Burritospace

Do you like burritos? I like burritos. 

If you want some fun burrito rice, take two scoops of brown rice, heat up some kind of oil/fat in a pan, add cumin, chili powder, paprika, some mexican oregano (just a teeny bit)  and salt.  Cook that shit up in the oil for a few seconds to release the essence of the spices and have it permeate your beef fat/vegetable oil/peanut oil/whatever oil  and then stir your brown rice around in there. 

Don't burn the rice, only a fool would burn the rice. Don't be a fool. 

Then add water.  I just use a random cup when measuring things and add 2 parts water for every 1 part rice. If you want firmer rice, do 1.65 parts water for every 1 part rice.    Get that a simmerin.   Now add an itty sized can of tomato paste.   Now add some more cumin.   Now add a can of chicken breast, juices and all.    If you're feeling really fancy you can add a can or two of chilli beans with all their juices too depending on your volume of rice.     Now get that stuff angry and a bubblin.     Then reduce it to a simmmer covered until the rice expands like the universe.    Don't forget to keep stirring it up once in a while before you get to the simmering stage, again, only a fool burns the rice.

Precise measurements of spices and exact temperatures are silly.  Just do the needful and make the burrito rice.  Feel free to slice up some fresh cilantro and throw it ontop of there, or some cheese, or mix in some sour cream or salsa.  live your truth.

The beff.

If you're poor and stupid like I am but you still want meat in your burrito, get some lean ground beff. The leanest I can find is 80/20

It's good to cook the beff before the rice because you can drain the beff and have some spices and meaty fats for the rice.  That way you're not throwing the fat away like a clown cause an animal died for that so you should use as much of it as you can calories be damned.


So anyways, you got your log/pouch of ground beff. 

Toss that in a wok/skillet/pan/dutch oven on medium heat.   Add cumin/smoked paprika/crushed chili and a few diced onions and a few crushed and diced cloves of garlic.   Keep this on the heat till its nice and brown.  A fun thing to add is "mushroom bullion" from an asian market.  it's really just fake mushroom flavoring and MSG and some kind of soy flour.  But the body craves MSG and its one of the building blocks of delicious.  It's fun to use different types of pepper here.  Dried Chipolte peppers, korean kimchi pepper flakes, white pepper, black pepper.  Just make it good and peppery and add lots of cumin and paprikas.  I'm not going to bubba gump shrimp you over paprika here, just use your nose and sense of taste.

Anyway, keep stirring that ground beff around till its all nice and brown with no pink in the middle.   Then drain that beff with a fine mesh colander and use the fat and loose spice in your rice.   Eat a spoon full.  Say Moo.  Thank the benevolent cow gods for their sacrifice and deliciousness. 

If you want to store this cooked beff in the fridge for a few days for making burritos without it getting all gross and fridgey tasting, I recommend adding a sauce to this meat when it's done being drained.   Chipotle peppers in sauce in a can works well, Guacamole type salsas work well.   Just put some kind of saucy something all over it to prevent the air from making it funky (it still gets funky in air tight containers) 

Now you've got an idea of the rice and the meat, you're well on your way to making a great burrito.

The sasla

Sasla can be a nice addition to your burrito.  Don't put it in your burrito if you're freezing burritos ahead of time, but if you're making them to eat them now, you can add a little salsa as a treat. 

"But tawd.. tostitos /pace/picante sasla is gross and loaded with excess salts and preservatives, I don't want more microplastics in my balls!"

I hear you and your balls.  So do this.

You're gonna need some tomatos.  Tomatos are going to be the majority of the mass in this mix.  I don't care if you use fat round tomatos or tomatos that look more like a banana.  Just get some nicely ripe tomatos and a couple firm tomatos.    A roma tomato is going to be less watery than a salad tomato, so thats a good place to start.

Dice the SHIT out of them tomats.  You're aiming for chunks the size of a starburst cut into quarters. 
Stick em in a bowl or a big jar and move along.

Some people really hate onions, I love onions.  They have layers.  Like ogres.   So I would say 1 medium sized white (least pungent variety) onion per 4- 5 roma tomatos.  Dice it up as small as you can be bothered to.  Nobody wants to scoop up some salsa to find a piece of onion the size of a tortilla chip.

   Now get a clove of garlic. put a knife flat overtop of it and smash that shit like your parents smashed you when the Bills lost the superbowl.   Now you can just pick the garlic skin out of there and dice up the supple garlic flesh into eensy teensy itsy bitsy pieces, go on ahead and put that in there with the tomatos.

Japalenos are good for heat.  If you can't handle jalapenos, I don't know, use a bell pepper or something. I stick with dicing up 2-4 fresh jalapenos depending on their heat level after picking off the seeds and stems.   Make sure to wash your hands after handling jalapenos or you will touch your face/eyes/something else and have a really bad time. 

FRESH cilantro comes in clutch here too.  You dont want to use a ton of cilantro stem.  Some people cry that this is bitter.  So chop off some of the stems and then finely chop up the leaves and some stems.  You're already using tomatos so this is a red salsa.  Keep that in mind when adjusting your ratio of freshly chopped cilantro.

Now add a pinch of sugar and salt to taste, maybe get kinky and dice up some peaches or mango and toss that in there too.  If you want to be a real freak you can add a bit of cumin, but whats really going to tie the rug together is lime juice.   

Get as many limes as you can and use a citrus reamer to juice em'.  Add alllll that lime juice to the tomatos/onions/garlic/cumin/salt/cilantro/onion.   Chill it in the fridge for a while after mixing it all up.    Find the balance of salt/sweet/sour that works for your face by adding more sugar/salt.