Homemade Tortillas! ...Forget the Store Bought Stuff!

Fresh tortillas, rolling pin style.

First: one thing's for sure, homemade tortilla recipes are all over the place...as different in recipe as the people who make them. Second: you do not need a tortilla press. Third: you need anywhere from an hour and a half to a full afternoon to make them (I worked with one recipe and another's technique, opting for the full afternoon camp). Fourth: you might not be able to stop eating these straight from the pan, so plan on making a lot if you expect to have some for filling.

Let' get some details out of the way.  I adapted this batch from Ree Drummond's repertoire.

For ~16 8" tortillas, have on hand:

2-1/2 cups all purpose flour (King Arthur's unbleached, or try Brookford Farm's), plus extra for rolling out dough balls

2-1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp kosher salt

1/2 cup plus 2 Tbsp lard

1 cup hot water (not boiling, just hot from the tap)

lg wooden/other bowl

wooden rolling pin (I used my French pin)

cast iron pan

couple of lint-free tea towels

Now, about the lard.  I never would have used this had I not come across locally and organically produced leaf lard, which is the best quality fat one can use for baking.  Vegetable shortening would have been my fallback.  If you choose to use vegetable shortening, know that you will not have the same flavor.  Nope, not even close.  But that's not to say that you'll discern "pork flavor" in your baked goods.  You won't!

That all said, let me just say, I thought I'd never use lard for anything, ever.  Then, seduction hit while watching a baker one day make something with "leaf lard."  All their talk about it being so pure and white...and how much flavor and tenderness and moistness it lends to a dough...and all their mmm's....  Synaptic plasticity strengthened in my brain that day, and while touring a farmers' market later that same season, there it was, for sale on Brandmoore Farm's table.  Yup, pure white.

This is leaf lard from Brookford Farm.  Brandmoore's came in a mason jar.  This stuff can last for a wonderfully long time in a sealed jar in the fridge without losing any baking/cooking appeal

Ree's recipe for homemade tortillas is fairly straightforward: mix the dry ingredients together, cut in the fat, then stir in the hot water.  You'll have a sticky dough at first, but after kneading the dough for a few minutes, it'll become less sticky.  Let it rest in the bowl, covered with one of the towels, for at least an hour.

After the dough has rested, form large golf ball-sized balls and arrange on a sheet pan to rest.  Once you've used up all the dough, let them rest for at least a half hour.  You might consider laying a sheet of plastic wrap over them before covering with the towel.

After you've rested the balls, start heating up your cast iron pan over a medium to medium-high heat.  Can you use a different pan?  Go ahead, but a heavy cast iron pan will give you the best heat distribution and control.  With these babies, which meed all of seconds on each side, you want control.

Next, lightly flour your board/counter and rolling pin.  Start rolling out each dough ball into fairly circular shape (or go nuts and make 'em any shape you want).  Ree stressed "super thin."  Lifting and quarter-turning your dough as you go is the way to go.

Initial shape taking form, but a lot more rolling to be done here.

You'll find this to be very easy dough to work with.  All that fat does that.  Forgive the rhyming; it's not intentional.

 

I worked in a roll it, pan it, roll it, pan it method.  While one was in the pan, i'd quickly get another one mostly rolled out.  Don't attempt this unless you're confident that your sixteen eyes can keep that pan in check.  Like I said, these things cook very quickly and can go from just right to too much in no time.

One side will cook for about 30 seconds, during which you'll notice air pockets forming.  Using one of your tea towels (light linen towel), gently press down on those as soon as they've formed, then flip the tortilla up and over.  You may want to press with the towel again as you cook the second side for all of 20-30 seconds longer.

King Arthur all purpose flour tortillas

A just-flipped tortilla made with Brookford Farm's whole wheat pastry flour

After each tortilla has been cooked, lay it on a towel-lined plate.  Use these same day and you can leave them out on the counter, covered with a sheet of plastic wrap.  For saving, store airtight in a ziplock.

FYI, all purpose flour has a protein content of about 9-12%, while pastry flour has 8-9%.  Protein is important for tortilla making--it's what provides the chewiness that tortillas are known for, where a lower protein flour yields a drier, flakier result, e.g. pie crusts. I was willing to take the risk using pastry flour for the sake of using locally grown and produced flour (Brookford's 'pastry' flour was all I had on hand; they also produce whole wheat 'all purpose'), but it no doubt yielded a more delicate tortilla, one that was really tasty, but unable to hold up as a wrap for the lamb kofta we made for this meal.  Had I made quesadillas, on the other hand, we'd have been dancing around the room.

Try this interesting video for picking up authentic tortilla-making techniques, complete with lovely Mexican music in the background.  I used her technique only for rolling out the balls and cooking.  A very big difference between my two sources was the amount of lard used, as well as, the resting factor.  I opted for more fat and more rest.

Which pretty much sums up my life.  :~p