Search
Brazil
Argentina
Bolivia
Chile
Colombia
Ecuador
Guyana
French Guiana
Falkland Islands (Malvinas)
Paraguay
Peru
Suriname
Uruguay
Venezuela
Germany
Austria
Belgium
Croatia
Denmark
Spain
Finland
France
Greece
the Netherlands
Hungary
Ireland
Iceland
Italy
Luxembourg
Norway
Poland
Portugal
the United Kingdom
the Czech Republic
Sweden
Switzerland
Turkey
the United StatesMexico
the Dominican RepublicTurkey
South Africa
Australia
FijiFlavors · Ensenada
White fish taco coated in a light batter and fried until golden, served on a corn tortilla with cabbage, tomato-and-onion salsa, mayonnaise or cream, and lime. It originated around 1960 at the stalls of the Mercado Negro, the fish market at the port of Ensenada.
Traditional dish from Ensenada, Baixa Califórnia
Also known as: taco de pescado, tacos de pescado estilo Ensenada, Baja fish taco
Illustrative images. The pictures in this guide are illustrations based on the real place, not photographs, and may differ from it.
Click a photo to enlarge it.
Taco de pescado estilo Ensenada — Ensenada, Mexico
The Ensenada-style fish taco is made with a piece of firm, fresh white fish, coated in a light batter—often made with beer—and fried in oil or lard until golden and puffed. It is placed on a corn tortilla with shredded cabbage, salsa bandera (tomato, onion and serrano chile), mayonnaise or a creamy sauce, lime, and other sauces to taste.
The taco’s history is tied to the Mercado Negro, the fish and seafood market by the port of Ensenada. One account published by Selecciones magazine places the origin of the fish taco tradition there between 1960 and 1961, at the stalls that served the market’s vendors and customers.
The names of the earliest vendors change depending on the source, and some link the light-batter frying technique to the presence of Japanese fishermen in Ensenada since the early 20th century, due to its resemblance to tempura. These are versions told by researchers and chroniclers, without documentary proof.
Today, fish tacos are sold at stalls and taquerías throughout the city, especially in the morning and at lunchtime, and the style has spread across the peninsula and to other countries. Alongside the fish, shrimp breaded the same way has become another Ensenada classic.
Ensenada , Baixa Califórnia
The tradition of the breaded fish taco arose around 1960 at the stalls of the Mercado Negro, Ensenada’s fish and seafood market.
Firm white fish (such as cañón or other local fish); flour batter, often with beer; oil or lard for frying; corn tortillas; cabbage; salsa bandera (tomato, onion and serrano chile); mayonnaise or creamy sauce; lime.
By hand, standing at the stalls or sitting in the taquerías. Each person assembles their own taco with the cabbage, sauces and lime laid out on the counter.
All year round. Many stalls operate from morning until early afternoon.
Your questions
At the Mercado Negro, the fish market at the port of Ensenada, between 1960 and 1961, according to an account published by Selecciones magazine.
Yes. The fish is coated in a light batter, often with beer, and fried until golden before being placed on the corn tortilla.
Battered fish, cabbage, salsa bandera, mayonnaise or creamy sauce, and lime, in a corn tortilla.
Flavors of Mexico
Layers of corn tortillas with black beans and shredded cazón, cooked with epazote, topped with tomato sauce and habanero chile. Despite the name, it does not contain wheat bread. It is considered a symbol of Campeche cuisine.
Salted, dried beef — tasajo — cooked in a thick sauce of ground pumpkin seeds, with tomato and rice. It is the celebratory dish of Chiapa de Corzo, served especially during the January Fiesta Grande, the Parachicos festival.
Tacos of pork seasoned with a chile adobo, roasted on a vertical spit (the trompo), and served in a corn tortilla with pineapple, onion and cilantro. They descend from the tacos árabes brought to Puebla by Middle Eastern immigrants and took their current form in Mexico City taquerías.
Sandwich made with birote bread, a hard-crusted loaf, filled with carnitas and drenched in tomato sauce, with a spicy chile de árbol sauce on the side. A symbol of Guadalajara’s cuisine, which dedicated a municipal day to it on September 10.
Corn tortillas dipped in a guajillo chile sauce and fried, filled with cheese and onion, served with boiled potato and carrot, lettuce and pickled chiles. A typical dish of the city of Guanajuato, which tradition links to the wives of the silver mine workers.
Broth of cacahuazintle corn and pork thickened with a green sauce made from pumpkin seeds, tomatillo and herbs, served with many accompaniments. Dish from Guerrero, where Thursdays are pozole day.
Thin, crispy batter cooked on a round griddle and rolled like a tube, filled with queso de bola, a cheese of the Edam type. A street sweet from Mérida, created by a family of ice-cream makers in the city and sold at night from carts in the plazas.
Whole fish butterflied open, seasoned with a chile sauce and grilled over coals secured in a double-wire grill, the zaranda, which gives it its name. An official publication places its origin on the island of Mexcaltitán, on the northern coast of Nayarit.
Milk-fed kid opened, salted and slowly roasted on an iron stake beside the embers, in the shepherds’ style. It is the best-known dish of Nuevo León, present on the state’s traditional gastronomy routes, from Monterrey to the northern municipalities.
The darkest of Oaxaca’s moles: a thick sauce of chiles toasted almost to the point of burning, including the chilhuacle negro, with chocolate, seeds and spices. A celebratory dish of the state, prepared mainly in the Valles Centrales.
Poblano chile stuffed with a meat-and-fruit picadillo, topped with a white walnut sauce and sprinkled with pomegranate seeds and parsley, in the colors of the Mexican flag. A seasonal dish from late summer, associated with the city of Puebla.
Thick, dark sauce made from several dried chiles, spices, seeds and chocolate, traditionally served with turkey. Tradition links its creation to the kitchen of the old Convent of Santa Rosa in Puebla, the city that gives it its name.
Pork slowly cooked in its own lard in large pots until tender inside and golden outside, served in tacos. Quiroga, near Lake Pátzcuaro, is called the capital of carnitas: families in the town have been making them for more than a century.
Raw shrimp butterfly-cut and cured in lime with chiltepín chile, served with cucumber and red onion. It originated in the mountains of Sinaloa as a meat broth with water and chile and reached the coast, where shrimp took the place of meat. It is presented as the state’s most representative dish.
Freshwater fish with a long snout, grilled whole over coals and eaten with tortilla, lime, salt and chile amashito. It lives in the rivers and lagoons of Tabasco and is one of the state’s most representative dishes, with roots in pre-Hispanic cuisine of the southeast.
Distilled spirit from blue agave named after the city of Tequila, in Jalisco, surrounded by agave fields. It has a designation of origin since 1974, and the agave landscape and the region’s old industrial facilities are a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Salad of romaine lettuce leaves with a dressing of egg, lemon, garlic, olive oil and Parmesan cheese, served with croutons. It was created in Tijuana by the Italian cook Caesar Cardini on July 4, 1924, according to Tijuanan historian José Fernando Escobedo de la Torre.
Red snapper cooked in a tomato sauce with olives, capers, garlic, onion, herbs and pickled chiles güeros or jalapeños. A coastal Veracruz dish, from the Gulf of Mexico, considered one of the country's best-known fish recipes.
Pork marinated in achiote and bitter orange, wrapped in banana leaf and slowly cooked in an earth oven, the pib. A Sunday family dish from Yucatán that combines the pig brought by the Spaniards with a Mayan cooking technique.
