While it may not be as convenient as buying store bought chips, making your own tortilla chips is super easy and fun to do! Plus, they taste good!
One of Michael Pollan’s Food Rules goes like this:
Eat all the junk food you want, as long as you cook it yourself.
Why make your own tortilla chips?
Reason 1: Calories/energy
Something I try to teach daily is the idea of calorie-density/volumetrics - including foods in your eating plan that have more water and fiber, helping to fill us up without exceeding calorie needs . Now, I do not focus on calories, I emphasize more nutrient-density, as there are many factors in nutrition besides calories, however they still matter. It is much easier to overdo it on calories from processed foods. This is because they are very easy to digest and they don’t fill us up very much.
Here’s an example:
So, let’s be honest, who eats just 7 chips? Not many of us. Because they don’t fill us up. We generally would need many more chips to feel full, unlike broccoli. We would likely feel full long before we ate 37 florets of broccoli. Now, this is not to say you can’t have regular tortilla chips - I still do! It is just about understanding where the bulk of your energy (calories) is coming from, and eating half a bag of tortilla chips (like I used to do!) is likely not what’s going to help us feel our best each day.
Reason 2: Healthy Fats
Many of the fats used to fry tortilla chips are inflammatory oils like processed canola, corn, and/or cottonseed oil. Olive oil, however, is one of the most well-studied fats, shown to be beneficial in moderation. It even has the added benefit of containing antioxidants - something most oils do not have.
Read more here:
From The Paleo Mom
From The Nutrition Source from Harvard
From Healthline
Reason 3: It’s fun!
Store bought chips may be more convenient at times, but I had lots of fun trying different flavors and trying to get the optimal crunch. I also had a lot of satisfaction making so many of my own chips and it was so easy! Plus, I knew exactly what was going into them, which I feel good about.
RECIPE
Ingredients
All-corn tortillas (I used two bags, but make however many you like!)
Olive oil
Salt and/or your favorite spice blends (I used Trader Joe’s chili lime, salt, and homemade ranch)
Tools
A brush
Pizza cutter
Cutting board
Medium-sized bowl
Baking sheet(s)
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350°F
Lightly brush olive oil on each side of the tortillas (do this one at a time on a cutting board)
Slice diagonally across the diameter of the tortilla into 6 even slices with a pizza cutter
Toss slices into a medium sized bowl
Repeat until you have all the soon-to-be chips you want for a particular flavor
Add enough salt or a spice blend to coat the chips into the bowl
Toss until all chips are coated
Lay each chip individually on the baking sheet until no more can fit (the number pans you need depends on the amount of chips you make - I made a lot of chips, so I used 3 pans and made multiple batches, rotating the pans)
Bake for 10-15 minutes, depending on the tortillas used and how crispy you want them.
Enjoy with everything! (I had these with Alton Brown's guacamole recipe that my husband made)
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