Cacalas (Toasted Guaje Seeds with Lime and Salt)

Zacualpan de Amilpas, Morelos, Central Mexico

Cacalas are a traditional snack from Zacualpan de Amilpas in the Morelos region of central Mexico, made from the dried seeds of Leucaena leucocephala — the guaje tree, whose pods and seeds have been eaten in Mexico since pre-Hispanic times. The seeds are slow-toasted dry, then finished with lime juice and sea salt until every seed is lightly crusted and fragrant. The result is something between a roasted nut and a salted seed: faintly grassy, pleasantly bitter at the back of the palate, and deeply satisfying as a simple afternoon snack or a table nibble alongside mezcal. Diana Kennedy encountered this preparation in the village markets of Morelos, where guaje seeds — fresh, dried, or ground — appear in everything from salsas to moles. Cacalas represent the simplest expression of the ingredient: nothing added but acid and salt, nothing removed but moisture.

Leucaena leucocephala seeds carry a faintly sulphurous, grassy bitterness that softens under slow dry heat into something almost nutty, with a back-palate astringency that lingers pleasantly. The lime juice cuts through that bitterness and binds the coarse sea salt into a thin, sour-saline crust on each seed. The overall effect is restrained and addictive — not rich, not sweet, but persistently interesting in the way that a well-salted olive or a roasted pepita can be.