Binging with Babish: Nachos from The Good Place (plus Naco Redemption)

Nachos number one easy, really yes, I mean salty, crunchy, cheesy, a little spicy, name one thing better than humans have created the painting of the Sistine Chapel on the ceiling, I mean okay, but can you eat it at the cinema? Touche, I'll see you later. You want that? Yes, thanks. Hey, what's up guys? Welcome back to Binging with Babish, where this week I just got back from my book tour and I'm pretty fried so I need something a little easier so you can imagine my delight when I tuned into the new season of the

good

place

and saw a gigantic plate of loaded

nachos

for bear and since tomorrow is National Nacho Day I was more than excited to try a litany of homemade tortilla chip options because we're going to need an especially robust chip to stand up to all those ingredients once I identified more on Bodega as my preferred brand of corn tortilla, all that was left to do was dry cut and fry, which is cut into tortilla chip shapes, dried in a low oven. talking at 200 degrees for about 10 minutes, flipping them halfway for maximum dryness or just letting them sit overnight until they are completely stale and rancid is exactly the texture we are looking for, a little flexible to the finger but firm to the tap.

I just made amends, but you know what I mean, once all our chips are nice and dry, it's time to fry them. I'll make it in about a gallon of canola oil, yes that's a lot of oil. but I have a lot of French fries to make and since the tortillas have very little sediment or flavor, this oil will be very reusable, so anyway I put them in the 350 degree Fahrenheit oil for a minute or two until they are just below what you need. Think it's done as they will continue to darken after cooking, season with a little kosher salt while they are still hot, rinse and repeat with the remaining tortillas draining on paper towel lined baking sheets until they are all cooked and fried but honey , you asked with a smug smile, “is it really worth all the time and effort?” Well, for the

nachos

, I think we're going to perform a structural integrity test on my right left ear, we have a garden of eating corn tortilla chips, one of the most robust on the market and to my right and to your left we have the tortilla of homemade corn in a little warm tap water.

They submerge for say two minutes. Of course, the humidity conditions are more exaggerated than what is asked of your average nacho chip, but it should be that way. a

good

indication of how they hold up to the pressure of the cheese and as you can see the store bought boat is not soggy but not crispy either. On the other hand, our homemade chip is practically ready for nachos even after a soak in the bathtub. so now that we have laid the foundation, let's build a very visible house on top of the pile of nachos and the good

place

is the guacamole, so in a medium bowl goes the pulp of three small ripe avocados, a clove of crushed garlic, half small piece red onion the juice of a lime a teaspoon of toasted and freshly ground cumin a healthy pinch of kosher salt a few twists of freshly ground black pepper and half a finely chopped jalapeño and that's it, nothing else goes in guacamole nothing in the cilantro worldwide fine, maybe 2 finely chopped tablespoons of the soapy green substance mashed with a fork until relatively smooth.

I like my guacamole chunky, but the things Sheedy and Elinor were eating looked pretty deep chunky, of course, taste the seasoning and stop if you want. We have reached the fist of 80's triumph, scrape down the sides of the bowl, no guacamole is to be wasted and cover it with plastic wrap making sure to press it directly onto the surface of the guacamole, this will prevent it from browning while it is in the refrigerator until I'm ready to use it now on something clearly visible on the plate. Pickled jalapenos, the ones in jars are fine, but sometimes they can be a little mushy and after trying some lightly sweetened and Dallas pickled jalapenos last week, I'm determined to put them in. in my nachos, so I'm going to take about eight large size jalapenos and cut them into nice thick slices and then I'm going to make a quick brine in a medium saucepan, two cups of regular white vinegar 2 cups of water 4 cloves of crushed garlic that's going to Do something weird later, I'll show you some kosher salt, maybe 1/2 whoo 3, 3 tablespoons of kosher salt and a quarter cup of regular white sugar, then we'll bring the whole mixture to a boil over medium-high heat.

Heat, maybe whisk a little to make sure all the sugar and salt is dissolved and then we're going to take our sliced ​​jalapenos to the party, we're going to turn off the heat to stir them around a little bit and see what happened. For our garlic it turns blue apparently this is some kind of chemistry involving amino acids, it's perfectly safe so don't worry. I'm sure there is someone smarter than me and the comments will explain it and now we're just going to set our quick pickled jalapenos aside long enough to make some taco meat. Taco meat starts out the same way it did when you were a kid, with a pound of ground beef browned in a pan until it's a nice color and just barely pink in the center, at which point I'll let the fat cool in a pan. side of the pan, I'll throw half a small, finely chopped onion into the fat and sweat it for about two minutes before mixing it with the meat and seasoning first.

The base for any taco seasoning is a ton of chili. in this case, about a tablespoon and a half, then a half teaspoon of ground cumin, ground coriander, ground garlic, dried oregano, and maybe a quarter teaspoon of cayenne pepper. After all, you're Chef John of whatever's going on, anyway, let's just leave it. those spices toast for about a minute before adding 1/2 cup chicken broth, season generously with kosher salt and freshly ground pepper, taste for seasoning, and let everything reduce for another two to three minutes until nice and That could leave me feeling like a taco. Other than that, because next we're going to compete with our cheese, which we're going to need a lot of, so you'll probably want to get the biggest bowl you have.

Mouse, so I'm reading 2 pounds each of sharp cheddar and pepper jack cheese, make sure I'm not using any pre-shredded cheese which is often coated with anti-caking agents that will prevent it from melting as much as possible. Now you'll notice that I'm making a roux, which means the cheese should be on its way to a big sauce. In the pan goes 2 tablespoons of butter to which we will add 2 tablespoons of flour, once it is nice and foamy, then we will beat them and cook them together for about a minute before slowly pouring them in one by one and a -half cup of milk , make sure the milk is cold, as this will prevent lumps from forming.

Once the béchamel has cooked for about two minutes and is nice and thick, we'll add 8 ounces of sharp cheddar cheese, whisking constantly until melted and adding half a drain. can of Rotel tomatoes and chiles which will give our cheese a nice color and a nice tang, season generously with kosher salt to make sure they are all nice melted and soft and of course the chip taste test above for added safety , now it's finally time to assemble our nachos. I was worried that I didn't make enough fries, so I started with a layer of store-bought fries, sorry, especially since it turns out I did make enough fries, but anyway , to our first layer of fries goes a generous sprinkle of cheese and a more cautious sprinkle of taco meat and a wanton drizzle of our cheese oh yeah, starting to think this is going to look good on the show, it seemed like there was some black beans, not my favorite, but I could also see chopped white onion and chopped onion. tomato, followed by perhaps my favorite thing in the world, these homemade quick pickled jalapenos and finally here comes the Calvary, the real potato chips, welcome to the world of food styling friends and then all we have to do is repeat one, two, three, three, three times.

I'm quoting that old tootsie roll commercial with the owl, you're probably too young anyway, this may seem excessive but we're talking about the good place here and if I were a girl from Arizona who had died in a tragic margarita cart Shopping. Mixing accident, this is the plate of nachos I would like to see in paradise. Top it with a final layer of pickled jalapenos and replace it on a rimmed baking sheet in a futile effort to prevent a mess. The oven that has been set for 300 degrees Fahrenheit is a little low, but this way we can bake it for 20 minutes and make sure it's melted and heated completely now for the most important taste test and I don't think the nachos are nachos without cheese and shredded cheese, I mean the ones that were once gooey, chewy and both are covered with tasty spicy beef, salty jalapenos, fresh vegetables, and much to my chagrin, giant mounds of guacamole and sour cream, don't get me wrong, I think these are essential elements for nachos.

I just think they should. It is served separately so that you can more precisely control the distribution of your guacamole and sour cream as you can see here I am putting together a chip with a little of everything a very important litmus test in the success of nachos and it passes with flying colors These They are the best nachos I have ever had in my life and now, while some drugged friends devour them in the other room, I have a score to settle with myself. You see, about a year ago I tried NACO. by Kim Possible and, as most fairly every commenter pointed out to me, I failed miserably, so since tomorrow is National Nacho Day and I'm still wearing my nacho-making pants, I thought I'd try to quickly redeem myself first.

The thing to address is the bright yellow cheese sauce, so to make that gooey movie theater-style nacho, I'm combining 8 ounces of shredded cheddar cheese with 1 tablespoon of cornstarch in a small saucepan along with 1 cup of evaporated milk and half a cup of pickles. Homemade or store-bought jalapeno brine. I'm going to stir this constantly over medium heat until the cheese melts and starts to resemble nacho cheese. At first it will look a little lumpy, but keep going, eventually everything will emulsify and smooth out, we will be left with it. with nothing but a wonderfully smooth nacho cheese sauce, however this thing coagulates pretty quickly so we have to move fast.

Ron's creation, stopped x, appears to be little more than a few chips, maybe smaller than the ones I have, so I'll break them up. a little bit in the form of beef nachos placed on a large tortilla, so I'll top those chips with a little bit of our cheese sauce, some of our taco meat from earlier and what the heck, why not a little more cheese sauce cheese? Nothing looked like that. It was dripping rather unpleasantly and there you have it, hopefully a more accurate recreation of the nacho whose flavor we can finally experience first hand and friends, I have to tell you that it tastes like beef nachos wrapped in a tortilla so you know it's delicious , disgusting and incredible. and terrible like most great innovations, I'm fine