4 Levels of Quesadilla: Amateur to Food Scientist | Epicurious

foreign [Music] hi I'm John and I'm a level one Chef my name is Alejandro and I'm a level two Chef hi I'm Saul I've been a professional chef for the past 20 years today I'm making chicken quesadillas they're super tasty super easy and also just a fun snack for like any time today we're gonna make quesadillas al pastor and they're going to be synchronizada style which just means two tortillas stacked so it's a perfect marriage between tacos al pastor and quesadillas so today we are making a blue corn quesadilla with handmade queso fresco queso Oaxaca roster tomatillo sauce in squash blossoms foreign [Music] I'm going to use these simple flour tortillas they're super tasty you buy them at any Supermarket if you're in a hurry you could buy a really nice bag of tortillas like these I usually go with a little more buttery and like kind of fancier tortillas but you could buy whichever you find at the store no need to ground your own weed or corn you just pull them out of the fridge and they're ready to go today I'm going to be making a blue con quesadilla and we're going to use blue corn flour and three simple ingredients salt and water you want to mix it with your fingers no gloves that's what the flavor is on your fingers I'm gonna brush the top of my tortilla with oil and then just like a paintbrush it'll cook more evenly on the pan when I go to cook it later as you can see these look nice burnt and buttery the best way to know when your Doge ready is when when the dough doesn't stick to your hands it's still very dry to me I'm gonna add a little bit more water just like to make a little bowl see it doesn't stick to my hands it looks like it's ready so I'm just gonna lay them out here later we're gonna prep them up and put really good stuff inside today we're going to be making queso fresco normally you can use only milk but since I'm a professional I'm going to use some buttermilk and whipping cream we're gonna add vinegar you're gonna steer you shut it off and you wait I use this Mexican cheese blend it's available in the supermarket looks like it's got cheddar monterey jack I have queso asadero right in front of me you don't have to use queso asadero sometimes it might be hard to get but guess a Oaxaca or any other kind of melting cheese would be really good for quesadilla it's been 10 minutes we're gonna break the cheese look at this watch me dump all the queso fresco all over the table I want to squeeze a little bit we're not a little bit of salt now we're gonna put it on the fridge to chill for four or six hours I'll be right back it's already shredded make sure to not cut your knuckles because you don't want bloody cheese not in the recipe I'm just going to open it up lots of cheese and you know what I always say cheese is good to taste because you can never have too much cheese now we have a full bowl of shredded queso and another cheese I'm going to use queso Oaxaca it's the Mexican consulate mozzarella I would say my favorite cheese is probably mozzarella but for quesadilla I wouldn't use mozzarella cheese you could you could if you want but I find this Mexican cheese blend is just way better it's like strings now the reason why we do this is because we're going to make sure the quesadilla melts nice and evenly the next step is going to be the filling I got this beautiful rotisserie chicken right here from the supermarket it's pre-cooked I'm just gonna shred it up and then we'll put it in our quesadillas are filling we are going to start with the marinade for the pork so the first step is to chop the pineapple next at chunks and you just put them aside in a bowl what I see here now is basically what I grew up eating is avocados jalapenos it's so much easier to use your hands like look how easy pull it apart now I have the Chile guajillo and ancho which I boiled them for 30 minutes to soften them we are gonna cut off the tops and then we're going to throw them into our food processor so along with the chili we are going to put one cup of orange juice put in some oregano and some garlic and blend it until it's like truly dark red orange almost Brown These ingredients are so delicate that you don't need to do anything to them thin slices of porcini mushrooms the other ingredients that's the Mexican caution of the basil nice avocado from Mexico things like this or jalapeno because we need a little bit of heat we also need a little bit of color Watercress this is going to add the freshness that I'm looking for and a little bit of a of a bitterness too now we have our slow cooker here and all of our ingredients we're gonna start with the pork after that Chile guajillo and ancho marinade put in your pineapple put your onion your cilantro and then you put your salt and lastly a cup of beer so I like to use Mexican light beer that'll give it some extra juice let's put the lid on and set it on high for four hours I think they even make pre-shredded chicken but I'm going to shred my own because I know how to do that today we're making a roaster tomato jalapeno salsa the key of making a gray salsa is by having simple quality ingredients for example a white onion and we are going to roast them because we want them to be sweet like our Chef after the onion I'm going to do the jalapeno tomatillos have a really nice citric flavor which is great for a sauce and a topping it's the Mexican cousin of the Tomato unlike other folks who like to make their sauces you two can buy them at the supermarket I feel like sometimes you buy sorba and it's hard kind of measuring how hot it's going to be or how mild or how actually like tasty I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel here I got some store block some store-bought salsa and some sour cream because thyme is Essence now we're going to do a little bit of garlic that's the color that we want nice charcoal let's add a little bit of salt we're gonna move on to the Chile Serrano at the top slice this open in half we're also going to use some now the tomatoes if you want to have a more milder sauce remove the seeds I'm going to remove the vegetables the caution to the knees the nephews the uncle jalapeno we're gonna broil them for five minutes then take them out flip them over and broil them for five more minutes and these will be great as toppings for the quesadilla you can pick and choose which ones you want I happen to like all of them all right so while the tomatillos and Chile Serrano are broiling we are gonna start prepping the other part of the sauce we have our onion cilantro our lime our garlic and our salt and we're gonna blend it I'm struggling a little bit to get all the ingredients so you might just have to turn it off give it a little Shake I think if you want to make your own guac that's great have fun same with salsa okay well no it's Blended enough this is my Mexican blender start with garlic in YouTube Peppers again some smelling the spices of the pepper let's add the rest of the family the onions tomatillo tomato now we have our broil tomatillos and Chile Serrano straight from the oven and you're just gonna plop them in there now is basically roaster vegetables with peppers supposed to be chunky we have this really nice consistency and now we're gonna make it creamy and to do that we're gonna use an avocado this salsa looks almost ready we're gonna add some fresh cilantro this is going to be delicious for my quesadilla I think that's good now that it's fully Blended we're gonna stick it in the fridge let it cool until you're ready to serve your quesadilla we are ready to Assam all our quesadilla so now you're gonna get a bag like this closer together in half another half this is one way to save the world use your plastic bags to press your tortillas so there we have it make sure to scoop up as much chunky Nest as you can all the cilantro the onion the pineapple if the dough doesn't stick to your hands that means it's nice and ready for you tortilla now you're gonna put this one right here press it when you made this type of tortilla it needs to be fresh I'm gonna put my tortilla face on the pan with the oil side and then on half of the tortilla cheese and then a layer of chicken we are gonna grab our tortillas and we're gonna sprinkle them with a little bit of cheese lay your tortilla flat and then you're gonna grab your pork and you're gonna put some on top a little more wine now you can never have too much chicken and then another layer of cheese I also have green peppers here you could just give them a little roast and then you put your other tortilla kind of sandwich I'm just gonna take half of my tortilla and fold it over the porcini mushrooms we're going to add the squash blossoms a little bit of jalapenos and then the beautiful queso fresco the Watercress you place it a little bit make sure the cheese stays we're not a little bit of oil because I want my quesadillas to be a little bit of crunchy so I'm gonna let this cook for about two to three minutes let it get golden brown on the bottom and I can just check it easily my spatula but once it's golden brown then I'll flip it and let it cook on the other side it was a pro and this is why you pay 25 for a quesadilla and a restaurant now it's time to Plate up my quesadilla I'm just gonna cut it into thirds cut it in fourths I'm just gonna lay them on a plate like this we're gonna also put these on how about that now this is ready to eat I'm gonna grab some green salsa and I'm just gonna kind of put it up top or in the middle make it seem like I'm in a fancy restaurant grab some sour cream I don't even want to put anything else but I'm gonna have to make it look prettier otherwise I won't look like a pro we have the roasted salsa things like so avocado maybe just one question a little bit of this this jalapenos just in case if you're like me they told me to eat healthy so I'm going to put a little bit more Watercress and we're going to finish it with some queso fresco and this is my quesadilla and this is my al pastor quesadilla synchronizada and there you have it Squash Blossom quesadilla with porcini mushrooms salsa martahada queso fresco Oaxaca cheese oh god um it's everything you want in a snack this is so good it's kind of a whole experience once you take a bite because you'll have the tortilla you'll have the cheese then you'll have the marinade and then you'll get some citrusy from either the pineapple or the lime and the green salsa just is a really nice finish wow wow wow wow delicious it's a Mexican Market in one bite Mexico right here with a little Italian thank you for tuning mushrooms this is just incredible maybe I should become a chef quesadillas are a delicious cheese dish to make any time of day let's see how each of our Three Chefs made theirs John and Alejandro both used store-bought flour tortillas which are convenient and soft made from enriched wheat flour with added leavening agents such as sodium acid pyrophosphate and monocalcium phosphate and antioxidants such as citric acid these chemicals extend shelf life and make a consistent product they're readily accessible you can buy them at any Supermarket Saul handmade blue corn tortillas the corn flour is blue due to the presence of purple or blue pigments called anthocyanins in the corn John used store-bought tomato-based salsa it has a cooked taste to it because the salsa is hot packed in the jar making it shelf stable for a long time Alejandro made a green sauce with a Litany of green ingredients like tomatillos Serrano chilies cilantro and avocado the tomatillos and Serranos are dark roasted which brings out a smoky quality to his salsa as the base of his salsa they add a layer of complexity from the pierazines and heterocyclic amines formed during roasting avocado is diced and added at the end it adds creaminess because it's high in unsaturated fatty acids Saul's martahada salsa is made with charred ingredients that are diced and then ground in a molcajete and make a lot of noise so everybody can hear you that you're making a salsa a special cooking apparatus like a mortar and pestle but usually made from volcanic rock allowing maximal flavor compounds to be exposed John used a combination of various cheeses like Colby and monterey jack that was already shredded and it says Mexican so you got that going for you great monterey jack is a cheese that's been around since the 1600s where it was first made by Franciscan monks in California its name is derived from the Jack an apparatus that was originally used to press the curds these cheese Blends have preservatives added but still have a shorter shelf like once they're opened because the cheese is already shredded exposing maximum surface area to potential food-borne pathogens Alejandro added shredded queso asadera to his quesadilla this cheese is slightly yellow colored because it's a cow's milk cheese cows consume beta-carotene when they eat grass but can't metabolize it so the golden color is expressed in their milk Saul made his own queso fresco by heating milk and cream together to just below boiling this destabilizes some of the watery soluble whey proteins he added acidic buttermilk and vinegar which are positively charged and destabilize the negatively charged Kappa casein protein in the mill the product of this destabilization are Curds which can be pressed into cheese and weigh the high protein watery byproduct that is a beautiful yellow green color from the presence of riboflavin also known as vitamin B2 save the way and use it in pancakes coffee cakes sauces or anywhere you use an acidic liquid the next time you're making delicious cheese filled quesadillas we hope you'll take some of these tips from our three amazing chefs

Channel: Epicurious

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Keywords: 4 levels, 4 levels epicurious, 4 levels of quesadilla, best quesadilla recipe, chicken quesadilla recipe, easy quesadilla recipe, epi, epicurious, epicurious 4 levels, homemade quesadillas, how to make a quesadilla, how to make quesadillas, loaded quesadilla, mexican quesadilla, perfect quesadilla, quesadilla, quesadilla 4 levels, quesadilla recipe, quesadillas, quick quesadilla, restaurant style quesadilla, saul montiel, simple quesadilla, the perfect quesadilla

Id: 4LJWiGPt7P0

Length: 14min 21sec (861 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 12 2022