A tortilla masterclass
It has been a long time since I actually used this blog to explain how to cook something simple, cheap and delicious. So this blog is that, in a long-winded and unexpurgated form.
For this you will need:
- one medium sized potato, bigger than an egg, smaller than a fist.
- 5 eggs
- Olive oil and sunflower oil
- slightly more salt than you think is wise
Start by peeling the potato and slicing into 1cm thick rings. Also, slice the onion into thin rings too. Lightly salt the potato and onion in their raw form.
Break the 5 eggs into a bowl, beat together and salt.
Line the pan with tin-foil unless you have a very good non-stick pan. This pan used to be fine but over time its non-stick surface has picked up scratches and dings and isn’t very good. Also, lining the pan with tin-foil makes flipping the tortilla easier, as the slightest sticking will mess this up.
Pour about a 1/2 a cup of olive oil and a 1/2 cup of sunflower oil into the pan and place on a gentle heat.
Add the slices potato to the oil, you will notice that some of the potato I have left as full rings, some as quarter rings and some more finely sliced to fill in holes. Cook for about 5 minutes, turning occasionally to prevent them sticking to the bottom.
After about 5 minutes add the onion and mix the two together. Cook for about 15 minutes, making sure the potato is cooked on all sides. The oil level should cover and coat the pan contents, add more olive and sunflower oil if you feel the need, excess oil will be drained anyway later. When you drain the oil, don’t bin the tinfoil!
I use a colander or sieve to remove the oil from the cooked potato and onion. Some people just drain the oil from the pan, I feel this doesn’t get enough oil out. You can re-use the same oil to make many tortilla over many weeks, so I drain into a bowl and then pour the bowl into a jam jar to store.
Pour the cooked and drained mixture into the beaten eggs, and stir together. I find this warms through the egg mixture which means when you cook it (you want a runny centre) you wont get a raw centre. However, you wont notice the egg cooking with the hot potato and onion mixture, this just warms it up a bit.
Pour the mixture back into the tinfoiled pan on a low heat, and keep the mixture moving slowly so that it doesn’t yet form a skin on the bottom and the whole mixture warms through. After a few minutes stop moving the mixture and wait, on a low heat for a few minutes for the mixture to bubble around the edges, when you feel a thin skin will have formed its time to ‘flip the tortilla’.
Drag the entire tinfoil lining out of the pan and onto a plate, tin-foil cools quickly so you should be able to do this with your fingers without burning! Fold the tin foil down, in the picture (above) it is sticking up.
With the tin foil folded down place the pan ontop of the plate, get your hand under the plate and flip the whole lot over.
Because you folded the tinfoil down, it will be sticking up once you have flipped it and not trapped under the tortilla! You can now easily peel the tin foil off the top. If it has begun to stick, just use a knife to gently separate it from the tortilla.
Because there is nolonger tinfoil the prevent sticking keep the tortilla moving gently, using a wooden spoon to push it away from the sides of the pan, etc.
Cover a plate in tinfoil , place over the frying pan and flip the tortilla out onto the tinfoil covered plate.
Wrap the tortilla in tinfoil, so that it continues to keep warm and cook a bit more, while still retaining the gooey centre.
Pop a plate on top to aid temperate retention!
So…. there we have it, an incredibly simple dish to make – made to seem complex by an excess of details and pictures! Enjoy!