By Regina Schrambling Melissa McCart, whom I’ve “known” forever on the Internets but finally met on a trip to Pittsburgh last fall, had a good piece up at the Post-Gazette the other day that led with how she couldn’t get through even a week without eating meat/poultry/seafood. I might be able to manage if tostadas were involved. And if I could cheat with crab. Back in the dark ages when the Catholic Church banned meat once a week, I had tostadas on many happy Friday nights. My mom would fry corn tortillas to a crisp and we’d spread Rosarita’s refried beans over them, sprinkle them with grated Colby Longhorn cheese and top them with shredded iceberg lettuce. Salsa was not in our vocabulary, but hot sauce or pickled jalapeños must have been involved somehow, although AZ-Mex is even milder than the Texan translation. It was a cheap supper, and certainly more satisfying than the canned sardines on saltines to which we kids were also subjected. Tostadas were always one of the elements of a combination plate in Arizona, along with enchiladas, tamales and tacos, but I don’t notice them often on menus in New York. In the last week, though, I came across two that were so great burritos may be endangered as our lunchtime standby. The first was the cheater’s tostada, at Gran Electrica in Brooklyn: a crisp but still cuttable corn tortilla topped with peekytoe crab mixed with lime juice, citrus, avocado, cilantro and habanero. My consort, who still doesn’t get why burritos get beans and tacos don’t, was as smitten as I was. Then, just a few days later, he ordered the pozole at Toloache 82 and was almost more taken with the bonus of the outstanding black bean tostada above. The Epicurious database has recipes for tostadas, but you really don’t need one. It’s just: Fry, smear, sprinkle, top. Leave off the cheese if you’re vegan. Otherwise, any combination of ingredients will do. Although I have never bought into meat.
Source: Epicurious
