Tacos al Pastor

Tacos al pastor descend from shawarma, the spit-roasted meat brought to Puebla, Mexico in the 1930s by Lebanese immigrants, many of them Christians who had left Lebanon to escape conscription, sectarian violence and economic hardship under the late Ottoman and French mandate periods. The immigrants introduced the vertical spit, known in Mexico as a trompo, roasting marinated meat in layers and shaving it off as it cooked, originally lamb served on flatbread in the style of shawarma. Over the following decades, Mexican cooks adapted the technique: pork replaced lamb, the meat was marinated in a chili and achiote based adobo, a slice of pineapple was added to the top of the spit, and the meat was served on small corn tortillas rather than flatbread. The dish remained largely a regional specialty of Puebla until the late 1960s, when the Mexican-born children of the original Lebanese immigrants opened trompo-based restaurants elsewhere in Mexico, spreading tacos al pastor into the national repertoire it now occupies.