Making your own fresh tortillas needn’t be very difficult or time-consuming, and the rewards in flavor are great. Tortillas do suffer with keeping, and if you’ve never had them freshly made, hot off the griddle, look forward to a real treat.
However, it’s only fair to give warning that if you intend to shape your tortillas by hand, you’re in for a long stretch of work. Although I’ve seen practicing tortilla makers slap out perfect circles, thin and tender, in mere seconds, the first time I tried it, I found myself surrounded by crumbs of dough, holding a shapeless, broken lump. I discovered that a first-timer could turn out decent tortillas, but only by the painstaking process of rolling each one out between two sheets of waxed paper slowly and carefully.
Fortunately, however, there exists a simple and cheap tool which reduces tortilla-making to a snap. The tortilla press, which can be purchased in most stores that sell ingredients for Mexican food, as well as in some stores that handle ingredients for Indian food (chapatis being similar to tortillas), is the miracle worker.
I heartily recommend obtaining one if you are at all fond of tortillas.
As for the ingredients, the masa harina from which tortillas are made is nothing more than corn treated with lime water and specially ground to a very fine meal. The Quaker Oats Company packages a perfectly acceptable dry masa, which needs only to be mixed with water and salt to taste. Do not attempt to substitute corn meal for masa harina—it is much coarser and will not work.
Makes 12 tortillas.
• 2 cups masa harina
• 1 cup water
• ¾ to 1 teaspoon . salt
1. Combine the masa, water, and salt in a bowl and stir until thoroughly combined. Knead gently with your hand for a minute or two, until the dough holds together. A few more drops of water may be added if the dough seems too dry and crumbles away easily. It should be moist but firm.
2. Divide the dough into 12 pieces of equal size and roll each piece into a ball.
3. If you are not using a tortilla press, place a ball of dough between two sheets of waxed paper and roll it out carefully into a circle about 6 to 6½ inches across.
4. If you do have a press, begin by placing the thin plastic sheet (which comes with the press) on the bottom section. Place a ball of dough on it, in the center of the press. Fold the plastic over the dough, leaving enough room for the dough to spread equally in all directions. This is simply a lining to keep the tortilla from sticking to the press.
5. Fold the top of the press down, flip the handle over from the other side, and push it down. Open the press up again, and there will be your tortilla, perfectly round and thin, shaped in about 5 seconds.
6. Peel back the plastic on top, turn the tortilla over onto the flat of your hand, and gently peel back the plastic from the bottom. Keep the uncooked tortillas layered between little sheets of waxed paper.
7. To cook the tortillas, preheat an ungreased griddle or heavy pan until it is hot enough to make a drop of water jump and sizzle.
8. Drop a tortilla onto the hot pan and, keeping the flame quite high, cook it for about 30 to 40 seconds. Turn it over with a spatula and cook the other side for the same amount of time. The tortilla may start to puff up. This is fine—just press very gently on it with the flat spatula to keep the bubble or bubbles even.
9. Turn the tortilla twice more, giving it a total of about 2 minutes in the pan. When a tortilla is done, it has a pale golden color, with a few dark brown spots or freckles here and there.
10. Keep your hot tortillas stacked, wrapped in a tea towel or cloth napkin, inside a close-woven basket or a bowl. They will stay warm for a good ½ hour this way.
11. Serve as soon as possible with any kind of Mexican food. Fresh, hot tortillas spread with a little butter are also marvelous just by themselves.
