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you call a group of guys named Ignacio. It is also one of the most beloved snacks in human history. Invented in 1943 by Ignacio Nacho Anaya in Piedras Negras, Mexico, they have since become an icon of Tex- Mex cuisine. But if you're like me, you've had a lot of nachos in your day, and not all of them are very tasty. Sometimes they take the form of tiny corn chips with a gooey melted cheese sauce. Other times, they are under- seasoned, under- seasoned, and unimpressive. And in the worst hours, sometimes they are made with Kraft chips in the microwave. So, I want to explore the full range of nacho possibilities. What are the worst nachos you could ever eat? Which are the best?
What are the simplest? Which are the most expensive? And where is the best place to prepare them at home? I have to figure it out here, along with Babish, and I'm not the only one here right now, so it sounds crazy, but that's the name of the show. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. They have been supporting this channel for over 7 years. In fact, they were my first sponsor. Squarespace is the perfect platform to create your own website and achieve your online goals, whether you're building a digital empire or just want people to pitch you funny episode ideas, Squarespace has you covered. I really enjoy making food rating videos and what love most is seeing what you come up with. So I created a site where you can submit
your ideas for episodes. Go to rankedwithbabish.com and submit yours. Squarespace's new design templates make it very easy to customize exactly what you need. To create your own, go to squarespace.com for a free trial and use the code babish to get 10% off your first website or domain purchase. Level one, nachos. These plates are so old that there's a non-zero chance that I've done this to them before. Chips, Tostitos. Cheese, Kraft Singles. By the way, friends, I don't recommend using Kraft Singles for literally anything. Okay, microwave. Well, that's it, friends.
Kraft Singles Microwaveable Nachos. You can always tell them apart by their wrinkled appearance and the fact that you just made them yourself Wait. Are they good? No. Are they bad? Almost so. After all, it's still melted cheese on warm corn chips. That's pretty much what you get on average. If you put some pickled jalapeños in here, you would still be able to tell the difference. The cheese is really, really sticky. But as far as the floor is concerned, it's quite high. It's just melted cheese on corn chips. I would highly recommend at least buying pre-grated cheese rather than cornmeal, because they are chemically made up of something weird. It's like a non-Newtonian fluid. But, ultimately, it's melted cheese on chips. What am I, a
monster? The second level, or maybe the first, I don't know. We'll figure it out. Taste nachos with Slim Jim. What's in it? Beef, pork, mechanically deboned chicken. No cheese products. Even cheese powder or imitation cheese-flavored powder or something like that. Oho. It smells like you cooked everything at the gas station all at once. Like all the burritos and all the Slim Jims and everything else, you just threw it in the oven and just heated it up. It's like you took a Slim Jim and put Dorito powder in it. I can taste the cumin and other taco spices. I would say if I didn't know it was a nacho flavor, I would probably say, "This Slim Jim is spoiled." But then it
stays, and it tastes like a microwaved burrito or something. And, I think, this is officially the second level. I would rather eat this than microwave Kraft nachos. It tastes and feels better, although it still doesn't taste very good. God, this smells like potential diarrhea energy. It's like diarrhea with weight. But, hmm, here it is. Second- level nachos in the form of meat sticks. Level three nachos. No conversation about nachos is complete without Lunchables nachos. Probably one of the least healthy and nutritious meals imaginable for a child, but that's how kids eat, so who cares?
I wish they would treat this like those yogurt cups that you just throw away. Okay, so Lunchables nachos come with a little salsa, which, if memory serves, tastes like just tomato sauce, and a little bit of cheese spread that tastes like pure Velveeta . Okay, no. I was wrong. I've written reviews for them twice on Beyond Babish. Well, how can I not remember what they taste like? Have they improved them? I mean, I was only rating Lunchables as such 4 months ago. They couldn't have improved them for so long just because I made a video about it. This cheese sauce tastes almost the same as the one sold in movie theaters. It seems like it's made of something. It's room temperature, and you dip round chips into it. Maybe not so small. This
annoys me so much. Like, how are you going to use them? You'll ruin everything. These are not nachos. Okay, let's try. Let's try it with a yogurt cup. Now that it's in my head, I can't stop it. Oh. Hey, hey, hey, hey. It works. Let's take some really cheesy chips, cover them with sauce, and then, after a few bites, this cheesy product will really lose any value. Wait, is there cheese in cheese sauce? So, it's mostly condensed milk. Hmm, that's honestly better than I expected. I thought it was just like plain water with cheese powder that they stabilize with 10 different types of gum or something. I'm stunned there's no gum in there. Oh, sodium alginate, it's chewing gum. It was thickened.
It was thickened, but only with one gum. I don't know if sodium alginate is a good option or not, but yeah, it's a pretty sad experience with nachos. What I would prefer is either Slim Jim or.No, I would prefer this. I would prefer that. We are at least a little closer to God here. But we are still quite far away. Let's move on to the fourth level. On the fourth level, we experiment with nacho-flavored chips and more. Well, I know it's not nachos, but it would be remiss of me not to include Doritos in this conversation. Good old Dorito cheese with nachos. I returned for my seventh birthday party. We got a pack of these, mother…We got a liter of soda, and we're ready to party. This, you know,
this is a Dorito with nacho cheese. What should I do? I will say that this is bad. Is this a nacho experience? Not quite. It's kind of like if you took nachos, ground them into powder, and sprayed them here. Like. Because you have all these attributes. Cheese, pepper, tomatoes. I also saw these Doritos in stores, just Naked. I think it means naked, because they simply don't add dyes, etc. Yes, sure, maybe a little better for you, but you're eating Doritos, so it's going to taste exactly the same , because if it tastes different, then I'll know that toxic dyes taste good. They look very heavily sprinkled. They just don't have the same bright red color. From a distance, they look more like regular corn chips.
Maybe it's psychosomatic, because they look like they have no taste, but their taste is more restrained. Let me try one by one. Pretty close. I would say the taste is just as good. This one is just less intense, but I do n't miss them. This is not the end of the world. So that's pretty good, that's right, that's pretty cool. I'm glad this is a growing trend. And honestly, you can throw both away, because my favorite is the nacho- cheese combo. All I have to say is, nachos? No. It's in a pretzel. It's nacho-flavored, but it's in a pretzel. Then the question arises, why did I choose Slim Jims? Just come with me, okay? If I had to choose one of them, I would choose this one. This flavor is richer, you
feel the texture of a real cheese paste. And, you know, I just like them better. And of course, considering protein is so popular right now, I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't tried Quest Tortilla Style Protein Chips Nacho Cheese. They have a really sandy texture. Literally, once you finish chewing them, it feels like you're chewing sand. This is not sand, this is sand. I mean, the taste is normal. Tastes like regular Flavor Blasted, whatever. Tastes like nacho-flavored Doritos. Yes, it's kind of like the situation when we have Doritos at home.
Next, we finally introduce the meat and other toppings from Living Moss, if you will. So, Taco Bell has several nacho options. They have real nachos and nacho fries. They also have nacho sauce, but my body can only handle a limited amount. This is our first, so to speak, properly seasoned nacho in the pantheon of nacho levels. Oh no. These chips seem to have been made with rancid oil. Maybe I got a bad batch or something. I know they don't fry them at Taco Bell. I know they make it in some big evil factory.
It's a shame, because underneath them I can taste pretty good French fries. Like these are actually pretty tasty fries. Taco Bell nachos are like listening to Chopin, but there's a kid with a recorder trying to play along. And it's their first day playing the recorder, and they have no talent for it. This is unfortunate. Because otherwise it would be great with them. This cheese sauce, this sour cream, this refried beans are pretty hard to mess up. I have a feeling I must have gotten a bad batch because, you know, I've bought a lot of Taco Bell but I've never tasted their fries. So, I do n't know. But these fries taste wrong. But I have a feeling I'll like this one more.
We ordered the nacho fries, which are sprinkled with a rather spicy nacho cheese powder and then they add some nacho cheese for dipping. Steeply. The texture of these fries is so bad. I get crispy. As if it wasn't because she was wet and they brought her here. This is the texture of the potato itself. It's not fluffy, it's sticky. And that's terrible. The taste is normal. I would say he is not impressive. It's like I need citric acid to offset all that stickiness and spice. Did they season the cheese sauce at all?
No, it's just Velveeta. Not only is it thicker, it's also less flavorful than the nacho cheese from Lunchables. And I'm not exaggerating. Hmm. Well, probably the appropriate level is level five. I thought, you know, classic nachos would be worse because it's just a cheese sauce with jalapeños, but I would kill for pickled jalapeños. Here is this vinegar bite. It will be neck and neck. It seems like the fifth and sixth levels will be neck and neck. There's only one way to find out. Let's make classic nachos. Dishes, paper. French fries, round. Cheese, ultra-superpasteurized canned nacho cheese sauce, and pickled sliced jalapeños on top. They are much better than the nachos from Taco Bell. Just good cheap beer. Oh my God, I'm
ready to use a public restroom for a severe bout of bowel movements. French fries are better. Cheese sauce is better. Pickled jalapeños add balance. It brings out the pungency and really nice sour-sour vinegary flavor of pickled cucumbers. So instead of just having a rich flavor, cheesiness or imitation dairy products spilling everywhere. Yes, definitely level six. Level six nachos, we found it. Level seven nachos, tacos of white people with nachos. Chips. Tostitos with a hint of lime, everything is delicious. Cheese, pre-shredded Mexican cheddar, Monterey Jack, Asadero and queso quesadilla, gourmet shredded cheeses. A B L W M N, always
layer when making nachos. Very easy to remember. One layer of chips, cheese on top, and then we put another layer on before adding any of our toppings. This prevents them from having a whole pile of chips with nothing underneath. Protein, ground beef, fried with nothing but taco seasoning. Oven temperature and time, 400°F, until melted and done, you know? Okay, the fries are browning and the cheese is bubbling. Black olives for some reason. I don't know if this is exclusively for white people's nachos or if it's a traditional ingredient, but it confuses me. I have some pico de gallo bought, we're just going to plop in there. A lot of sour cream. Oho. And some store -bought guacamole, it.
Level seven nachos. They probably won't be bad. There's some guacamole in there. It tastes really, really like my childhood taco nights, i.e. white people's tacos. I mean, that's not bad. Maybe you should dilute the sour cream and pour it over for the sake of appearance, but you know, I think this is a more accurate option. You need to go to Studio Hinto Limes. You just have to do it. I'm trying to bring some flavor to this house. So sorry for trying something exotic, honey. There is nothing wrong with this. These are far from the best nachos you will ever taste, but they are nachos, and they are not bad. You know, they're pretty good.
Eighth level. At this level, I want to put almost as much effort into making the last pair of nachos, but make them much, much better. And I think I have an interesting idea on how to do it. The idea of a fundido. Okay, these are going to be queso fundido nachos but I'm going to make them very, very special, and you'll see how. French fries, blue corn Chica. The cheese, Oaxaca, is essentially Mexican mozzarella. Protein, fresh chorizo sausage, sautéed along with roasted and deseeded poblano peppers and about a teaspoon of whole cumin seeds. I'll add them for a nice floral
effect. Spread about half of our sausage and pepper mixture. Now I have a hot frying pan. This pan is still very hot, and that's important. You will understand why. Don't spare the cheese. It should be nachos with lots of cheese. Top with the rest of our chorizo poblano. And I want them to be sharp. So I'll add some serrano pepper. Look how beautiful it is already. I like the purple chips against the white cheese, red sausage, and green chili. Well, because. And this guy is heading to the oven just to melt the cheese. Don't go too crazy.
Our cheese melted nicely. Everything is hissing. There are still a few touches left. A little more Oaxaca. Let's just add it there. Make sure all the fries are coated as best as possible. I have a surprise cooking on the stove. A little tequila, which I brought to a boil, and I'm going to very, very carefully pour it over our queso fundido, making this queso flamado. We'll let it burn out. This will finish melting our cheese. He will thoroughly fry some of our French fries. OK. I'm just cheating a little. Quickly returned to the oven to finish it. A little green onion, and there you have it. Nachos with queso
fundido, or, more precisely, nachos with queso flamado. So, how did it work? Look at this cheese stretching. Look at this, dude. Gotta love Oaxaca. Oh, I love Oaxaca. This is incredibly cool. The beauty is that, like in Oaxaca, these fries are made in a flash. It will become very tough and rubbery in exactly zero seconds, but because we're on a nice hot cast iron skillet, it will stay nice and melty. So, every French fry has this stretch factor inherent in queso fundido. And tequila definitely adds a certain flavor. Not much, but tequila is very appropriate in this situation. Actually, we could really use a little wine. It drags on every time, baby.
Yes. I don't even know if the lens was wide enough to capture that length. A well-deserved eighth level. It's a little scary to flambé, but you don't have to. You can just skip the extra cheese and just, you know, bake it in the oven. Make sure everything melts. If you are comfortable doing this, it is a fun tableside activity for your guests. Okay, we're doing it, people. Here is the ninth level, the most expensive nachos in the world. I don't know why this bothers me so much, but it does. Cheese, some extremely expensive cheddar in a cloth wrapper from Jasper Hill Farm. It costs $34.99 per pound. And then we have Alta Badia Mia, which is obviously a good Italian processed cheese. It costs $28.99 per pound. A real bargain.
Before we do anything crazy, like make a cheese sauce out of them, I'll try them to make sure they're appropriate. God, this is really great. It's like Gruyere, but without the smell and sharpness. And we also got some cheddar wrapped in cloth. It is really delicious. It's just a nice sharp cheddar. It tastes like dairy products, like milk fat. Hmm, I know they are, but I think they are good for nachos. We'll obviously apply a little molecular gastronomy and make a cheese sauce. So I'll start by grating these cheeses. This would go great with truffle and wagyu. Oh. Ruined the surprise. Is it really a surprise that I'm making the most expensive nachos in history? I didn't think so. We're making a sauce with sodium citrate, so I need
to be a little precise. I use 69g of good cheddar from Jasper Hill. And then we have a little bit of Alta Badia Mia. Try to put in 150g in total, I would say. Oh, that's right. Oh, 151. Exactly 151. Now I'm going to pour 200 grams of milk into a small saucepan. Most recipes call for a ratio of two to three parts sodium citrate to 99 parts of everything else. And I always noticed that it became too sticky. So I'll add about 3 grams. Technically, it should be 6 to 8 grams of sodium citrate. Again, I don't trust this. So I'll just add a little more, like one extra gram. And now I'll bring it to a point where the water just starts to get hot.
Dissolve sodium citrate, warm well. Wait, 200 g.I got the ratio mixed up. Oh, we'll just hope for the best. Now that's 150g of cheese and I'm going to use a one to one ratio. That should be enough, \{question mark\}? I don't know. This has to be accurate, and I just got it all wrong. Heat the milk until boiling, but not scalding. And pour it in slowly. It should melt the cheese and create the perfect cheese sauce. Good. Let's see what it looks like and tastes like. God, that's good. This is really delicious. Terrible, dense, just right. American Wagyu ribeye without bone and without protein. This piece cost $124.
I want to note that the most expensive nachos I could find online cost $120. This piece of beef alone makes them more expensive. So I can say with some confidence that without the presence of the people from the Guinness Book of Records, these would be the most expensive nachos in the world. So I don't need all this steak for nachos, okay? But I'm going to cut it like this so that get a piece that I'm going to use for nachos, and I have a piece for me. Before cooking, I just add a little salt, quickly add a little dry brine. I mean, it needs to be seasoned, right? We have to season it. Okay, I have a significant amount of vegetable oil on the stove, which I'm heating until smoking because I want to create a crust quickly and strongly. I do
n't want to cook it. If you put it in a large amount of fat, it will cause a lot of spattering. It will be uncomfortable and scary, but it's actually like deep frying. You need a nice crust on the outside. You can see before, after, before, after, before, after. Okay, now to stop the cooking and make it firm so I can slice it thinly, I'm going to put this straight in the freezer. Probably for 45 minutes. I want it to be not frozen, but rather hard. Now regarding chilies, the most expensive peppers I could find were these Peruvian pearls which cost $17 a pound. These are cute, adorable little chili peppers. I think they were
pickled. Very tasty, light, sweet, barely spicy, like without any spice, almost without any spice, but with a rich fruity flavor, similar to habanero. As for chips, I wanted to try these traditional Masa corn chips. If you can't tell just by the package, these are the most expensive corn chips imaginable. For reference, a 12-ounce package of Tostitos typically costs $5.50. These 5-ounce ones cost $13. Why? Naturally cooked tortillas, just like the Aztecs did. Cooked in beef fat from grass- fed chickens, like traditional Belgian fries. If you compare this, the words "Aztec" and "Belgian" almost touch. And then they cook them in grass- fed beef fat, which
sounds great, but then they say, "Just like traditional Belgian fries." They don't smell very good. They smell stale. Yeah, I never in a billion years would have guessed what it costs. So obviously we use them, I just try to pull out the whole fries for optimal presentation. There should be whole fries. We're talking about a plate of nachos for $200. Do you think I won't think that I'll have broken fries? But that's enough. I will lose my Michelin star. I've cooked the most expensive options a few times now, and for some reason they didn't bother me as much as these. I think it's because nachos are supposed to be fun, simple, casual, inexpensive, and shareable. When fancy chefs make $120 nachos, they seem to run out of ideas.
Do something else. Do whatever you want. I want to be able to grill them and then serve them right away. So I'm going to make this little dish. Our steak is thoroughly chilled. It should still be quite raw inside. Ideally. That's what I want to see. I want to slice it thin enough so it cooks quickly in the oven. As for tomatoes, I'll take these vintage cherry tomatoes. They were $4 a pint, which is a lot less than I thought. Still quite expensive. I think that's all. I think we're ready. I 'll start by rubbing some cheese on the bottom layer of nachos. These fries are quite dense. I don't think it will get soggy, so I'll put some cheese sauce on it.
Everything here is exaggerated. A just sprinkle a handful of these Peruvian peppers on my fries. Okay, the oven is preheated, so these guys are heading there for a while. I just want to fry some fries and melt the cheese. Here she is. Now, of course, using tweezers, let's put a whole bunch of wagyu on this crazy thing. So, I'm just going to grill it, really hot, really fast, to sear the wagyu. If you look at the pieces, you will see that they are still pink on the bottom. This is perfect. lot of truffles there. It's a very, very subtle flavor, and it's probably going to get lost in all this. So, and of course, we have to serve with one of the most annoying \{quote \} ingredients in the world, a little bit of edible gold. They almost covered it with
gold leaf, otherwise those oligarchs who were waiting for dinner would have been angry. We'll calculate how much it will cost. Let's see. Well, that was a huge waste. Honestly, just eat the beef on its own. The taste of cheddar, the taste of tomatoes, the taste of peppers, they drown out the beef and truffle. They really do have flavor, don't get me wrong, they are delicious. It 's unpleasant to cook, unpleasant to eat. All of this can be said, I'm going to eat this right now, because what am I supposed to do to throw this in the trash? Am
I serious? Well, there you have it level nine, the most expensive nachos in the world. Huge diminishing returns. I would rather eat a regular plate of nachos than this. Given all of this, I will eat it all right now because I will not let it go to waste Nachos level 10. What are the best nachos? I don't know if anyone can answer that question because, well, the world is huge. But I will try to make my best plate of nachos. Discussing with many different approaches. Should I fry my own corn chips? Should I do some kind of complex protein? Should I make cheese sauce with citric acid the old-fashioned way, or an even easier way? Should I make Texas-style nachos?
That is, each individual chip is filled with all the nacho toppings before being put in the oven. Many things to consider. I'll start with the protein. I bought a few different types of protein and I'm just going to try something out of the ordinary. I think I'll use pork. Maybe I'll cook it a little like carnitas, a little like pork mojo. I will not follow any recipe. The recipe will be on the website, but I'll just try something unconventional. I'll see what happens. So, let's start with our pork shoulder. I have a small half of a boneless pork shoulder. I'll cut it into about 2-inch pieces. And while I'm preparing the other ingredients, I'll just add a little kosher salt to
dry it out a little bit, probably about half an hour before it goes into the sauce, into the marinade. Good. Now I'll make the stew. I'm thinking of onions, of course. Add these guys. Enough garlic. You can fry your whole head, right, people? Let's take a whole teaspoon of cumin seeds, one and a half teaspoons of coriander seeds, four bay leaves, a good Mexican cinnamon stick, a teaspoon of dried oregano, and, of course, lard. Simmer the lard all day. Also, let's take a few whole black peppercorns, a teaspoon each. And then I'll just throw it on the stove, because it's enameled cast iron, it's perfectly safe to throw it here. And I'll
just heat up this lard while I prepare the other ingredients. I'll turn off the fire so we don't have any big problems. I'll start adding our pork. This will cool the mixture a bit, and I want to make sure it's cool enough before adding any liquids. Now I'll add the juice and zest of one large orange, the juice and zest of one lime. Now I'm going to add enough beer to almost cover the pork. And now, as best I can, I'm going to try to take the pieces that are submerged and prop them up with something so they stick out a little better. Now this guy went into a smokehouse preheated to 160°C. That's why I want one side of the pork sticking out. She will absorb this wonderful smoke.
Look at this. Still bubbling from the smokehouse. Yeah, I'm not sure what to call it because it's not exactly carnitas. This is n't exactly pork mojo. I smoked it for about 3 hours. You can see how pretty and reddish-pink they are from all that smoke . I flipped them halfway through to make sure they. I'm not going to waste a single bit of this stuff, and I'm not going to waste this fat, because, you see, we're going to make our own refried beans. Refried beans don't contain much fat. Leave some of these wonderful herbs and stuff there. And look, we have pork fat infused with spices and citrus, ready to make refried beans, just incredible refried beans. Purists will definitely say: use dried beans, soak them overnight, cook them low and slow, add
flavors to them, and they will be better. And I'm sure that's true. But if you make it with canned beans, it will still be much better than any canned refried beans you can buy because you can control the flavors. So, I have about 1/4 cup of our infused lard. Let's make about 1/4 cup of our chopped white onion. And a little color, that's perfect. Now I'll add our rinsed and drained beans. I'm going to fry it with the onions so the spices can get properly roasted. Here's a pinch of freshly ground cumin . It will smell wonderful. 1/4 teaspoon of oregano won't hurt anyone. We 'll cook this for about 5 minutes. Now that these pieces are well cooked, it's time to knead. Let's taste them with this reliable Bulgarian meat that I didn't even
know about. God, that's good. There is salt there. Even without salt it's delicious. Wow. Oh, wow. This is really delicious. I'm going to cover them. Leave until we are ready to cook the nachos. Nachos without some pico de gallo seem incomplete to me. So, I have some nice tomatoes on the root here. Oh my God, I hate dicing tomatoes. This is my least favorite part of making pico de gallo. Chopping tomatoes is such a dirty job, but I'm going to try it because it's definitely worth making your own pico de gallo. Especially if you don't like cilantro and want to avoid it.
I also have white onions here. Ideally, I want to chop the onion smaller than the tomato for the pico. Let's add tomatoes in there, and, you know, about a quarter of an onion than tomatoes. And of course, we'll need some jalapeños. I'm going to do a whole jalapeño because I want it to be a good source of heat. That's it. Here I have some cilantro. This is parsley. I really only recommend doing this if you're making a food video and want it to look right because it will add something special, but not in the same way as cilantro. And boom, no one on the internet will ever know it's parsley. I also add the juice of probably half a lime for this small amount.
I know it's not traditional or even correct, but I like to add a little olive oil, about a teaspoon. I just love the way it affects tomatoes. She just, you know, softens them up, gives them a little bit of fat, a little bit of fat for experimentation. Oh, and of course, salt. I'm going to mix it up, and that's how we got a high-quality homemade, almost traditional pico de gallo. Now put this in the refrigerator until serving. Now to my heat source, and I like to just slice up a jalapeño, put it on the nachos, and that's it. But recently my partner made red jalapeños on bread and butter. These are n't red jalapeños, they're Fresno
. But this is one of my favorite chili peppers. Wonderful sharpness. They are bright and fruity. This is a great chili. So I'm going to marinate them like pickled pickles on bread and butter, that is, with lots of sugar. Thus, we will get sweet, spicy and pickled dishes. Let's start with thin slicing. Let's maybe not be too subtle. Why do n't we make them a little thicker? Let's see if this one will be sharp. Oh, yes. I did n't expect it to be so sharp. T- okay. It's a good thing I'm oiling them. Oh, God. Here's our chili, which I'll put in a heatproof bowl. Hooray.
Now for the pickling liquid, I'll use equal parts apple cider and white vinegar, half a cup of each. You only need enough to cover the chili, really. And I want it to stay hot. So maybe a little more. I'm also going to add half a cup of water. I don't like too much vinegary brine. Instead, I'm going to use coriander seeds, about a tablespoon. One and a half teaspoons of salt. Also add some peppercorns. Normally, regular white sugar is used for pickles in bread and butter, but I'm going to use brown sugar instead. You need about half as much sugar as vinegar. So, that means I'll add about 3/4 cup of sugar. Okay, now we're going to bring this to a boil, make sure all the sugar has dissolved, and then pour it over the chili. I'll also add some
onion. I think it will only help. In fact, I know it will. And let's also add some garlic, two cloves. Okay, our pickling liquid is boiling, and we're going to pour it over the chilies. So now we're going to let them sit for 30-45 minutes until it cools down and the chili quickly marinates. As for the chips, I'm going to make my own, but only for one reason. I want to use flour tortillas. I like flour corn chips. I think they are wonderful. This is as optional a thing as you can imagine. You don't have to do this to make great nachos. The oil is heated to about 175 degrees.
Let's try. So far they haven't curled up, which is cool. I just press them down a little. Make sure they brown evenly. They seem to be almost ready. They will continue to brown when removed from the fryer. OK. They don't look very good. These have become quite greasy. Hmm, and they browned too quickly around the edges. If you cool them a little more, they will become even fatter, but if you heat them any more, they will not brown evenly. This is a real vicious circle. You really need to wait for them to cool down. Otherwise they will be kind of bland and weird. It needs to be hotter.
Perhaps 375 degrees is the golden mean. It was probably worth looking for, you know? This may not be a worthwhile experiment. You know what, guys? I just don't think it will work. I think flour tortillas don't exist for a reason. I've made them before, but I forgot how they turn out, which is almost like dough. After all, they're just flour, water, and a little something else, so why shouldn't they work like dough? Yes, these chips won't work. So, in conclusion, just use store-bought ones. I like El Monterey tortillas. I also like their corn chips. They are incredibly tough. I wouldn't recommend eating them just with salsa or queso. These are great nacho chips because they are extremely durable and water-resistant. So we can pour
cheese, sauce, etc. over them. I noticed that when you eat them straight from the package, they need to be toasted a little. They are almost stale. So throw them in the oven. They will become crispy immediately. They will be perfect. We have our carnitas. They have cooled to an acceptable temperature. We chop them into bite-sized pieces that can be sprinkled on top of nachos. You want to do this after it's cooled down, because if you do it while it's hot, it'll not only, you know, burn your hands, but it'll also cause more moisture loss. You can
see that the pork has developed this wonderful little smoke ring while it has been braising. It will have some of the characteristics of barbecue pulled pork, but with the speciality of carnitas. Take some more of our cooking oil and just drizzle it on. I'll just add a little salt. I make sure each layer is properly seasoned. Holy [__], this is great. OK. They're ready for nachos. This means that all we have left is cheese sauce. And I'll show you the easiest cheese sauce there is. I can't imagine anything simpler. It only requires two ingredients and a saucepan. So, you may have heard about making cheese sauces with condensed milk. One of the easiest ways to do this.
You grate the cheese, mix it with a little cornstarch, and then add it to warm condensed milk on the stove, let it melt, and bang, bang, you have cheese sauce. But I can prepare an even simpler version for you. Do you know what already contains starch? Pre-grated cheese. That's right. I usually really dislike pre- grated cheese because of the anti- caking agents: tapioca starch, potato starch, corn starch, that are sprinkled on it. But in this case it works to our advantage. So, let's make the simplest cheese sauce that you never knew existed. As far as I can tell, no one else has tried this. I have n't found any recipes for this online. In every recipe with evaporated milk, you sprinkle your favorite cheese with cornstarch and it's done.
Pour 1 can (350 g) of evaporated milk into a saucepan. And that's it. We're going to heat it up and it's going to make a cheese sauce. That's all. To add a little color and spiciness, I'll use chipotle peppers in adobo sauce. In general, if you've ever used dried chili peppers, especially chipotle peppers, they have a very distinct flavor. And it's like that flavor distilled into, you know, kind of a semi-fresh sauce. Oh, you can smell it already. And it will add wonderful color, flavor, and spiciness. At least, that's how I theorize. Oops. She brought the condensed milk to a boil. I don't know if that's bad or not. Turn off the fire.
Let the boiling reduce. Add cheese to it. And start folding. If you stir the cheese too much while making a cheese sauce, it can sometimes break up or become grainy, or both. Looks pretty good. So now I'm going to add my chipotle chili. This will give it a wonderful color as well as a rich flavor. Wow, look at this. This is perfect. And if you don't add chipotle, you'll essentially have the world's easiest two-ingredient cheese sauce. It's like a miracle. It's stable, it's smooth. Oh, that's strange. He looks split. Why is it cracking? Oh, it really cracks. I've made this several times. It has never cracked like this. Maybe it's because of the chili. Fortunately, I know how to fix it.
Let's see if I mix it up, will it come back together? Because yes, it cracks. Yes, now it's smooth as a daisy. Well, somehow even smoother than before. Good. Finally, time to assemble our nachos. Let's space them out Overlapping fries are a lost opportunity for cheese, we of course use our cheese sauce, but I also want to add shredded cheese. I think it's ideal to have both. I wanted longhorn cheddar, which is an extremely sharp cheddar that doesn't melt that well. I don't have the perfect cheddar, but we have cheddar just for an extra twist, just to show that we care.
Normally I would just put cheese on the bottom layer, just cheese, but I know these chips can handle it. Let's pour some of our cheese sauce on top. I don't have as much pickled chili as I would like, so I'll skimp on this bottom layer, just save it for the top. Here are our refried beans, which have cooled completely and are almost crumbly, which is actually perfect. Our first layer, let's put another one on. I'm going to do this in parts because I want even and dense coverage. Let's get started, and then I'll finish with the chili and pico. In the meantime, let's, uh, share a few stories about life, love, and all of the above. Or at least that's what I do on my podcast "Booth with Babish," which is now available on YouTube and wherever you can listen to
podcasts. Good. Do you hear that?" Let's add some pickled chili peppers. I'll also take some pico and just sprinkle it all around. There they are, my friends, my level 10 nachos. It took a little time to prepare, but was it worth it? Let's find out. Mmm, that's okay. Mmm. Oh, God. So much is happening. The pork filling is incredible. So the second nachos. I don't know if I can eat it all, but I'll try. Nachos level 10. I'll take them upstairs to my significant other, who won't deny that something fell out of my mouth while I was making them. Just like pure fat. What the hell just came out of my mouth? And we will fix it, or try to. Thank you very much for watching.
Please leave a comment below. What do you want to see me explore in the next 10 levels? What are your level 10 nachos made of? What did I miss? What should I try next time? And what does the inspector do? I know that word, but I never.don't know what it is. Proctor? It sounds like " municipal" or " medical". Maybe it's because it rhymes with the word "doctor." Anyway, I'm going to eat this. Thank you.
I love you. See you later. Thanks again to my longtime partner Squarespace for sponsoring this episode. Be sure to visit rankedwithbabish.com to submit your ideas on what you think I should rank next or who you want to see as a guest. While you're there, admire the smooth template designed by Squarespace. If you're struggling to build your own website, Squarespace can definitely help. With just one click, you can choose from curated color palettes and fonts that can be applied to any template. You can create an entire website in just a few minutes. Their SEO tools help your site reach your audience, and you can use Squarespace to manage e- commerce invoices or even create your business name.
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