Tacos in Hidalgo

Hidalgo, the highland state north of Mexico City, is regarded as the heartland of pit-cooked lamb barbacoa, served on weekends as tacos with consomé and pulque-based salsa borracha, with the town of Actopan as its symbolic capital.

Barbacoa

Barbacoa in Hidalgo means lamb wrapped in the thick leaves of the maguey and cooked overnight in an earth pit. In the method described by Mexico News Daily, a hole roughly a meter deep is lined with wood and stones and fired until the stones are very hot. A pot holding vegetables, rice and guajillo chiles goes in first to catch the dripping juices, then a grill, a layer of maguey leaves, the seasoned meat and more leaves. The pit is sealed with earth and left for six to twelve hours depending on the load. The juices collected in the pot become consomé, served alongside the tacos.

The shredded meat is folded into corn tortillas, often blue corn, and topped with onion, cilantro and salsa borracha, a sauce of pasilla chile made with pulque. Barbacoa is weekend food: families, restaurants and roadside stands across the state sell it on Saturdays and Sundays.

History

The word barbacoa has Caribbean roots, and food writers also link the earth-oven technique to the Maya pib. Larousse's gastronomic dictionary, cited by Chilango, holds that the central Mexican version took its current form once Spanish sheep and goats became available. The 1831 cookbook El cocinero mexicano already lists several pit-cooked versions, and by the 1840s observers noted that barbacoa was especially common in the Hidalgo towns of Actopan and Apan, where it was a wedding dish.

Much of this barbacoa country lies in the Mezquital Valley, the homeland of the Otomí (Hñähñu) people, and in the pulque-producing plains of the south. México Desconocido notes that barbacoa tacos were originally eaten in the pulque states around Mexico City, Hidalgo among them, and Hidalgo still produced the large majority of the country's pulque in 2020.

Actopan and its fair

Actopan, a town of about 30,000 people on the edge of the Mezquital Valley, hosts the annual Feria de la Barbacoa y Ximbó each July. The festival runs for about ten days in and around the main plaza, fills the town with music and craft stalls, and ends with a judged contest among barbacoa cooks. Visitors can also find ximbó, a local dish of chicken wrapped in maguey leaf that, according to Mexico News Daily, began as pollo en penca in the 1980s and took its Otomí name in the 1990s.

Insect tacos

Hidalgo shares with Tlaxcala and the State of Mexico the old maguey-country taste for insects. Maguey worms, fried and set on a tortilla with guacamole, and escamoles, the larvae of a native ant, are sold as luxury taco fillings in season. At the Actopan fair, stands also offer chicharras (cicadas), chapulines and chacas beetles.

Signature tacos

• Tacos de barbacoa
• Tacos de gusanos de maguey
• Tacos de escamoles

Reviews

See also

• Tacos de barbacoa
• Salsa borracha
• Tacos in Tlaxcala
• Tacos in the State of Mexico

References

1. "State by Plate: Barbacoa of Hidalgo". Mexico News Daily. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
2. "Actopan's Feria de Barbacoa: a festival of taco delights". Mexico News Daily. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
3. "Barbacoa: la historia y dónde comer el platillo dominguero". Chilango. Retrieved 2026-10-10.
4. "¡Para tacos, sólo México!". México Desconocido. Retrieved 2026-10-10.