My Go-To Guide for Nachos
There’s tons of recipes that need a step-by-step guide, but there’s others that are more like “partial assembly required.” That’s exactly how I feel about nachos. With that said, I’m incredibly particular about my nachos. Here’s my go-to guide when you’re looking to make the best nachos.
Ingredients:
Tortilla chips: I don’t have a particular favorite type of chips, but I do think the chips should be relatively small for easier bites. If you can only find big tortilla chips you can break them into smaller pieces before toasting.
Cheese - I love a nacho cheese sauce, but simply melting cheese is much easier than making a whole sauce. I stick to good melting cheeses but particularly like Pepper Jack cheese that adds an extra hit of spice on the nachos.
Herbs - I don’t tend to add any herbs other than cilantro. If you’re not a cilantro fan, leave it off and just add scallions.
Salsa and guacamole - For me, they’re two must haves in nachos. I love make a quick guacamole and I purchase spicy salsa.
Pickles ingredients - I love to finish with pickled jalapeños or pickled onions for a fresh bite.
Must do assembly tips:
Toast the tortilla chips for 5-10 minutes before you start to add any other ingredients. This helps to keep the nachos from getting soggy. Let them cool before layering cheese and adding the other ingredients.
Do it layers - place the cheese between a few layers of chips so there’s lots of cheese-to-chip ratio. It won’t take a long time to melt the cheese if it’s shredded so evenly space out on the chips and pop back in the oven for about 3-5 more minutes.
One thing I am super particular about is that you should have hot and cold bites the entire time. After I melt the cheese I add the other ingredients like salsa, sour cream, guacamole, scallions, etc. right before serving so the cheese and chips are hot and the rest is cold.
Dollop everything - I like to place small dollops of each ingredient evenly dispersed across the nachos so everyone gets a bit of something.
Serve it right from the pan. There’s no sense in transferring the nachos to another vessel when they’re perfectly good right from the pan!