Tortitas de camarón: what they are and how to make them

What is it?

Dried prawn fritters (tortitas de camarón seco) are one of the most distinctive Lenten and Christmas dishes of central Mexican cuisine. They consist of small crisp discs or fritters made with ground dried prawns (without heads or legs), beaten egg, flour or breadcrumbs, coated like a batter and fried in hot oil. They are usually simmered in a sauce of romeritos with mole rojo or poblano, where they absorb the flavours and rehydrate, forming one of the most identity-bearing dishes of the Lenten menu and the Christmas Eve dinner in Mexico City, the State of Mexico, Tlaxcala, Puebla, Hidalgo and Morelos. Their flavour combines the intense umami of dried prawns with the complexity of mole, balanced by the herbal freshness of the romeritos. It is a dish deeply rooted in Mexican family tradition.

Origin and history

Dried prawn fritters emerged in colonial Mexican cuisine as a creative solution to comply with the Catholic abstinence from red meat during Lent and fasting days. Larousse Cocina notes that dried prawns, especially those from Oaxaca and Veracruz, have been a Mexican trade product since pre-Hispanic times, when coastal peoples exchanged them with high-plateau regions for salt, cacao and other goods. Bernardino de Sahagún documented the pre-Hispanic trade in dried prawns in the Florentine Codex. After the conquest, the New Spain convents developed the fritters as a technique to present prawns as the centrepiece of a substantial dish compatible with abstinence. México Desconocido records that the romeritos-mole-fritters combination became established in the 19th century as the canonical Lenten recipe. Mexican Lenten cuisine was recognised in 2010 by UNESCO as part of intangible cultural heritage when traditional Mexican cuisine was inscribed.

Characteristic ingredients

The essential ingredients are: dried prawns (preferably Oaxacan, medium-sized, without heads or legs, well cleaned), fresh eggs (whites separated from yolks), wheat flour or breadcrumbs, salt and pepper. The dried prawns are ground dry to a coarse powder in a molcajete, blender or processor. The whites are beaten to firm peaks; the yolks are gently folded in with a spoon or spatula. The flour or breadcrumbs and the ground prawns are mixed with the beaten egg, forming a thick but light batter. Small discs 4-6 cm in diameter are shaped with a spoon and fried in hot oil until golden on both sides, draining on absorbent paper. The romeritos sauce: romeritos boiled in water with salt and bicarbonate of soda (which keeps the green colour), drained; mole rojo or poblano dissolved in dried-prawn stock (made by boiling the heads and shells); diced cooked potatoes; the fritters are added at the end and cooked for 10-15 minutes in the sauce to hydrate and integrate the flavours. It is served hot with tortillas.

Cultural significance

Tortitas de camarón in romeritos are one of the most identity-bearing dishes of the Lenten and Christmas menu of central Mexico, present in any Mexican home during February-April and the days before Christmas Eve. The preparation is a family ritual: mothers and grandmothers spend hours grinding prawns, beating egg whites and shaping fritters, passing the technique on to the new generations. The economy of Mexican dried prawns is concentrated on the coasts of Sinaloa, Sonora, Nayarit, Oaxaca, Veracruz and Tabasco, where thousands of artisanal fishers sun-dry prawns following ancestral techniques. Mexico City markets such as La Viga, La Merced and Sonora sell tonnes of Oaxacan dried prawns during December and Lent, with prices climbing in these seasons due to high demand. Traditional Mexican cuisine was recognised by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2010. Prawn fritters are an example of the sophistication of Mexican Lenten cuisine and the ingenious use of dried ingredients.

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