Who doesn’t love a good plate of nachos? Melted cheese, crispy chips, bell peppers, and green onions, what more could you want? Whether it’s game day, you’re having a movie night, or you just have a wicked bad craving, this is the post for you. Well, today we are going to take a look at how you can make Great Nachos at home whenever you want.
Let’s get to it…
Step 1 – The Nachos
It should come as no surprise that great nachos start with great tortilla chips. With poor quality chips, you can only make poor quality nachos. What then is it that makes a tortilla chip good or bad?
First and foremost take a look at the bag. Are most of the chips intact or are half of them broken and crumbled in the bottom of the bag. If they are broken that obviously isn’t a very good sign. Other than that it is more a trial and error type of situation. I will say that bags labeled as restaurant-style or restaurant quality will generally have thicker and stronger chips than regular bags.
One final point I will make about the chips is that you don’t have to buy the most expensive bag you can find. You don’t want to cheap out either. Buying the cheapest bag will probably lead to sad nachos.
Step 2 – The Cheese
Types of cheese
There are a million different kinds of cheese you could choose for your nachos. But what one do you really want? Do you want to go crazy and put some nice swiss cheese on there or blue cheese? Or do you want to keep it simple? Cheddar? Mozza? Maybe a three-cheese mixture with cheddar, Mozza, and Monterey jack? How can you choose?
For my money, I’m a fan of either just cheddar, preferably a mild cheddar, or a three-cheese mixture. If you want to use a three-cheese mixture it is definitely better to buy the cheese whole, grate and mix it yourself. There are a few reasons for this. First of all, you can control the ratios of the different types of cheese. Secondly, pre-grated and mixed cheeses usually have anti-caking agents mixed in, and you just don’t really know what you’re getting.
How much cheese
As for how much cheese to use, don’t go too crazy. It’s actually better to go a little lighter than you might expect. Too much cheese can lead to soggy chips due to the oils being released as the cheese melts. Ideally, a thin, even coating of cheese is best. This will give you maximum flavour without causing the chips to go soggy.
Step 3 – Vegetables
Most commonly the vegetables that appear on nachos are bell peppers, onions, tomato, green onion, and pickled jalapeno. I am completely fine with all of these except the tomatoes. Generally, nachos are going to be served with salsa which is made of tomatoes. So, putting tomatoes on nachos is redundant. Also, like adding too much cheese, tomatoes will cause the chips to go soggy.
As for the other vegetables like the bell peppers, and onions, there is one small thing that you can do that will drastically improve the quality of your nachos. What could that be? Pre-cook the vegetables. It seems pretty obvious, right? Almost no one does it.
To take your nachos from okay to great you just need about 3-5 minutes to heat up a frying pan with a touch of oil and sauté the peppers and onions just until they start to soften. Then spoon the vegetables over the nachos and bake them like you normally would.
For the jalapenos, pickled is definitely the most common way to go. However, don’t discount the impact a few slices of fresh jalapeno can have on your nachos. These can honestly be pre-cooked with the other vegetables or put on raw and cooked only as long as it takes to melt the cheese. For pickled jalapenos drain as much of the liquid off as you can before putting them on your chips.
Step 4 – Meat?
Meat or no meat? I prefer steak on my nachos, some people like ground beef, chicken, or even pork. Really, this all comes down to personal preference. Of course, I do have a couple of tips if you are planning on putting meat on your nachos.
First of all, and this should go without saying, cook the meat before putting it on your nachos. Having said that, when it comes to steak I will often cook the whole steak to rare, let it rest, slice it thin, and put that on the nachos. This way by the time the cheese has melted the steak is cooked, but not overcooked. As for other meats, just make sure they are hot when they go on the nachos. If you are using leftover chicken or pulled pork, you don’t want it to come straight out of the fridge and on to the nachos. It just won’t heat up enough.
One final point is that small pieces of meat are better than big pieces when it comes to nachos. A lot of small pieces evenly spread makes for a much better eating experience than a handful of large pieces on 1/4 of the chips.
Step 5 – Layers?
To layer or not to layer? Both layered and non-layered nachos have their benefits and their downsides. Let’s look at them both.
Layered.
Layered nachos obviously provide multiple layers of cheesy goodness. However, there is a downside in that it takes a lot longer to bake layered nachos unless you bake it in stages. Whether you bake in stages or not you risk overcooking the chips in order to get all the cheese melted.
Layered nachos should be baked on 350°f for about 15-20 in order to melt the cheese all the way through.
Single Layered
Single layered nachos, in my opinion, are far superior to multi-layered nachos. All the chips are more evenly coated with cheese and the other toppings. They take less time to bake. And there is no risk of coming upon a pocket of unmelted cheese.
Single layered nachos should be baked on 400°F for 12-15 minutes.
Step 6 – Sauces on or off?
Unless you are a psychopath, leave the sauces off. Okay, okay, that may be a bit judgmental by why would you put the sauces on your nachos when you know it is only going to make the chips soggy?
Conclusion
Nachos can be a great snack to prepare when a bunch of friends come over, for those nights when you don’t really feel like cooking a full meal, or just to fill a craving. You can obviously do whatever you want with your nachos but if you follow my recommendations you will have delicious nachos every time.
Do you have any nachos secrets that you would like to share? Tell me about them in the comments.
Normally on Fridays, I write a post titled “Everything I know about…” I do a deep dive into a specific topic and share what knowledge I have about it. Today, I decided to do something different. Today, I am going to share with you the recipe for my favourite chicken wings. Why? Why not? It’s Friday, that’s why. Let’s take a look.
What makes a great chicken wing?
In my opinion, a great chicken wing has to be crispy on the outside and tender inside. It is best when the wings are tossed in a sauce that nicely balances sweet and spicy.
What makes a terrible chicken wing?
Wings that are overcooked and dry are obviously pretty terrible. There is no question about it. Know what else is terrible? Breaded wings. There I said it. Someone had to. Breaded wings are the worst.
I know that there are some people out there who will completely, and adamantly disagree with me in regard to breaded wings. To them I say, you’re wrong…Obviously, people are entitled to like breaded wings, just for me, I’m not a fan.
What else makes a terrible wing? Not enough or too much sauce. Yeah, both of these are a thing. You don’t want a big pool of sauce at the bottom of your bowl or basket when you’re done eating your wings. No one wants that. You also don’t want dry spots on your wings that aren’t sauced at all. That’s just as bad.
How to get crispy chicken wings at home.
There are a few different techniques for getting wings crispy in the oven. The best one I’ve seen is to dust them lightly in baking powder and bake them on 375°F, on a rack set over a baking sheet until they are cooked through. This does work…sort of. But here’s the thing, the wings come out good, but there is something slightly weird about them.
How often do you eat chicken wings?
How often do you eat chicken wings? More importantly, how often do you eat wings at home? My guess is, probably not that often, right? So, since you don’t eat them that often isn’t it fair to say that when you do eat them you should strive to make them the best they can be?
Here’s what I’m saying, more than likely the chicken wings that you are making at home are a treat for some specific occasion. So, treat yourself. Fry those guys. Fry em’ up! Even if you don’t have a deep fryer, you can shallow fry them in a pan with an inch of oil.. Just be careful. Use a thermometer to watch the temperature and again, be careful.
Here’s the deal with wings, frying takes 7-10 minutes. They come out hot, crispy, and delicious. You don’t need to add baking soda or flour to them. Just pat them dry with a paper towel, so the oil doesn’t splatter too much when you put the wings in. Fry them on 365°F, until they are cooked through. And enjoy.
The sauce
My favourite chicken wing sauce is actually really simple to make and absolutely killer. I take two parts of my favourite hot sauce, combined with one part honey, and I boil it until it is thick. That’s it.
For the hot sauce, I usually use either Franks Red Hot or Louisianna Hot Sauce. Both are delicious and both work very well with the honey.
Boiling the sauce concentrates the flavour of the hot sauce. This means that the flavour is much stronger. But, the honey helps to balance that out. So, what you end up with is a slightly sweet, really flavourful sauce, that is thin enough to completely and evenly cover the wings. It is also thick enough that it doesn’t make a big mess. It holds on to the wings.
Because I’m a glutton I sometimes add a bit of butter into the sauce to give it a silky texture and richer flavour. That is the chunky stuff in the picture below.
Blue Cheese Dressing
To balance out the heat it is nice to have something cooling to dip the chicken wings into. Enter, blue cheese dressing. I really want to call this blue cheese ranch but that’s not really what it is, so we will settle with the broad term “dressing”.
What this is really is a bit of blue cheese mixed with sour cream, a bit of mayo, chives, vinegar, and pepper. And yes, it is perfect with these wings. It’s not too fancy, or complicated and it can be put together very quickly. Delicious!
Conclusion
When you put all of these components together what you get is a delicious plate of chicken wings that will satisfy even the most decerning wing connoisseur. I highly suggest that you give this a try. In my opinion, they are the best wings you will ever have.
My Favourite Wing Recipe
Crispy, slightly sweet, spicy, and delicious with blue cheese dressing on the side.
Pat the wings dry with a paper towel and set aside.
Heat a heavy bottom skillet with about 1 inch of oil in it to 365°f. Make sure to leave at least 1-2 inches from the surface of the oil to the rim of the pan.
While the oil is heating combine the honey and hot sauce in a medium pot and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until thick. Remove from the heat.
Combine the blue cheese with the sour cream, mayo, chives, vinegar, and black pepper. Stir well and set aside.
Carefully place the wings in the oil and fry for 4-5 minutes. Flip the wings and fry for another 4-5 minutes or until they are cooked through.
Drain the wings well, toss with the honey and hot sauce mixture and serve with the blue cheese dressing on the side.
I just want to say thank you as always for reading, I really appreciate your time. Also, I wanted to let everyone know that I will be taking the next week off from the blog. It has been a long time since I have taken a break and I think I’m due. I will be back on the 29th of July. Thanks again and see you then.
A few moments ago, sitting where I am sitting now, sipping from my morning coffee, writing and deleting sentence after sentence, unsure of how to begin this post, I decided to reach for google. I asked google for statistics regarding the amount of hummus consumed globally per year. I found that in 2015, sales of hummus in the US totaled around $725 million. That’s a lot of hummus. I discovered something even more important and surprising while googling, hummus prices are about to get way higher.
In the last three years India (the world’s largest consumer/producer of chickpeas) has experienced fairly severe draughts leading to lower than normal chickpea crop yields. Because of this India has had to reach beyond its borders and import chickpeas from other producing nations. On top of this, there has been a year over year increase in demand for hummus in Europe and North America. Putting these factors together you see an increase in demand and a decrease in production, leading to higher than normal chickpea prices. According to the New York Times article cited above, the UK has seen a 12% price increase in chickpea prices in the last year alone. This is just the beginning.
As with any convenience product, premade hummus costs more to buy than it does to make it at home. If you want to continue to enjoy hummus over the next 12 to 24 months, you may want to consider learning to make it yourself, and even possibly subbing white beans for the chickpeas. Making hummus, with chickpeas or white beans, is incredibly easy. You will need a food processor of some type but you can pick up a small one for around $40 ( http://amzn.to/2sqebpC ).
There are only six ingredients in hummus.
Chickpeas
Lemon Juice
Garlic
Tahini
Salt
Olive Oil
The one that might be standing out to you there is Tahini. Tahini is simple sesame seed puree. Essentially, sesame seed butter. You can buy Tahini in the international section of most grocery stores, or you can also sub in peanut butter or anything nut butter.
A very basic hummus recipes goes as follows.
1 can chickpea (drained and rinsed)
juice from 1 lemon
3 – 4 cloves garlic
2 tsp Tahini
a pinch of salt
2 tbsp olive oil
Put all of these ingredients in your food processor and puree. You may need to add a tbsp or two of water to make it a bit smoother but that’s it. You can also follow the exact same recipe but sub the chickpeas for white beans.
This article is titled “Hummus; The Gateway Drug”, the reason being that I honestly think that hummus can be a gateway for a lot of people, into the world of home cooking. I find that often when people see how easy hummus is to make, and how much cheaper it is to make, they being to look at what else they could be making instead of buying. This is a good thing.
More than ever we live in a global community. A drought on the other side of the world affects chickpea prices here. This is not an isolated instance, nor will it be the last time we see something like this. We are about to being to see these drastic increases in the price of foodstuffs more and more in the coming years due to droughts, fires, insect infestations, floods, and other natural disasters. This is not me being an alarmist, it’s reality. I recommend that you take the time and learn to cook for yourself because it is not unrealistic to think that within our lifetime convenience foods may become impractically expensive. If and when that happens, those of us who understand cooking and food will still be able to eat well. Let hummus be your gateway into the world of cooking, because someday it may really matter.
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