Corn Tortillas
Ingredients
6 tortillas
- For the tortillas
- Corn flour 1 cup (200 ml), plus a little for dusting
- Wheat flour 0.5 cup (65 g)
- Warm water (35–40°C) 120 ml
- Fine salt 0.5 tsp (3 g)
- Vegetable oil 1 tbsp
- For nachos (optional)
- Vegetable oil for frying
Step-by-step recipe
Making the dough
The amounts are very approximate, just to show the proportions. Usually up to 1 kg of flour is used.
Corn flour is rarely used in our traditional cooking, but you can find it in stores. It is usually not as finely ground as regular wheat flour and looks more like bran, with a pleasant pale yellow color. Go for a finer grind.
Sift 1 cup (a 200 ml glass) of corn flour into a large bowl.
Add 0.5 cup of regular wheat flour (65 g). Corn flour is much less sticky than wheat flour, so if you have never baked with it, the wheat flour gives you a head start when rolling out the tortillas, and they won’t fall apart. Add 0.5 tsp of fine “extra” salt to the flour. Stir the flour and salt thoroughly so the mixture is as even as possible.
Pour 120 ml of warm water (35–40°C) into a glass. Add 1 tbsp of vegetable oil and whisk with a fork.
Pour the liquid into the flour and knead the dough. The dough will most likely be a little runny, so add corn flour in small portions until you get a very soft dough. Roll the dough into a ball, cover with a cloth and let it rest for 30 mins at room temperature.
You will get about 350 g of dough, enough for 6 tortillas. Divide the dough into 6 pieces and roll them into balls.
Rolling out and baking
Put a frying pan on the heat. The pan must be dry, so no oil. A crepe pan works very well, by the way.
Next you will need plastic wrap or an ordinary plastic bag.
Place a ball of dough on a piece of plastic and press it flat with your palm into a round. Cover the dough with a second piece of plastic and roll it out between the two layers with a rolling pin into a round flatbread 15 cm across, roughly the size of a CD.
Peel off the top sheet of plastic, flip the tortilla onto your palm and peel off the bottom sheet. Carefully lay the tortilla in the hot, dry (!) pan. Bake for 1.5–2 mins on each side. The edges may curl up a little, which is fine. A little puffing is fine too. The tortilla will turn a deep yellow and cook through nicely.
Stack the finished tortillas on top of each other and cover with a cloth to cool. If they are not overbaked, tortillas bend easily and fold in half.
With a filling or as nachos
Then, without delay, let your imagination run and make a filling of meat, vegetables, chicken, peppers, herbs and garlic. Spoon on the filling and add some fiery salsa. Fold the tortillas in half and enjoy.
Many will also like making nachos (corn chips), which takes just 10 mins.
Cut the finished tortillas into 6–8 wedges, like a pizza. Fry the wedges in hot vegetable oil for 1–2 mins. Put the chips on a paper towel to drain off the excess oil. The chips are especially good with guacamole.
Calories and macros
175 kcal
Serving ≈ 50 g
- Protein3 g7% of kcal
- Fat7 g35% of kcal
- Carbs24 g58% of kcal
100 g347 kcalProtein 6 gFat 13.2 gCarbs 48.4 g
Calculated from the recipe ingredients, excluding salt and spices. Data: USDA and Matvaretabellen.
To Get It Right
Which flour to use
Choose finely ground corn flour: the coarse kind looks like bran, and the dough made from it doesn’t hold together well. Readers also bake them from a mix of three flours: corn, rice and wheat.
Roll between plastic or paper
The dough is soft, so it’s rolled out between two layers of plastic. Baking paper works too: readers do it this way, and the whole batch takes about 20 minutes.
To keep the tortillas soft
Stack the finished tortillas under a cloth right away. Readers cover them with a damp cloth, as with lavash. You can also bake them a day ahead: put the cooled tortillas in a bag and warm them in a dry pan for 10–15 seconds on each side before serving.
Have your own trick for this recipe?
Questions and answers
What is a tortilla?
A Mexican flatbread made from corn or wheat flour, baked as far back as the ancient Maya. A tortilla serves as both bread and spoon: fillings are wrapped in it, and it’s used to scoop up sauce. A Spanish tortilla is a completely different dish, an omelette.
What is the difference between a tortilla and lavash?
Both are unleavened flatbreads that serve as bread and spoon. But a classic tortilla is made from corn flour, is small, about 15 cm, and bakes in a dry pan in a couple of minutes; lavash is thin, made from wheat flour and much larger.
Do tortillas need baking powder?
No. A tortilla is simply a flatbread made from the plainest unleavened dough, with nothing extra and nothing complicated. Even “reprints” of original recipes sometimes add things, but the tortillas turn out just right without them.
Can you make tortillas without wheat flour?
Yes, but dough made from corn flour alone is harder to roll and falls apart: it’s much less sticky. If it’s your first time, it’s better to add half a cup of wheat flour (65 g). I haven’t tried using gluten instead of wheat flour.
What if the dough crumbles and the tortillas crack?
The dough should be very soft. If it feels like damp sand, add a little warm water: readers added another 10–15 ml. And to keep the tortillas from cracking, don’t overbake them: 1.5–2 minutes on each side.