Curado de Piña Horneada Putleco

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Sharp chef's knife and cutting board
• •Wood coals and a grate, or a sheet pan and a hot oven
• •Large (3-liter) clean glass jar or vitrolero with a lid
• •Small saucepan for the piloncillo syrup
• •Fine-mesh strainer or manta de cielo (cheesecloth)

Instructions

1. 1

   Choose a ripe pineapple

   Pick a pineapple by smell, not by looks. It should be heavy for its size and sweet at the base, with leaves that pull free under a light tug. Carnaval falls in the pineapple's best months, late winter into spring, so for once the calendar is on your side. A pale, hard pineapple will not caramelize and it will give you a thin curado no matter how long you wait. It has to be ripe going in.

   If the pineapples at the market are sour and green right now, don't make this now. Cook what the mercado is selling today and come back when the fruit is sweet. That is how this has always been made.
2. 2

   Roast until it chars

   Peel the pineapple and cut it into thick rounds, about two fingers wide. Leave the core in. It holds flavor. The traditional way is over wood coals, laid on a grate until the sugars blister, the edges blacken in spots, and the smoke gets into the flesh. That smoke is what makes this a Putla curado and not just fruit drowned in liquor. If you have no fire, roast the rounds on a sheet pan in a hot oven at 220C (425F) for 45 minutes to an hour, turning once, until deeply caramelized and charred at the edges. Don't be timid with the char. Pale roasted pineapple gives you a pale curado.

   The fire is better than the oven. If you ever make this for a real fandango, find the coals. The smoke is half the drink.
3. 3

   Make the piloncillo syrup

   While the pineapple roasts, put the chopped piloncillo in a small saucepan with the water, the canela, and the cloves. Simmer over medium heat until the piloncillo dissolves completely, about ten minutes. This is piloncillo, not refined sugar. It carries molasses and minerals that white sugar does not, and you will taste the difference in the finished curado. Pull it off the heat and let it cool all the way to room temperature. Hot syrup poured over the spirit cooks off its edge, and you want the aguardiente going in cold and clean.

4. 4

   Pack the jar

   Cut the roasted pineapple, char and all, into rough chunks and pack them into a large clean glass jar. Pour in the cooled piloncillo syrup along with its canela sticks and cloves. Then add the aguardiente de caña until the fruit is fully submerged. Use real cane aguardiente, the strong unaged kind they distill in these lowlands. The spirit is the spine of this drink. Everything has to stay under the liquid. Any fruit poking above the line will spoil, so weigh it down with a small clean glass or saucer if you need to.

5. 5

   Rest it for weeks

   Seal the jar and set it somewhere cool and dark, on a shelf away from the sun. Now you wait. Three weeks is the absolute floor. A month is better. Six weeks and you have something serious. Swirl the jar gently every few days so the syrup keeps moving through the fruit. The liquid turns a deep amber-gold as the roasted pineapple and the piloncillo give themselves up to the spirit. No me vengas con atajos. The waiting is the recipe.

6. 6

   Taste and strain

   After three weeks, taste it off a spoon. It should be sweet, smoky, warm with canela, and the alcohol should be hiding underneath all of it. That hidden alcohol is both the danger and the charm. When it tastes the way you want, strain the curado through a fine-mesh sieve or a square of manta de cielo into clean bottles. Keep a few pieces of the macerated pineapple back to drop into the glasses. Bottled and capped, it holds for months. The aguardiente sees to that.

7. 7

   Pour it at the fandango

   Serve it in small glasses, never big ones. This is a sipping drink and it is slow to hit. Tell your guests that, or don't, and watch what happens. A piece of the cured pineapple dropped in each glass is how they pour it in Putla when the band starts and the chilolos come through the street. Así se hace y punto.

Chef Tips

• •Pick the pineapple by smell, not by looks. It should be heavy and fragrant at the base, with leaves that pull free easily. Carnaval lands in the pineapple's sweetest months, so the fruit is on your side. A hard, pale pineapple gives you a thin curado no matter how long you wait.
• •Use real aguardiente de caña, the unaged cane spirit they distill in the Oaxacan and Guerrero lowlands. It is the spine of the drink. If you truly cannot find it, an unaged cane spirit like cachaça is the closest cousin. White rum is not the same. It is sweeter and rounder and it changes the drink into something else. A substitution here is a compromise, not an upgrade.
• •Two things people get wrong: they roast the pineapple too lightly, and they don't wait long enough. The char is where the smoke lives, so let it go dark. And three weeks is the floor, not the goal. Set the jar on the shelf a month before you need it.
• •Serve it in small glasses and respect it. The sweetness hides the aguardiente completely, which is why they say it is slow to hit. By the time you feel it, you have already had more than you planned.

Advance Preparation

• •This is a drink you make ahead by design. Start it at least three weeks before Carnaval, and a month or six weeks ahead is better. The longer it rests, the deeper the amber and the rounder the spirit.
• •Once strained and bottled, the curado keeps for months in a cool, dark place. The aguardiente preserves it. Leave a few pieces of the macerated pineapple in the bottle for the glasses.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 110g)