Recipe: Easy Tortillas to make at home

Tortillas are a family favourite…

We love tortilla wraps in our house. And making homemade tortillas is our latest baking obsession!

There is usually one meal a week on our meal plan that involves tortillas. And it’s not just for Mexican food: our slightly fussy eating son tries a wider range of food when presented with a selection of food he can add into a wrap! Especially vegetables such as lettuce, carrot, cucumbers, and tomatoes, as well as rice, beans and /or chicken. It makes me happy as a parent to see everyone enjoying veges at dinner.

The downside to tortillas is the plastic packaging. I buy the 15 tortilla packs, to reduce the amount of packaging by buying the largest pack size available. But, it’s still a fair amount of plastic to add to my soft plastic recycling.  Even though I recycle the soft plastic packaging through the recycling scheme, it would be better to avoid bringing it home in the first place.

I found a few tortilla recipes online, tried three of them, and have put together a recipe and method that is a combination of them all. Please find the recipe below, and then my tips and tricks afterwards. There are definitely a few tricks that make it easier to produce a successful tortilla!

Homemade Tortillas Recipe

Homemade Tortilla Wraps

These tortillas are easy to make from basic store cupboard ingredients, and taste fantastic.

Preparation Time: 20 minutes

Cooking Time: 20 minutes

 Servings: 12 big tortilla wraps

Ingredients

• 600 g high grade flour (4 cups)
• 4 tbsp olive oil
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 360 ml boiling water

Method

Making the dough stage

1. Combine the flour, oil, baking powder and salt in a big bowl.
2. Slowly add in the hot water, a little bit at a time.
3. Mix the ingredients with a fork to start, and when it’s not too hot to touch with your hands, knead it until it forms a soft dough. It shouldn’t be sticky, you may not need all the water.
4. Leave the dough to cool for 10 minutes.
5. Put the dough ball on to a floured bench or chopping board, and cut into 12 even pieces.

Cooking stage (can use either a pan or an electric sandwich press)

1. Preheat a pan to medium-high heat. I used both a cast iron pan and a stainless steel pan. Or turn on the sandwich press, if using that method.
2. On a floured board, roll a piece of dough out into a circle of about 1.5mm thickness.
3. Place in the preheated pan or on the sandwich press hotplate. You don’t need to add any oil. With the pan method, if the dough starts to smoke, turn the heat down.
4. In the pan method, cook on the first side for 2 minutes, then turn the tortilla over and cook on the other side for another 1.5 minutes. In the sandwich press method, it cooks more quickly, so cook for 1 minute, then turn it over and cook for 1 more minute. 
5. Repeat the rolling out and cooking process with the remaining dough balls.
6. Place the cooked tortillas on a wire rack or plate to cool, stacking them on top of each other. Cool completely before using them (as they become more pliable when cooled).

Tips and tricks for making tortillas at home

This recipe is full of ingredients you may have at home already, and that you can buy in bulk or in paper or glass packaging rather than in plastic.

The whole process took me an hour first attempt, but by the second attempt I had it down to about 40 minutes. Having a helper roll out the dough balls while you cook the tortillas really helped!

Using hot water in the dough helps to soften it and makes it easy to roll out into the traditional circle tortilla shape.

Work with one tortilla dough ball at a time. If you roll out too many, they may stick to the board and you may have to start again! Luckily, they are easily to knead back into a dough ball, and then roll out again (as I found out when I rolled one too thinly).

Speaking of the thickness, roll each dough ball out to 1.5mm thick – this is pretty thin, but not see through. If they are thinner than that, holes will appear in the tortilla.

When you are cooking the tortillas, heat the pan (if using that method) to a medium heat. Little bubbles will appear on the surface of the dough, similar to cooking pancakes.

Turn the tortilla over after approximately 2 minutes, to make sure that it is not burning. If the bubbles are too cooked, they go dark brown and the tortilla won’t roll up as easily. (But it does become really nice and crunchy, and you can just eat it up as it is!).

Cook the second side of the tortilla for a slightly shorter time.

Stack the cooked tortillas on a rack or plate. Let them cool completely before you use them, as they can break if you roll them before they are cool.

Store the tortillas in an airtight container for up to three days or you can freeze them.

What do you think of this tortilla recipe?

Have you tried it, or will you give it a go? Let me know what you think!