Name: Mexican Tlayudas
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 40 min
Total time: 130 min
Ingredients: 1.5 lb flank steak; ¼ cup olive oil; ½ cup fresh orange juice; 3 garlic cloves ((minced)); 2 tsp cumin powder; ½ cup cilantro ((chopped)); 1 tbsp hot sauce; salt & pepper; 3 arból chillies; 3 dried avocado leaves ((sub: 2 dried bay leaves + 1 tsp anisee or fennel seeds)); ¼ cup olive oil; ¼ onion ((chopped)); 4 cilantro stems ((finely chopped)); ½ tsp salt; 8 corn tortilla ((7" size)); 1 iceberg lettuce ((shredded)); 1 cup white cabbage ((shredded)); 1 bunch radishes ((cut into julienne)); 1 cup cherry tomatoes ((cut in half)); 1 cup Oaxacan cheese ((chopped)(or firm mozzarella)); 2 limes ((cut into wedges for garnish))

A Oaxacan wonder, these Mexican Tlayudas are a delicious response to Pizza! Crunchy, soft, meaty and jam-packed with flavour. It’s high time you experienced Tlayudas!

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The biggest and most amazing surprise of visiting Mexico's Oaxaca (pronounced wa-ha-ca), besides it's sheer beauty, is the food. I can't stress enough, just how amazing it is!

One of the country's hot-spots for food lovers, Oaxaca has a vast array of delicious and unique dishes to sample. Street food is in abundance - I sampled LOTS! like the amazing street corn, Esquites, and being the home of 'mole' I tasted varieties that would bamboozle any taste bud! So many food firsts and tasty treasures! One such first was a dish I'd not experienced before - the Tlayuda. A thin, crisp corn tortilla topped with all manner of Mexican flavours. It was a complete revelation.

Tlayuda - Mexico's response to pizza.

To the western tongue, tlayuda is closest to being pronounced 'cla-you-da'. The premise of Tlayuda is to offer a crisp corn tortilla, topped with whatever you like! Much like a tostada, but uniquely Oaxacan. This Tlayuda recipe follows a traditional recipe and features:

A base of the famous Oaxacan refried black beans (BONUS, you get the recipe for these too!)
A few slices of carne asada
A generous handful of freshness in the form of lettuce, cabbage, radish, cilantro and tomato.
A scattering of the much loved Oaxacan cheese (kind of like mozzarella)
A final spritz of lime to liven up the whole affair.

It's a taste and texture sensation, a wonderful crunch of tortilla and vegetables with the smooth beans and spiced meat. Who needs pizza!? So let's get started. Making Tlayudas is not difficult - it's more of an arrangement of food, but there's some prep work to be done! And it starts by marinating the beef.

Step 1: Marinating

I use a thin flank steak - Mexican's love their meat butchered into thin slices, so that they cook quickly on the parilla/grill. You can, of course, cook your favourite cut of steak and just slice it later, but flank or flat iron is a great option. The best flavour comes from a long marination (24 hours) but 4 hours will do if you're in a hurry. The flavours of cumin, orange juice (traditional for tenderising meat), cilantro and a host of other ingredients bring this meat out of marination kicking and screaming with personality.

Step 2: Making the refried beans

Refried beans are a delicious essential to the Tlayuda. I use canned beans (frijole negro) for convenience, but you can use dried and cook them if you like. The beans are flavoured with a couple of interesting ingredients. Arból chillies, are a common Mexican chilli, a fairly fiery dried variety that will add depth and a light spice to the beans (depending on how many you add, obviously). The second are the dried avocado leaves, They bring a unique aniseed flavour. Now, I know hunting down avocado leaves may be an ingredient too far for some, but the good news is there's a substitute! Replace with 1-2 dried bay leaves and a teaspoon of aniseed or fennel. These are toasted in a dry pan to bring out the flavour before being blended into the beans.

The beans are now fried for 20-30 minutes with onion. This frying ensures most of the moisture evaporates and the texture rich and thick. The flavour is also intensified, leaving us with a flavourful bean paste that packs a punch.

The beans, when cooled thicken even further and become a thick, spreadable paste. Incidentally, at this stage - these Oaxacan refried beans are amazing simply served alongside some corn tortilla chips. A wonderful alternative to Guacamole and salsa let me tell you! In fact, let me tell you again... These refried beans with some corn tortilla chips are sublime.

Step 3: Cooking the steak

Now that the meat has been marinating for a while, it's time to grill until charred on either side. I must say, and I don't want to receive a single hate email, Mexican's overcook their meat! There, I said it... but you know what? I'm not mad - the thin steaks crispen at the edges which makes for another textural sensation, so how could I be mad!? You can cook your steak however you like, and just slice into thin slices ready to arrange on top of the Tlayuda.

Step 4: Arranging the tlayuda

Now all that's left is to arrange the ingredients on the crisp, baked tortilla. Start with the beans as a base and then freestyle however you like!

So, what more can I say? These Tlayudas are a simple, flexible and super authentic Oaxacan treat. Feel free to change up the ingredients you pop on top, In Oaxaca, one evening we ate a grasshopper Tlayuda, which was absolutely life-changing! Another night, we ate an artisanal corn version, so there's a world of toppings waiting for you to experiment with. For now, hopefully, you enjoy this Carne Asada & Refried Bean Tlayuda.

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How to make my Mexican Tlayudas

Mexican Tlayudas