Recipe: Flour Tortillas

We were lucky enough to receive a bounty of garden fresh vegetables from a friend's backyard garden, including jalapenos, onion, and fantastic tomatoes. When ever I see this combo of ingredients my mouth immediately starts watering for jalapeno rellenos. In keeping with my goal to experiment as much as possible with my stand mixer, I decided to make my own tortillas.

When I first started I thought a BIG plus to this recipe is the cost savings. There's very little in terms of ingredients in this recipe and the supplies come cheap. After finishing this recipe, I realized the investment is more in your time. Rolling out and individually pan-frying 8 tortillas takes some commitment. But the result was a hearty, deliciously chewy flour tortilla.

Lets take a look:

Recipe adapted from a recipe found here

Ingredients

2 cups of all-purpose flour 

1 1/2 tsp baking powder


1 1/4 tsp salt


2 tsp vegetable oil


3/4 cups warm milk



In your stand mixer bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, salt and oil.
 Attach to your mixer the bowl, dough hook and guard. Turn the stand mixer on to Speed 2 and slowly add the warm milk to the bowl. Allow the dough hook to kneed the dough for about 2 minutes. You may increase to Speed 4. 

Remove the bowl from the stand mixer and cover with a damp cloth. Let sit out on the counter for about 20 minutes. Divide the dough into 8 equal balls. To do this, first divide the dough into two equal balls, then working with one ball at a time divide it into two, then those balls into two again. This is easier than trying to rip 8 sections of dough off of the original ball. 

Place these 8 balls on a plate making sure they do not touch one another. Cover again with the damp cloth and let sit for at least 10 minutes. Take each ball and roll out on a floured surface. If you are going to stack these tortillas together, you must keep a layer of damp cloth between them to prevent sticking. 

Using a large skillet, heat over medium heat. Lay one tortilla in the pan and bake for approximately 1-2 minutes or until golden. Flip and bake for an additional 1-2 minutes to brown the other side. To keep warm, place each cooked tortilla in the oven set to warm (200 degrees F or so). Pan-fry all 8 tortillas this way. Serve warm. 

Lesson of the day: No oil is needed in your skillet to pan-fry these tortillas. I started out with a splash and liked the result better about 4 tortillas in after the oil had been used up. Also, medium-low heat is really all that is required. I originally thought high heat would be better but this caused the tortilla to immediately bubble. The tops of these bubbles would brown (nearly burn) while the rest would remain white. Less heat means better golden distribution.

Recipe in photos: 

Dough after being kneaded by the stand mixer 

Dough divided up into 8 equal balls

What I Learned:

• The stand mixer wasn't a huge help here. It saved me maybe 5 minutes of kneading. 
• This recipe takes an investment in time - rolling out the dough and pan-frying each tortilla took the greatest investment
• Dont pan-fry on high heat and oil isn't necessary. 

This recipe receives a four whisk rating because I would not have made it without having my mixer.