Higaditos En Chipotle

Higaditos en chipotle is Mexican home cooking at its most honest: chicken livers quickly sautéed with onion and drowned in a smoky chipotle-tomato sauce. It is the kind of dish you find on menus at no-frills taquerías and in family kitchens, where good ingredients meet confident technique in about 20 minutes flat.

The sauce could not be simpler. Unpeeled tomatoes, garlic, and canned chipotle chiles in adobo blend into a rustic sauce with a little texture left for body. Chicken livers get trimmed of any connective tissue and bile spots (the small step that separates clean liver flavor from bitter liver flavor), cut into six pieces each, and flash-fried in chicken schmaltz until still faintly pink inside.

Pouring the blended sauce into the hot pan lets it reduce around the livers for 5 more minutes, picking up meat drippings and turning from bright red to smoky brick. Serve with warm corn tortillas for scooping, Mexican rice on the side, and cold beer in the glass.

Chef Tips

• Trim the livers carefully. Connective tissue turns stringy, and any green spots from the bile duct taste unforgivably bitter.
• Cook the livers just past pink, about 3 minutes over high heat. Overcooked liver turns grainy fast.
• Use canned chipotles in adobo, not dried chipotles. The adobo sauce adds a vinegar-garlic depth dry chilies lack.
• Start with 2 chipotles; add a third for more heat. Chipotles vary widely in intensity.
• Substitute lard or vegetable oil if schmaltz is hard to find. Butter burns too fast for this dish.

Variations

• Swap chicken livers for chicken hearts, or use a mixed plate of both.
• Add 1 chopped poblano pepper with the onion for extra vegetable depth.
• Stir in a tablespoon of crema or Mexican sour cream at the end for a richer sauce.