Celebrate Cinco de Mayo in style with Mexican sopes filled with refried beans

Cinco de Mayo (on May 5), a celebration of the victory at the Battle of Puebla in 1862 by the Mexican Army over France, deserves more than a supper of leftovers folded into tortillas. Try sopes, savory corn cakes that are popular Mexican street food, made with fresh or dried corn masa. They're little round cakes filled with whatever you fancy (refried beans, shredded chicken, or cheese are a few possibilities), topped with all kinds of garnishes, such as salsa, avocado, and cilantro. Often sopes are fried until crisp, but they can also be made without deep frying to create a sope that is a little crisp on the outside and soft and warm in the center. Sopes are fun to make and serve as a meal.

Fresh masa dough is hard to find, but instant dried corn flour, called masa harina, is available in most grocery stores. It's not the same as cornmeal; it's made from corn that has been treated with lime, ground into a dough, and dried into a flour that can be reconstituted with water. The traditional cheese for sopes is crumbly, salty cotija, but feta or goat cheese are good substitutes, or improvise with your favorite cheese.

Mix the dough, then rest it to let the masa hydrate. Form it into balls and press them into rounds between two squares of plastic with a glass pie pan so you can see the size and shape of the round; they should resemble thick tortillas. Cook for a few minutes in a dry skillet, let them cool briefly, and use your fingers to form a ridge around the rim to hold the filling. You can make the shells, unfilled, up to three hours ahead (keep them covered with foil.) Mix and match your garnishes. Celebrate Cinco de Mayo in style.