Marcelita's Burritos Delicioso Especiale

BURRITO MUCHO BUENO !!!

It's burrito night at mi casa. I've been on a burrito kick for a few months. Burritos are an awesomely convenient way to get a lot of my favorite salad ingredients packed into a deliciously crispy tortilla shell. When I make a burrito instead of a salad, I replace the lettuce with black beans, the croutons with a crispy tortilla and the dressing with some bitchin' hot sauce.

Get all these things:

left to right - top row: tortilla, black beans, delicious meat
middle row: cheese, cilantro, shallots
bottom row: tomatoes, pepperoncini, bitchin' hot sauce

A baking dish - glass or ceramic
Burrito size tortilla - (flour, 10" diameter - freshly made are best)

Black Beans - 1/3 - 1/2 c.* (drained)

Delicious (cooked) Meat - 1/3 - 1/2 c.* (chopped smaller than 'bite-sized')

Cheese - 1-2 tbsp* 

Cilantro - 1 tbsp*

Shallot - (sliced wafer thin) to taste*

Tomatoes - 1/2 of a Roma (roughly chopped)

Pepperoncini - 1-2 tbsp* (roughly chopped)
Bitchin' Hot Sauce - to taste* (roughly a dozen or so heavy drops flung onto all the ingredients before wrapping up the burrito)

Keep in mind, there's only so much that can fit into a 10" diameter tortilla, and all those ingredients fill the space pretty quickly. Adjust the volumes of ingredients to your taste.

Basically throw all of the ingredients listed above into a tortilla, fold it up, spray the top with some oil, sprinkle on some salt and bake @ 300 degrees for 30 minutes and consume.

*BUT... (keep reading, for delicious advice and for safety's sake)

There's a bit of prep time... 

• Into the baking dish, place the tortilla. (My favored baking dish is an oval, ceramic dish I got at Ikea a few years ago - they don't carry it anymore, bastards!)

tortilla in dish

• Measure the beans into a strainer so the liquid that typically accompanies canned black beans is drained away, distribute evenly on tortilla, as shown below.

drained black beans in tortilla

• Meat - in this burrito is London Broil (chopped roughly and perfectly cooked, a couple nights before). Other cuts of beef work just as well as does Carne Asada - mmmmmmmmmmm... carne asada. Or pork or chicken or chorizo... any meat will do (meat, not fish - or skip the meat and double up on the beans)

delicious and perfectly cooked London Broil on black beans

• Cheese: Feta is my favorite - it doesn't melt quickly and it's delicious. White cheese is best in this burrito - a dry-ish, slow melting cheese. In other burrito experiments, I have incorporated Myzythra (a dry, non/slow-melting greek cheese) with favorable results.

crumbled Feta on delicious and perfectly cooked London Broil on black beans

• Cilantro: It's understandable that not everyone is a fan of cilantro - use flat leaf parsley instead (same volume) or another preferred herb. Or mix flat leaf parsley with basil (to achieve the same volume). Something green should be incorporated into this burrito - I bet some nicely blanched or sauteed asparagus would be good, I'ma hafta try that.

• Shallot: Sliced wafer thin, separate the rings. A volume isn't noted because I like A LOT of shallots on my burrito and I guess visually when I put everything in the tortilla. Red onions are good too (use less than you would shallots) as are plain ol' onion onions. Scallions would probably be good as well.

• Tomatoes: Half of a Roma, roughly chopped is about 2 tbsp-ish.

• Pepperoncini: Mezzetta's Deli Sliced, Golden Greek Pepperoncini - roughly chopped. I keep this ingredient stocked at all times. I hated these things when I was younger, but now I'll eat them right out of the jar. 

• Bitchin' hot sauce: Guacamaya is what I'm addicted to, I add it to almost everything. Frank's hot sauce comes in a close 2nd and Crystal hot sauce comes in an even closer 2nder.

everything, before folding into burrito form

Fold the tortilla onto the ingredients so that it becomes a recognizable burrito form. Drizzle (or spray) the top of the burrito with olive oil, smear the oil onto the tortilla with your fingers so there's an even coat of oil then sprinkle on some kosher or roughly ground sea salt.

folded burrito, lighly coated with olive oil and sprinkled with course sea salt

For best results this is cooked in a convection, toaster oven set to 300 degrees and cooked for 30 minutes. Yes that's a long time. During that time all the ingredients combine and blend and turn out a most delicious burrito that comes out LAVA HOT!!!

I'm not kidding, it's hotter than asphault in mid August in Phoenix - let this thing sit for at least 10 minutes after it comes out of the oven, then poke it with a fork about a dozen times to let some of the steam/heat out. Then wait a little longer before attempting to consume. It's gonnu be HOT and stay hot for quite some time after it comes out of the oven. BE CAREFUL!!!

done - wonderfully crispy tortilla shell - nuclear, lava hot ingredients within

Delicious fried things

Oh we are in a mood this evening... need comfort food and tasty beverages. So... we're making the best chicken strips E-V-A-R! In the history of poultry! The best. ever. for reals. HOLY Mother of Pearl they're good!

First thing's first... concoct the tasty beverage of your choice, this evening it's vodka sodie with a splash of lemon. If you're not a drinker, skip this, or get a root beer, strawberry soda or water. whatever.

Salmon en Papillot

This evening's delicious concoction is Salmon en Papillot - Salmon in an Envelope.

(writer's note: cooking temps and time may vary depending on oven, atmosphere and B.A.C. - writer will edit with corrections at a more sober-ish time)

To make this happen you'll need:

Lemonade with Herbs

The experiment du jour is Lemonade with Basil and Parsley.

We're making a concentrate, the recipe is:
1 1/3 c. lemon juice
1 1/3 c. water
2/3 c. sugar
2 large basil leaves
A dozen-ish flat parsley leaves

This is basically a 1:1:1/2 recipe - I like lightly sweet lemonade, hence the 1/2 part, if you prefer sweeter lemonade add 1 part sugar.

First things first... get your things together - get a bunch of lemons and juice them (I use a reamer and juice over a strainer so the seeds and most of the pulp are excluded from the juice).

Put the water in a pot, throw in the sugar and heat until it just comes to a boil - don't let it boil too long, just make sure the sugar is completely dissolved plus we don't want the sugar to carmelize so keep an eye on it. 

While the sugar and water are heating up get your herbs together. Stack the basil leaves on each other then put the parsley leaves on top, roll everything together like a cigar. When the sugar water has come to a boil, turn off the heat and add the herbs to the sugar water (I used kitchen scissors and cut the herb cigar into thin strips directly into the sugar water. Otherwise cut the herb cigar into thin strips using a sharp knife).

Let the herbs steep in the sugar water for a about 3 minutes(+/-)  then strain into a heat proof vessel (i.e. 4 c. Pyrex measuring cup - something large enough to hold all the sugar water and lemon juice). Add the lemon juice to the herbed sugar water, stir and let cool to room temperature-ish.

When ready to drink, pour an amount of the concentrate into your glass and dilute with same amount of water, add ice and drink. I keep the concentrate in a glass pitcher/measuring cup (something with a spout) that can be covered.

Options:
1. Pour the concentrate into an ice cube tray and freeze. Then chuck a couple ice cubes into some water and have a light herby lemon drink - super good when it's 200° outside.
  a.  cool some delicious vodka or a gin and tonic
2.  Add a few strawberries, cherries, pineapple chunks and/or sliced grapes to the concentrate while it's still warm.
3.  Use lime juice instead, or both lemon and lime or grapefruit or all 3 - why not?!?!?!
4.  Dilute with sparkling water - HA! Screw you soda companies!