Pastries

When I was a little girl, I would sneak downstairs with my cat Lider, while my sister and parents were asleep, and search the cupboard for the doily-lined tray that held these chocolate “sandwiches” decorated with an amusing chocolate scribble. I think these cookies were the first solid that my little brother ate. Garabatos are still baked in the home of a lovely woman named Elvira Bleyer. She extended her home kitchen, attached a storefront to it, and named it Délvis. The bakery has expanded and is now a franchise. These cookies are not part of the traditional Mexican repertoire, but they are part of my culinary memory growing up in Mexico City and are still served for dessert. This version was developed through a collection of recipes from friends and colleagues, but mostly from palatable memory.

My mother’s friend Yoya Estrada is one of the sweetest ladies I’ve ever met, and she transmits her kindness through her hands. She shared this family recipe from Durango with me a few years ago, and it’s one of my favorites. It lasts awhile if it’s well wrapped. Enjoy it sliced on its own or serve it with an assortment of cheeses, even though that is not the traditional Mexican way.

It’s no secret that there is a playfulness in Mexican culture, and it is very apparent in the names and shapes of our sweet breads. One of the most amazing panaderías I’ve ever visited is Horno Los Ortiz in Morelia. The owners are some of the most creative people I’ve ever met. They spend months shaping dough into intricate figurines that will form a nativity scene like no other. Their signs, specially designed boxes, and skillfully adorned breads for the holidays are remarkable. Their artistry is still present in their daily bread, but on a much simpler and smaller scale. These little pig faces, made from flaky pastry and filled with delicious pastry cream, are similar to ones they were selling during one of my visits. They a very fun project indeed.

The name of this crunchy, sugary pastry alludes to their shape. You will find enormous ears in Mexican bakeries, but I’ve made smaller ones, which are perfect to serve for brunch or with coffee. They’re traditionally made with puff pastry, but I’ve used a mock puff recipe so you can make them at home easily, with less guilt (there is much less butter), and still have plenty of flavor and texture. I like to keep the ready made dough in the freezer so I always have them on hand for guests.

I want to thank Victor Gomar for sharing the recipe for these quick and fun morning pastries that are more like cookies. The sugary cocoa dough in the center helps shape them like a belt buckle and the same dough can be used to make playful worms (gusanitos) filled with jam (opposite page), Pastry Cream (page 164), or Cheese Filling (page 103).

The small bicycle town of Pomuch in Campeche has some of the best bakeries in Mexico. One of the oldest, La Huachita, still uses a brick oven and has been around for 120 years. They were kind enough to let me spend hours as a spectator, and this is a recipe I adapted from one of their creations. These small sugary breads are slightly flaky, buttery, and filled with a rich cream cheese mixture.

Campechanas are fragile, crunchy, glasslike sweet treats that crumble as you take a bite. Valle de Bravo, a town a few hours from Mexico City, has some of the best ones, but you can find them everywhere. Funnily enough, though, they are hard to find in Campeche, where their name comes from. They are a bit tricky to make, but once you start, you’ll quickly get the hang of it. You may be surprised by the amount of fat that goes into these, especially because you couldn’t tell from eating them. The lard or shortening is what makes these incredibly flaky. You will need a very thin rolling pin that is at least 15 inches long and no thicker than the stick of a broom; you can find one at a hardware store or a woodshop.

Requesón is a slightly grainy, lightly salted cheese somewhere between ricotta and pot cheese. Lime zest complements the cheese filling hidden inside the golden, flaky crust. These are a really nice option for a brunch menu, and if you make the dough ahead of time, you can make these in a jiffy!

It is a spectacle to see these fritters made at the churreria that opened in 1935, called Los Churros del Moro, in downtown Mexico City. The churro master, as I call him, presses a lever that pushes out the soft dough, and as it hits the oil, he moves it, forming a large coil that looks like a six-foot-long snake all curled up. He very gently bathes it with the oil. When it is golden, he pulls it out and drains it on a round metal tray. It is then handed to another churro master, who cuts it with scissors into long strips the size of a straw and rolls the strips in plain sugar or a ground canela–sugar mixture. You can get hot chocolate (there are five types: Vienna, Francesca, Español, Especial, and Mexicano, varying in sweetness) to accompany them, although some people prefer to dip them in warm cajeta or chocolate sauce. I knew the famed churreria was not going to share its recipe (I have tried for a long time), so I was always on the lookout for one that was close enough . . . Then one day, while visiting the Mercado Pino Suarez (the main market) in Villa Hermosa, Tabasco, I was suddenly distracted by the distinctive aroma of freshly made churros. I followed the scent, which led me to a small corner stand. The churros were warm, a little puffier than those at del Moro, and absolutely, undoubtedly, one of the best I’d ever had. There was no hot chocolate or sauce to dip them into. Just pure crunchy, sweet fritters with an intense cinnamon flavor and a little something else I couldn’t quite make out. I really wanted the recipe, and after a little talking and smiling, I was allowed to visit the next day to see how they were made. So, there I was, walking alone on the streets of this not-so-safe place, at 4:00 in the morning. It was still dark, and there were a few people around: some were just finishing their night and others were busy getting ready to open their businesses. I am not a morning person at all, but making churros at a market in Mexico is definitely an antidote to morning crankiness. The secret ingredient in these churros? Queso fresco! Here is the adapted recipe from Lorenzo Sanches Mendoza from the stand El As Negro, with my profound thanks.

You know how people love to eat muffin tops? Well, these muffins have a topping on the sides as well. Whenever we bought them, my mom would always take a bit off the top, then the sides, and leave the center in the tray as if it was the most natural thing to do! Their flavor is deliciously subtle and they are a favorite among my whole family.

Ah, the conchas! These wonderful soft breads with their crunchy shelllike topping are a favorite in Mexico. This particular recipe is based on one made by Irving Quiros, a pastry instructor at the Colegio Superior de Gastronomía in Puebla. The dough is almost like a brioche, and the buttery bun makes wonderful, melt-in-your-mouth conchas. To make a chocolate topping, substitute 3 tablespoons cocoa powder for 3 tablespoons flour.

There is a really interesting publication from 1969 titled El Dulce en Mexico (The Sweets of Mexico). One of the things it talks about is old cookbooks with alfajor or alajú recipes (alajú means “the stuffing” in Arabic). The author describes a candy that he called a “type of fruit cake,” (even though it doesn’t seem to have to do anything with one) from 1786, which I, in turn, have translated. It is basically a sweet paste made from honey and different nuts, which is thinly “sandwiched” between two wafers. They are absolutely addictive! Feel free to play around with different nuts and spice combinations.

A gaznate is a crunchy cylinder filled with a very sweet and airy meringue. They were carefully stacked into a tower and commonly sold outside movie theaters. The meringue is either left white or tinted a fluorescent pink and is commonly flavored with pulque (a fermented alcoholic beverage made from the maguey plant), which many believe is essential. Pulque is practically impossible to get outside Mexico, so I made my version with mezcal. You will need noncorrosive metal tubes, which you can buy at many cooking stores or online, for wrapping the dough and frying it. Or follow the alternative method below if you can’t find the tubes.

Easy to transport and to eat while unpacking, these moist and dense muffins are more like little pound cakes with blueberries than your typical crumbly muffin. If blueberries are out of season and you want to use frozen ones (a perfectly fine option!), increase the oven temperature to 375 degrees F.

PAT I have a confession—when I was a kid, I would jump my grandmother’s neighbor’s fence and pluck peaches from Mr. Johnson’s trees. I figured that there were so many of those little darlings hanging from Mr. Johnson’s trees he surely wouldn’t miss a few. Looking back on it, you could say those peaches helped me develop an appreciation for the simple pleasures life has to offer. Over the years, we’ve grown fond of grilling sweet fruit. (Yes, we do “grill everything.”) When you add the smoky flavor from the grill to the sweetness of the apricots and peaches, well, you are talking about a different kind of dessert from the shortcake you’re used to. Ours also calls for biscuits (talk about a Neely spin on things!). And the turbinado sugar is just a fancy name for sugar in the raw . . . like me!

Angel biscuits are so easy to make that they’re often called “bride biscuits.” They have three different types of leavening, so they always rise up fluffy and tall.

Southerners take sausage and egg biscuits for granted. They are just about everywhere in the South—we make them at Foster’s, and you can even buy them at country convenience stores, where you might find a stack wrapped in cellophane in a basket by the register. If you haven’t already had sausage and egg biscuits yourself, I hope this recipe will make you a convert. For extra flavor, cook the eggs the way my dad did, by frying them directly in the sausage grease left in the skillet rather than using butter. Feel free to scramble rather than fry the eggs if you prefer.

With the airiness of dinner rolls and the flaky, buttery layers of traditional biscuits, angel biscuits—which get their extra lift from a little yeast—truly deserve their celestial name. I add chopped watercress for its mild peppery flavor and a pop of color.

Growing up, my sister, Judy, and I coveted one simple dish above all others for breakfast: hot biscuits topped with lightly mashed strawberries and lots of sweet butter. I use a dead-simple recipe for cream biscuits adapted here from the Times-Picayune of New Orleans.

As anyone who has actually made biscuits from scratch will tell you, they are fast and oh-so-easy—no culinary wizardry required. Of course, you needn’t go out of your way to divulge that fact when serving these rich, flaky biscuits to a chorus of oohs and ahhs. Sometimes, certain things are better left unsaid. Serve warm with lots of sweet butter, honey, molasses, or jam.