Baleada (Honduran burrito)

“Baleadas” are a Honduran version of “burritos.” A wheat flour tortilla is folded in half and filled with beans, crumbled cheese and sour cream, and often with other ingredients added such as beef, chicken or pork.
 
Baleadas are sold in Honduran areas of the Bronx and they are also sold at the Red Hook Ball Fields in Brooklyn, where various foods from Latin America are served (dubbed “soccer tacos”).
   
   
Wikipedia: Baleada
Baleadas are one of Honduras’s most original and popular foods. A baleada is a wheat flour tortilla, often quite thick, folded in half and filled with mashed fried beans. This is the no-frills baleada. People may also add other ingredintes. The most common types of baleadas are the baleadas simple (simple baleada) which has crumbled cheese and sour cream. The other baleada is the baleada mixta (mixed baleada) which has same as the baleada simple but with an additional scrambled eggs. Many other people add sausage plantain, hot sauce, avocado, chicken, pork and chirmol which is diced tomato, onion and bell pepper. The biggest Honduran town often have more than one restaurant that sells baleadas.
 
Baleadas Express is a popular Honduran fast food restaurant.
 
History
There are two stories behind the baleada’s name. The first one says that they are called baleadas since beans have a bullet shape and bullet in spanish is “bala” hence by adding the suffix “ada” it makes it baleada. The other story is that a woman used to make tortilla with beans and she was shot so every one use to say, “let’s go eat at the baleada”, as stated before, it comes from bala.
   
flickr 
Burrito? Baleada.
A baleada with frijoles, mantequilla, queso, avocado, pollo y huevo…closest thing to a burrito I’ve had in Honduras. 
 
Sidewalk Mystic
Baleadas
Baleadas are to Honduras what burritos are to Mexico.
 
Take a fresh warm tortilla (6”, 8” or 12”—your call) and add your favorite fixings:
°  Pintos, simmered or mashed
°  Shredded cheese
°  Sweet/sour cream
(...)
Others enjoy and will add these to their baleadas:
°  Simmered beef
°  Minced onions
°  Diced jalapenos
°  Egg
°  Avocado
 
Fold, roll, however you care to do it—and dig in.
 
30 March 1997, Miami (FL) Herald, pg. 1A:
Outside, after Mass, women raise money for a new mission building by selling food from back home—pupusas from El Salvador, baleadas from Honduras.
       
Google Books
Latin American Spanish Phrasebook
by Sally Steward
Lonely Planet
2003
Pg. 160:
baleadas pl (Hon) ba-le-a-das
white flour tortillas filled with refried beans, cream & crumbled cheese
 
Google Groups: rec.food.cooking 
Newsgroups: rec.food.cooking
From: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) (S.Dunlap)
Date: 6 Sep 2003 10:04:22 -0700
Local: Sat, Sep 6 2003 1:04 pm
Subject: Re: Translation, please  
 
More on Honduran school lunches
 
Snacks (in addition what already was mentioned) - mini chicken tacos (look like American style taquitos) with shredded cabbage and salsa; fried plantain split and stuffed with refried red beans and topped with crema; baleadas - a flour tortilla filled with refried red beans, scrambled egg, grated cheese, and crema. 
 
Google Books
Nueva York:
The Complete Guide to Latino Life in the Five Boroughs
by Carolina Gonzalez and Seth Kugel
New York, NY: Macmillan
2006
Pg. 40:
La Orquidea (Honduran). The Bronx has the city’s biggest Honduran population, large enough to support two Honduran restaurants, but skip the nearby Ruinas De Copan (147 Brook Avenue); it’s a bit shady. Honduran cuisine resembles the more widespread Salvadoran cuisine down to the papusas, but what makes the trip worth it are the baleadas, thick flour tortillas rolled around beans, cheese, and some combinations of egg, beef, and avocado. Splurge on the “everything” baleada for $4, and wash it down with a Honduran-made Tropical brand banana soda.
   
Google Groups: rec.food.cooking
Newsgroups: rec.food.cooking
From: “SD”

Date: 23 Mar 2006 19:55:29 -0800
Local: Thurs, Mar 23 2006 11:55 pm
Subject: Re: Breakfast burritos
 
It’s called a baleada here in Honduras: refried beans, egg, cheese, ham wrapped in a flour tortilla (basic version). These sell for $0.50 to $1.00 a piece. At the market - breakfast for two - 2 baleadas and 2 horchatas - comes to $1.50. At home we jazz it up with onions, chopped tomatoes, sauteed green peppers and what ever else we can find to toss on the tortilla.   

New York (NY) Times
RESTAURANT REVIEW | RED HOOK BALL FIELDS
A Latin Fiesta, Near the B.Q.E.
By PETER MEEHAN
Published: August 23, 2006
SUANY CARCAMO, stout and smiling, works under a smudged white tent midway down the Bay Street side of the Red Hook ball fields; you’ll know you’re at the right place if there’s a hulking aluminum pot of beans warming on the griddle next to Ms. Carcamo, who will be smacking little balls of wheat flour dough into thick tortillas and tossing them on the griddle to cook.
 
Ms. Carcamo left Honduras for Brooklyn more than 20 years ago and has been turning out these baleadas, which might be most expediently described as Honduran tacos, at the Red Hook ball fields for more than a decade. Away from the sun and soccer, on weekdays and through the winter, she runs Honduras Maya, her restaurant on Fifth Avenue in Park Slope.
 
la Gringa’s Blogicito
Saturday, October 07, 2006
Honduran fast food
The Honduras Moon Handbook says, “Honduras isn’t known for its culinary specialties .... The quality of street food in Honduras is not as good as in Mexico.” Despite that, some of the most popular and inexpensive of Honduran fast food is also some of its best food. The following are some of the most common fast foods in La Ceiba.
 
Baleadas (literal translation is shot) are one of the most well known Honduran fast foods. It is sometimes described as the poor man’s burrito. The basic baleada is a thick 6” to 8” (15-20 cm.) flour tortilla folded in half containing a smear of smashed refried red beans and a sprinkle of grated queso duro (a hard salty white cheese, tasting at its best a little like parmesan). A baleada preparada (prepared) includes a bit of scrambled egg, although sometimes you can add avocado, mantequilla (similar to sour cream), or meat for an extra price. Right now a plain baleada sells for about 7 lempiras (U.S. 37 ¢) in La Ceiba and a baleada preparada with eggs costs L. 8 - 12 (U.S. 42 - 64 ¢). 
 
New York (NY) Post
‘DINE’-AMITE DISHES
By KRISTA GARCIA
July 11, 2007—‘STAND’ AND DELIVER
Summer means sampling everything under the sun at the Red Hook soccer field trucks. Every weekend from late April through October, a slew of vendors representing eight Latin American countries serve up treats to hungry fútbol players, immigrants craving a taste of home and intrepid snackers from all corners of the city.
 
Where: The corner of Clinton and Bay streets in Red Hook, Brooklyn.
When: Saturdays and Sundays, 9 a.m. until dusk (though some quit earlier).
(...)
Carcamo Honduran
Home country: Honduras
Order: baleadas ($1.50)
Suany Carcamo’s specialty are baleadas, thick chewy tortillas made on the spot and slathered with thick slow-cooked refried beans, swiped with crema, sprinkled with white cheese and folded over into a crescent. 
 
Village Voice
Ball Field Baleadas Live on at Honduras Maya
posted: 5:02 PM, October 29, 2007 by Nina Lalli
(...)
Two baleadas arrived smelling deliciously like pancakes that have been allowed to burn around the edges. Inside was a healthy smear of bean puree, some very funky grated cheese, and some salty crema. The tortilla was hot, thin, and offered a perfect chewy resistance to the teeth. Really, this was the perfect lunch, but then came the steak (salty, tangy with marinade), the plantains (sweet, oily), the rice (also oily), the slab of cheese (the same extremely funky stuff), and the salad (iceberg). The guy who had come in to chat and drink a beer said “You’re a healthy eater!” Why thank you.
 
Honduras Maya
587 Fifth Avenue
South Slope
(718) 965-8028