Mexican cooks are lauded for their love of the tortilla, but they also know their way around the roll.
There's the hoagie-based torta, of course, but there's also the cemita, a superstar of a central Mexico made with a fluffy round roll. These cabeza-size sandwiches are now making major inroads in the city, thanks to Cabrito, a tiny West Village Mexican joint from the owners of Fatty Crab.
Like all cemitas, Cabrito's are staggeringly large, round like a New Orleans muffuletta and overloaded with ingredients. The classic features milanesa--chicken pounded paper-thin, then breaded and fried--but just about anything is fair game, from roast pork to scrambled eggs and chorizo.
Cabrito's sandwiches ($12 to $13) come topped with a standard corps of condiments: refried beans, mayonnaise, a slightly salty string cheese called quesilla and the leafy herb papalo--a cemita's defining ingredient--which tastes like cilantro on steroids. Like cemitas themselves, it's a flavor that's new to most New Yorkers, but you'll find yourself craving them both in no time.
Cabrito, 50 Carmine St. (at Bleecker St.); 212-929-5050 or cabritonyc.com
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