Tortilla Chips, and Corn Tortillas

I'm milking this mexican thing for all its worth. This week we're doing corn tortillas and tortilla chips. Just like the flour tortillas, corn tortillas take a bit of finesse to get right.

Couldn't be much simpler. That's masa, by the way. Look around, it's in most large grocery stores and many ethnic stores. You could make it at home, but it involves lye, and I stay away from making things with lye.

Mix two cups of masa and a few pinches of salt together.

Add a cup and a third of water, or a little more if needed. It will come together in a dough. A weird dough. It looks like a dough, and it kind of feels like a dough, but if you try to knead it, it will just shear instead of bending. That's what happens when you don't have gluten in a dough.

Pull off a golfball sized ball (and again, it will just kind of shear off the ball, it's really really weird). Put it in your tortilla, press, and press.

Throw it on a skillet for about 60 second a side. Also, feel free to steam it before reuse. That will make it more pliable. These should be really thin, they're best like that.

Now, take the tortillas, corn and flour, that didn't come out so well and cut them up into little bits.

Heat up some oil in a pan, wait until it shimmers, and drop in some of the uncooked chips.

When they're done, sprinkle with some salt.

Enjoy.