What You’ll Find in a Mexican Grocery Store in the U.S.

Produce Department

You’ll find many of the same fruits and veggies at a Mexican grocery that you will anywhere else; after all, carrots, potatoes, and apples are eaten the world over. Keep an eye out for the following specific items:

• Fresh chile peppers: Types include poblano, jalapeño, serrano, and chilaca chiles.
• Tomatillos or Mexican green tomatoes: Only distantly related to red tomatoes, this ingredient is indispensable for making green sauce.
• Limes: Often known as Mexican limes or key limes, which are the tart, juicy limes used to flavor and brighten a myriad of sweet and savory Mexican foods.
• Chayotes: This squash native to Mexico is sometimes called cristophene, mirliton, or vegetable pear in English. Chayotes are used often in Mexican soups and stews. If you are especially lucky, you will find a grocery which also sells chayote root, a less common but no less useful ingredient.
• Jicamas: Unknown to most Americans just a dozen years ago, jicama has been gaining popularity in recent years. It´s usually eaten raw in salads, and its crisp texture and mild flavor make it practically irresistible.
• Prickly pears: These sweet, juicy fruits of the nopal cactus are a wonderful treat when eaten by themselves or as part of a fruit salad.
• Nopal cactus “leaves” or paddles with or (hopefully) without the spines: These are delicious grilled whole or cut up and boiled for use in salads and stews.
• Plaintains: They are related to bananas, but much bigger and never eaten raw. They are always cooked, steamed, or baked, and they are common to various Caribbean cuisines.
• Calabacita (Mexican squash): Look for the longish kind that is similar to zucchini (only smaller) or the round kind. Both are light green. If you are extremely lucky, your market might have squash blossoms for sale during their very brief season. (Those are super perishable, though, so you would probably only find those at a farmer’s market).
• Fresh herbs: These include cilantro, epazote, hoja santa, and avocado leaves.
• Tropical fruits: These include papayas, mangos, guavas, guanabanas (soursop), pineapples, and mamey.
• Dried corn leaves: These are used for making tamales.
• Dried hibiscus flowers: These are used for making Jamaica Agua Fresca.

Packaged Groceries

• Dried chile peppers: Types include ancho, guajillo, chipotle, piquín, or mulatto chiles.
• Canned or jarred chile peppers: Examples include pickled jalapeños whole or in slices and chipotle peppers in adobo sauce.
• Drink mixes: They come in powdered or syrup and are for preparing horchata, tamarind drink, hibiscus tea, and other aguas frescas.
• Jarred salsas, moles, and cooking sauces: Common brands include Herdez, La Costeña, Doña Maria, La Sierra, San Marcos, and San Miguel.
• Corn and flour tortillas
• Tostadas (baked or fried corn tortillas)
• Canned beans (cooked) and bagged beans (dry, uncooked) in different varieties
• Masa harina flour: This is used in place of fresh masa for making tortillas, tamales, and other corn-based goodies. The most common Mexican brand is Maseca.
• Long grain rice, the variety almost always used by Mexican cooks
• Chicken bouillon cubes and/or powder: Common brands include Knorr and Maggi.
• Bags of small pasta in different shapes (for making soup): Common brands include La Moderna, Roma, and Barilla.
• Fruit juices (cans or boxes): Look for mango, pineapple, or guava juices or “nectars.” A common brand is Jumex.
• Marie biscuits and other dry cookies: Common brands include Gamesa, Bimbo, La Moderna, and Marinela.
• Jarred/canned cactus pieces: Common brands include La Costeña, San Marcos, and Doña Maria.
• Table chocolate: This cooking chocolate is used for making hot chocolate, atole, mole, and other dishes. It generally is somewhat sweetened and has cinnamon in it. Common brands include Abuelita and Ibarra.
• Canned Mexican hominy (for making pozole)
• Dried herbs and spices: Examples include sticks of cinnamon, dried oregano, cumin seeds, anise, and whole cloves.
• Ate (concentrated fruit paste), in cans or plastic-wrapped
• Achiote seeds and packaged adobo paste: This is used in recipes such as cochinito pibil.
• Boxes or envelopes of mixes for making atole, gelatin desserts, soups
• Jars of vanilla extract: If you are lucky, you will find some good quality genuine Mexican vanilla concentrate. If not, you will find only cheap imitación varieties—don´t bother even looking at those.
• Piloncillo or hard Mexican brown sugar: This may come labeled as panela, chancaca, raspadura, or tapa dulce, which are names used for this ingredient in some other Latin American countries. It may be sold in large or small cones or in roundish, somewhat flattened “loaves.”
• A variety of Mexican candy: Some kinds contain powdered chile pepper.

Refrigerator and Freezer Cases

• Mexican cheeses and creams: Common brands include Cacique, Fud, Lala, Supremo, and Olé,
• Mexican chorizo: Common brands include Fud, Olé, and Cacique.
• Mexican soft drinks in bottles or cans: Look for tamarind, guava, or other flavors of carbonated drinks, and the ever-popular non-alcoholic sangria soda. Common brands include Jarritos, Señorial, Peñafiel, and Mundet.
• Banana leaves: They're used for wrapping tamales like those made in Oaxaca and other southern Mexico states.
• Frozen tropical fruits: These include fruit mixes such as that used to make hot holiday fruit punch.
• Fresh-rendered pork lard

Prepared food cases

• Chicharrones (pork cracklings, deep-fried pork rinds)
• Carnitas (deep-fried, tender chunks of pork): They're chicharrones in some other Spanish-speaking countries.
• Pan dulce (sweet bread): Several different types include as conchitas, polvorones, madgalenas, and buñuelos.

Non-food Items

• Pottery and dishes: Some are made of clay and often decorated with traditional designs.
• Mexican cooking and serving implements: These include as tortilla presses, comales, wooden and metal utensils, tortilla baskets, and lime squeezers.
• Lotería sets: Lotería is a much more colorful and interesting version of the game Bingo.
• Votive candles: They often are decorated with religious artwork.