The Best Chilaquiles You’ll Ever Make (Restaurant-Quality)

Hi, I am Saul Montiel.

I'm a professional chef,

and today, I'm gonna show you how to make

the best chilaquiles, spicy, lots of flavor

that wakes you up, and cures your hangover.

This is Chilaquiles Uno and Uno.

The perfect chilaquiles to me,

the sauce has to be a little bit spicy.

If it's not spicy, it's not chilaquiles,

chili, chilaquiles.

The tortillas has to be soaked enough

without being over soaked,

just a little bit of crunch, and it has to be on point.

This is the Mexican breakfast for champions.

You don't need none of those pills to cure your hangover.

You just need this.

Who is ready to make some chilaquiles?

[upbeat music]

Chilaquiles are corn tortilla chips, salt, and spicy salsa.

I'm gonna do chilaquiles verdes,

which are green chilaquiles,

and I'm gonna be using tomatillos.

So for my tomatillos, I'm going to remove the husk.

So how do you know you have a really good tomatillo?

The firmness and the color.

If it's too yellow, that means it's getting too ripe,

so it has to be nice and green.

And now I'm going to rinse, because they're so sticky.

Look how sticky they are.

[water splashing] [upbeat music]

Now I'm gonna bring this to a boil, but before I do that,

I need to add some onions, serrano, and garlic.

Quarter pound of tomatillos, I'm gonna use half an onion.

I cut it the same size as the tomatillo

so they cook almost at the same time.

And now for the serrano,

it's just going to go right in there.

I'm going to smash the garlic

[palm pounding] [upbeat music]

to bring the flavors of the garlic even brighter.

[palm pounding] [upbeat music]

Now it's time to learn some Spanish.

Cebolla, chile, tomatillo, ajo.

We need mas ajo.

Epicurious in Spanish coming up soon.

[palm pounding] [upbeat music]

So that's plenty of garlic.

Once it's boiling, and I'm going to lower the heat,

and simmer it for like, you know, eight to 10 minutes.

I'm just gonna wait for the tomatillos to change the color

to a little light brown.

This is what we're looking for,

nice, light brownish, yellowish tomatillos.

The skin is still nice, still whole, so do what I say.

Now I'm going to remove this gently with the spider.

If you don't have a spider, you can use tongs.

Now I'm gonna add a little bit of salt,

a whole cilantro with the stems,

because the stems has a lot of cilantro flavor.

See when I'm squeezing it, how much liquid came out?

So that's why do the vegetable first.

If you need more liquid, you add it later,

but if you add liquid now and you blend it,

and it is very watery, you're not listening.

[blender whirring]

Always taste as you go.

[upbeat music]

Ay guey.

This is ready.

My tomatillos look nice and smooth, just like it should be.

Next step, sofreir.

We're going to cook some of these onions.

I'm doing dice,

because I don't want to have big chunks of onions.

The reason why I don't want to brown the onions,

because I want to keep it nice and white.

That's why we go on low heat,

and I add a little bit of salt here for sure,

and this will sweat the onions and help them cook it too.

So I have the onions already cooked.

Now I'm gonna add the sauce,

[sauce simmering]

and I'm gonna simmer the sauce.

Now I'm going to stir it,

and I'm gonna add some chicken bouillon.

Why I'm using chicken bouillon, not chicken stock,

it's because I don't want this to be watery,

but I want the chicken flavor.

Half a cube for one pound of tomatillos.

Okay, now we're gonna lower the heat so the sauce cooks

a little bit longer so it's a little thicker,

and also we get rid of some

of the acidity from the tomatillos.

I'm gonna let this cook for 10 to 15 minutes,

and I'm gonna make some crispy tortilla chips.

[upbeat music]

The perfect tortilla to use

for chilaquiles is always gonna be corn,

'cause if you use flour, they'll be soggy and gooey.

Using a pre-made tortilla chips is a no-go.

I think you should fry you own tortillas.

So the size of cutting the tortillas is very important,

because that's gonna determine

how long you're going to fry them for.

So we're gonna cut them in half, half a moon,

and then we're going to cut this in fourth.

So it'll be one, two, three.

So for frying tortillas, I'm using a neutral oil.

Now, the your oil has to be at least 350 or more.

375, you get nice and gold tortillas.

If you don't have a thermometer, you can use a chip.

Lot of bubbles, it's really hot.

Not enough bubbles, it's cold.

So this looking perfect.

[oil sizzling]

We want bubbles.

We don't want to put a lot of tortillas in,

because the tortillas are cold,

and by adding a lot of tortillas,

you will make the oil cold, so it will take longer to fry.

Always stir, because you don't want the tortillas

to get stick together.

How do you know when they're done, when there's no bubbles.

Right now this is ready, and nice and brown.

Now, very important, you have to season

as soon as they come out,

'cause that's when the salt gets stick to the chip.

I'm gonna make another batch.

[oil sizzling]

Remember to stir, always stir,

and just making sure all the tortillas are cooking evenly.

Take your time.

The reason why I'm using a sheet pan

and a rack is because I don't want my chips to be oily.

Salt, very important, that's it.

Our crispy tortilla chips are ready.

Now let's add the delicious tomatillo sauce.

[upbeat music]

When mixing the sauce and the tortillas,

you can do it in a bowl, but I like to use a pan

because I feel like I have better control of things.

I'm gonna put a little bit of sauce here,

and I'm gonna be mixing the sauce and the tortillas as we go

because we don't want to have soggy tortillas,

but not too crispy tortillas.

Now I'm gonna add more sauce,

and now I'm going to wet them.

[chips rattling]

The reason why I'm adding sauce as we go,

because I want to control the sauce portion,

'cause we don't want it to be too wet.

We don't want IT to be all about tortillas.

It's kind of a balance of both.

Again, you wanna make sure

every single tortilla chip is nice and wet.

Okay, I think it's good.

Now it's time to put it on a plate,

some queso, caramel onions, and egg, delicious.

[upbeat music]

So our chilaquiles, they look nice.

They kinda have a little bit of a crunch, but not a lot.

We're not making nachos, we're making chilaquiles.

Basically, this is like my Mexican lasagna.

Now crema fresca, if you don't have crema fresca,

use sour cream, just add a little bit of milk

and a little bit of lemon and salt.

Now, the crema, we wanna put it all over the chilaquiles

so to make sure every bite of chilaquiles have crema fresca.

Now I'm queso fresco.

Queso fresco is a crumbly, salty cheese.

I think we have plenty of queso.

I'm gonna do some onions,

and now I'm going to add the egg,

'cause it's a breakfast thing.

Now, this is optional, right?

Some people like to have chorizo,

some people like to add beans to it.

You can add whatever you want,

but this is how I do my chilaquiles.

I'm gonna gonna show with a little bit of serrano.

This is just to add a little bit more heat.

I'm gonna gonna garnish it

with a little bit of cilantro leaves.

The reason why I'm using leaves,

it's because I don't want this to taste a lot like cilantro,

and I also already added cilantro into the sauce,

so this is more like for garnish.

And there you have my chilaquiles con salsa verde y huevo.

Just by looking at it, it looks beautiful.

I think it's already a winner.

So now I'm going to cut a little chilaquiles.

I'm gonna add a little bit of avocado.

I'm going to break the egg.

I want the egg yoke all over the place,

and an extra serrano, because I like spicy,

layers and layers and layers of pure love, amore.

Ready?

[upbeat music]

Mm, the tortilla, it's nice and soft without being soggy,

with a little bit of crunch.

The crema kind of cuts a little bit of the spiciness,

and balance everything out.

And the onions is just like a,

[lips popping]

a pop-up in your mouth.

And the egg, you can't go wrong with that.

It just makes everything really good.

Excuse me, I want to take another bite.

[upbeat music]

Mm-hmm, wow.

[music continues]

This is how you make the best chilaquiles, simply delicioso.

Three years ago when I was back home in Mexico,

I over drink, and my mom would make me this.

This is like the best solution.

Thank you, Mom.