3.3 Huevos Rancheros

A popular southwest / Mexican style breakfast. I view it a bit like a pizza: There’s a generally agreed-upon basis, but plenty of room for variation. Below is how I like to make them.

Source: Experimentation.

Ingredients:

Ingredients

Tools

1/8 lb chorizo sausage

All of your frying pans

1-2 Eggs

Spatula

Black beans

Corn

Chile (green or red)

Tortilla

Preparation:

  1. Start frying the chorizo. Personally, I like to break it up into many chunks and fry it to the point that it gets a bit crispy or crunchy.
  2. While the chorizo is frying, put some chile, beans, and corn into a smaller pan and set it on very low heat. It’s just supposed to get warm. I throw some olive oil in the pan as well.
  • If you don’t have chile, you can use salsa as a substitute, but know that I’m judging you for it.
  1. When the chorizo is done, put it on a plate and crash 1-2 eggs into the pan. Prepare them how you like, my preference is over-medium, but scrambled is also good.
  2. While the egg is cooking, use another pan to crisp the tortilla. Depending on how quickly your eggs finish, you might need to start this before the eggs.
  3. When the tortilla has a bit of crisp (on both sides), put it on your plate, add the eggs, add some of the chile/corn/bean mixture, and add the chorizo.

Variations:

  • If you would rather your tortilla be soft, don’t fry it (one less pan, hooray!). You can just use it plain, or microwave it slightly.
  • I like to add several more things to my huevos rancheros: Home fries, guacamole, cheese, and sometimes a drizzle of my southwest dressing.
  • I like to add some home fries to this as well.

Notes:

  • Chorizo often comes in 1-pound packages. I ususally make huevos rancheros for two, so it’s easy to cook up 1/4 of the package.
  • I tend to have a black bean and corn mixture on hand (literally just a can of black beans, and a can of corn, both drained, and then dumped into the same bowl). It goes great on salads, quesadillas, this, and probably more that I’m forgetting. If you don’t have that, you may want to make sure you have enough people to make brakfast for, have other uses for the corn and beans, or forgo the corn and beans.