Snack crawl
The Fried Chicken Crawl: Oaxaca
Start hungry and start early; the best stalls in Oaxaca sell out long before the guidebooks say they open.
- Stops
- 9
- Walking
- 6 km
- Budget
- Pocket change
Before you set off
Order one portion between two at every stop. A crawl is a marathon made of sprints. Stop 12 is a hole in the wall with four stools and a queue. Join the queue. The queue knows. The owner, Kenji, has been folding these by hand for longer than we have been alive and has opinions about furikake. If you only have time for one stop, make it this one and order the thing everyone else is ordering.
The owner, Kenji, has been folding these by hand for longer than we have been alive and has opinions about dried lime. Stop 5 is a hole in the wall with four stools and a queue. Join the queue. The queue knows. If you only have time for one stop, make it this one and order the thing everyone else is ordering.
Stop 3 is a hole in the wall with four stools and a queue. Join the queue. The queue knows. Walk between stops. It is the only reason any of this is physically possible. The owner, Clara, has been folding these by hand for longer than we have been alive and has opinions about capers.
Stop 1: The basement counter near the bus depot
There are snacks you eat standing at the counter, and then there are fried chicken — the kind you clear your evening for. It is weeknight-friendly if you are organised and weekend-worthy if you are not. It reheats well, travels well, and disappears at parties at a frankly alarming rate. Here the cherry tomatoes is piled on with abandon and the chilli is not a suggestion.
Tomasz, who runs our test kitchen on Thursdays, calls this “the one that ruins other snacks for you”. It reheats well, travels well, and disappears at parties at a frankly alarming rate. Carry cash, tissues and a bottle of water. Thank us later.
Stop 12 is a hole in the wall with four stools and a queue. Join the queue. The queue knows. Here the cherry tomatoes is piled on with abandon and the chilli is not a suggestion. Priya, who runs our test kitchen on Thursdays, calls this “the one that ruins other snacks for you”. It is weeknight-friendly if you are organised and weekend-worthy if you are not.
Stop 2: The family place near the cathedral steps
If you only have time for one stop, make it this one and order the thing everyone else is ordering. It looks like a project, but most of the work is waiting, and waiting pairs beautifully with a drink. There are snacks you eat standing at the counter, and then there are fried chicken — the kind you clear your evening for.
Do not skip the chives; it is the bright note that stops the whole plate from feeling heavy. We recreated this one at home — see the recipe section — but it never tastes quite like it does on a kerb at midnight. It reheats well, travels well, and disappears at parties at a frankly alarming rate.
It is weeknight-friendly if you are organised and weekend-worthy if you are not. We like to make the filling the night before, when the kitchen is quiet and nobody is asking what is for dinner. We tested this 8 times in the Snack Crawl kitchen, and the version with capers won every single round.
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