Tortilla chips rewards a little know-how: how to choose them, cook them, store them, and substitute in a pinch. Browse 124 recipes to cook with them.

What are tortilla chips?

Tortilla chips are wedges of corn tortilla, fried or baked until they go rigid and crisp.

They started as a thrifty way to use up day-old tortillas in Mexican kitchens, and they grew into the chip you scoop salsa with at every table from a taqueria to a Super Bowl party.

The classic chip is corn: a stack of tortillas cut into triangles and dropped in hot oil until they blister and turn golden. Baked versions exist and run lighter and less greasy, and flour-tortilla chips show up too, though corn is the standard for that snappy, toasty crunch.

What makes them so useful in the kitchen is that sturdiness. A good corn chip stays crisp under salsa for a minute, then softens slowly in soup or crushes into crumbs that fry up crunchy. That range is why they do far more than ride alongside a dip.

Ways to Use Them

The obvious job is scooping. Pile them under cheese and run them under the broiler for nachos, or set out a bowl with salsa and guacamole.

For nachos, the trick is even coverage. Spread the chips one layer deep so every chip gets cheese, the way Loaded Super Nachos and Mexican Nacho Casserole build their layers, rather than dumping toppings on a tall heap that leaves the bottom bare and the top soggy.

Chips also melt into soups and stews. Sopa Azteca (Tortilla Soup) drops a handful into the broth at the table so they soften without dissolving, holding just enough body to matter.

Then there is chilaquiles, the dish built on the chip itself. Black Bean Chilaquile simmers tortilla chips in salsa until they soften to the edge of falling apart, a classic way to use chips that have gone a little stale.

Crushed, they turn into a crunchy breading or a casserole topping. Scatter them over a Mexican-style bake for the last few minutes, or use the crumbs the way you would corn flake crumbs on chicken.

Do not forget the salad. Southwest Grilled Chicken Salad uses chips broken into shards for crunch instead of croutons.

Cooking and Common Mistakes

Tortilla chips love bold company: melted cheese, refried beans, salsa, lime, cilantro, jalapeno, sour cream, avocado, plus any well-seasoned meat. Their corn flavor is a base note, mild enough to carry almost any Mexican or Tex-Mex topping.

The cardinal sin of nachos is the soggy middle. It comes from too many wet toppings piled high, so layer chips and cheese in shallow tiers and add cold, wet toppings like salsa and sour cream after baking, never before.

For chilaquiles, timing is everything. Pull them off the heat while the chips still have a little chew, because a minute too long turns the dish to mush.

When you crush chips for breading, leave them coarse. Crumbs ground to powder pack down and lose the crunch that made them worth using in the first place.

A bowl of stale, soft chips is not a loss. A few minutes in a warm oven crisps them right back up, or they go straight into soup or chilaquiles where softness is the goal.

Substitutes

For dipping and nachos, any sturdy corn chip works, and a thicker restaurant-style chip holds heavy toppings better than a thin grocery chip. Corn tortillas cut and fried at home are the original and the best when you have ten minutes.

For crunch in a salad or a soup topping, fried corn tortilla strips do the same job and look the part. Crushed corn chips like Fritos bring a similar corn crunch in a pinch.

As a crushed breading or casserole topping, corn flakes, panko, or crushed crackers all stand in, though you trade the toasted-corn flavor for something more neutral. In chilaquiles there is no real swap; the dish is corn tortillas softening in sauce, so use chips or fry your own.

Buying and Storing

Look at the ingredient list: the best bagged chips are little more than corn and oil with a bit of salt, with restaurant-style and thick-cut versions standing up best to dips and melting. Thin, very salty chips shatter under a heavy load.

Keep an open bag sealed tight, with the air squeezed out or a clip on top. Chips go stale by absorbing humidity, and once they soften they lose the snap, though they stay perfectly good for soup or chilaquiles, or for crushing into crumbs.

Unopened bags keep for months up to the printed date. Store them somewhere cool and dry, and away from anything heavy that would crush the bag to crumbs before you open it.

To revive a stale bag, spread the chips on a sheet pan and warm them in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about 5 minutes, then let them cool so they crisp.

Nutrition

Quick facts

Where to find tortilla chips: Tortilla chips are usually found in the snacks section or aisle of the grocery store or supermarket.

Food group: Tortilla chips are a member of the Snacks US Department of Agriculture nutritional food group.

In Chinese

玉米片

British (UK) term

Tortilla chips

en français

chips tortilla

en español

chips de tortilla

How much do tortilla chips weigh?

Amount	Weight

Related

Snacks

Recipes using tortilla chips

There are 124 recipes that contain this ingredient.

All 124 recipes

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