 hours before you want to use them. For picadas I used about 1.5 cups of pinto beans & put them in a pot with boiling water to simmer over medium heat for 2 hrs. Add salt to taste but not until the end of cooking or the beans will be hard as a rock. I learned that the hard way. When they're done (they'll be really soft), drain most of the water out & use a potato masher to mash them up until they have lumpy mashed-potato consistency.

You can use any kind of meat but chicken is the easiest (and I am all about the easy way). It's best to have about a pound of chicken for 3-4 people. Boil the chicken until it's cooked through then shred it. For extra flavor put a whole garlic clove in the water while you cook the chicken then salt it to taste afterward.

Should you decide to make homemade salsa you'll need:
4-5 ripe Roma tomatoes
about 1/8-1/4 of an onion, diced
1-2 jalapeño peppers (or more if you like real spicy)
1-2 tablespoons cilantro (optional)

Boil peppers and tomatoes together until tomatoes start to split open. Then put all ingredients in blender & blend until smooth. Add salt to taste.

So when you are done, you will have:
(from bottom to top)
Tortilla, beans, meat, lettuce, salsa, & crumbled queso fresco.

Moral of the story: Do this in an afternoon when you have LOTS of time to spare.