Main course · Mexico, the pit

Barbacoa

Barbacoa is Mexican pit-cooked meat: lamb, goat or beef wrapped in maguey leaves and cooked overnight in an earth oven over hot stones. Sealed under earth for 8 to 12 hours, the meat steams in its own moisture until it falls apart, while a pot underneath catches the drippings for the consomé.

Last reviewed 25 Oct 20264 sources

Lamb in Hidalgo, beef head in Texas

In central Mexico, barbacoa is meat slow-cooked in a pit (hoyo) dug in the ground, heated with firewood and stones, lined with roasted leaves of the maguey plant (pencas) and sealed with earth. The meat steams and roasts in its own moisture for most of a night. It is a weekend food: sold from early on Saturday and Sunday mornings in markets and roadside stalls, by weight, with tortillas, salsa and a cup of the broth.

The meat changes with the region. In Hidalgo and the State of Mexico, barbacoa is traditionally lamb (borrego). In the northern states and in South Texas, the usual form is barbacoa de cabeza, a whole beef head, from which the cheek (cachete), tongue and other parts are sold separately. Goat and, in some regions, mutton are also used.

An earth oven and a Taíno word

Cooking in earth ovens is pre-Hispanic in Mesoamerica — the Maya pib of Yucatán is one surviving form — but sheep, goats and cattle all arrived with the Spanish, so barbacoa as it is known today is a colonial combination of an indigenous technique and European livestock.

The word has a separate, Caribbean history. Barbacoa was recorded by Spanish chroniclers in the early 16th century, notably Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, as a Taíno (Arawakan) word for a raised frame of sticks on posts, used for sleeping or for drying and smoking meat over a fire. The Spanish carried the word to the mainland, and through Spanish it passed into English as barbecue by the late 17th century. The popular derivation from French barbe à queue, "beard to tail", is a folk etymology without documentary support.

A metre deep, sealed with earth

A traditional pit is about 1 m / 3 ft deep and wide. Firewood is burned inside for several hours on a layer of stones until the stones are glowing hot. A large pot with water, chickpeas, rice, vegetables and chiles goes on the stones; a grill or a lattice of sticks over it holds the meat, so the drippings fall into the pot and become the consomé.

Before use, the maguey pencas are passed over the fire to soften them; they line the pit, wrap the meat and are laid over the top. The pit is then covered with a mat (petate) or sacking and a layer of earth, and left 8 to 12 hours. In Texas, health regulations ended most commercial pit cooking; restaurants there now steam or braise beef heads in ovens, and only a few still use pits.

Ingredients

Method

1. Blend the soaked chiles with the garlic, half the onion, vinegar, cumin, cloves, oregano and salt into a smooth adobo. Rub it over the meat and refrigerate for 4 to 12 hours.
2. Heat the oven to 150 °C / 300 °F. Pass the banana leaves briefly over a flame to make them pliable.
3. Put the chickpeas, carrots, the rest of the onion, bay leaves and water in a deep roasting pan or pot. Set a rack over it.
4. Wrap the meat in the leaves, place it on the rack, and seal the pan tightly with a lid or a double layer of foil so no steam escapes.
5. Cook 5–6 hours, until the cheeks are completely tender and shred under a spoon; the inside will be well above 90 °C / 194 °F, the range where collagen turns to gelatine.
6. Unwrap, shred the meat and season it with some of the juices. Skim the fat from the broth, season it with salt and serve it as consomé with the chickpeas.

Mixiotes, birria and Sunday tacos

In Hidalgo, barbacoa de borrego often comes with montalayo (lamb stomach stuffed with offal and chile) and mixiotes, meat steamed in packets of the maguey's thin outer skin. Texcoco, in the State of Mexico, is another centre of lamb barbacoa. Jalisco's birria and Yucatán's pork cochinita pibil are related pit or slow-cooked dishes.

In Texas, barbacoa de cabeza is a Sunday-morning breakfast taco filling, and in many shops cheek meat alone is sold as "barbacoa". At home, beef cheeks or chuck are braised in a slow cooker or oven, as above. The American barbecue of smoked meat shares the word but not the method.

By weight, with tortillas and consomé

Barbacoa is sold by weight and eaten in warm corn tortillas with chopped onion, cilantro, lime and a salsa borracha (pasilla chile and pulque or beer) or salsa verde; the consomé comes in a cup, with rice and chickpeas, onion and chile. In central Mexico it is often accompanied by pulque. Common mistakes: a pan that is not airtight (the meat dries instead of steaming), too high an oven temperature, not soaking the chickpeas, and serving the consomé without skimming the fat.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

4

1. McGee, Harold. On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen, rev. ed. New York: Scribner, 2004.
2. Kennedy, Diana. The Essential Cuisines of Mexico. New York: Clarkson Potter, 2000.
3. Bayless, Rick; Bayless, Deann Groen. Authentic Mexican: Regional Cooking from the Heart of Mexico. New York: William Morrow, 1987.
4. Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés, Gonzalo. La historia general de las Indias. Seville, 1535.

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