History

The name means sandal, which is roughly what the flattened, sauce-soaked roll looks like on the plate. Chanclas are a Puebla speciality that almost never travels: a pambazo-style bread is filled with pork or chorizo, lettuce, onion and avocado, then ladled with a thin guajillo sauce until it collapses. They are usually served in pairs. Antojitos Tomy on 5 Poniente runs a milder version at about fifty-five pesos, and Antojitos Mellos out in Barrio de los Remedios serves them next to its molotes and pelonas.

Common allergens: Gluten

Make it at home

Yield Serves 2Hands-on 30 minTotal 45 minDifficulty Easy

Ingredients

  • 4 small pambazo or soft white rolls
  • 6 guajillo chiles, stemmed and seeded
  • 3 tomatoes
  • 1 garlic clove
  • 1/4 white onion
  • 500ml chicken stock
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • 250g cooked pork shoulder, shredded, or 250g chorizo
  • Shredded lettuce, sliced white onion, 1 avocado
  • Salt

Method

  1. Toast the guajillos briefly in a dry pan, then soak in hot water for fifteen minutes.
  2. Blend the drained chiles with the tomatoes, garlic and onion, and push the purée through a sieve.
  3. Fry the purée in a little oil for five minutes, add the stock and oregano, and simmer for ten minutes into a thin, pourable sauce. Season.
  4. Warm the shredded pork or fry the chorizo until it releases its fat.
  5. Split the rolls, fill with meat, lettuce, onion and avocado, and set two per plate.
  6. Ladle the hot guajillo sauce over the top until the bread is soaked through, and serve with a fork.

Tip from the editors. The sauce must be thin enough to pour like a broth. If it coats the spoon it is a salsa, and the bread will sit on top of it instead of drinking it.

Where to eat chanclas poblanas

Chanclas poblanas in Puebla

Antojitos Mellos ★ 4.2

Pueblan$$los-remediosDaily 13:00-22:30

Antojitos Mellos is the weekend mole and pipian stop in Barrio de los Remedios, Puebla, with pozole and mole de panza on the board the rest of the week.

Why locals love it: Weekend-only mole and pipián in Barrio de los Remedios, far enough from the Zocalo that the queue stays local.

Tip: Mole and pipián are cooked on Saturday and Sunday only, so a weekday visit gets pozole and mole de panza instead.

Avenida Don Juan de Palafox y Mendoza 2008, Barrio de los Remedios, 72377 Puebla

Antojitos Tomy ★ 4.3

Pueblan$centro-historicoDaily 09:00-21:00

Antojitos Tomy on 5 Poniente is where Puebla eats cemita poblana, chanclas and chalupas at one counter, from nine in the morning until nine at night.

Order: Cemita poblana, chanclas and chalupas ordered as one round.

Tip: The cemita poblana here is genuinely large, so order one between two before adding the chalupas.

Avenida 5 Poniente 145, Centro, 72000 Puebla

Comal ★ 4.4

Pueblan$$centro-historicoDaily 08:00-24:00Until 00:00 daily

Comal looks straight at Puebla cathedral from 16 de Septiembre, cooking blue-corn chilaquiles, chanclas, pelonas and mole poblano from breakfast to midnight.

Try: Chanclas and mole poblano

Tip: The kitchen runs to midnight seven days a week, which is unusual for a Centro dining room of this quality.

Calle 16 de Septiembre 311-B, Centro histórico de Puebla, 72000 Puebla

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