Total Time: about 90 minutes
Serves: 3-5 people
Ingredients:
This recipe comes together in five different steps so the ingredients are listed in five sections. Remember to season the sweet potato queso and black bean/corn mix with salt & pepper as you go.
1. Sweet Potato Queso Ingredients:
1 sweet potato
4 cloves garlic
1/2 of a yellow onion
3/4 cup oat milk
3/4 cup nutritional yeast
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1-3 tablespoons of Adobo Pepper sauce (add 1 tablespoon and add more as desired)
salt & pepper to taste
2. Quick Pickled Jalapeños
2 jalapeños
1/2 cup white or apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon salt
3. Caramelized Onions
1/2 of a yellow onion
about 3/4 cup of oil for frying
4. Corn and Black Bean Mix
1 can of corn (or one ear) - I used a 15 oz can and had leftovers
1 can of black beans - I used a 15 oz can and had leftovers
salt & pepper to taste
cumin - optional
5. Fried Plantains
3 ripe plantains
about 3 cups of coconut oil
6. Additional Toppings
cilantro
coconut oil
Recipe Instructions:
Begin making the sweet potato queso. Peel and dice the potato. Put in a saucepan and cover the potatoes with water. Cover with a lid and bring the water to a boil. Boil the potatoes until soft (about 10-15 minutes). While the potatoes are boiling, complete instruction #2. Strain the potatoes and put in a bowl to chill in fridge.
Peel the garlic and mince. Peel and chop the 1/2 of the yellow onion. Add both to a small frying pan with a dash of oil and sauté until slightly golden. About five minutes. Set aside in bowl.
While waiting for the queso ingredients to cool, you can begin to caramelize the other onion half. Thinly slice the onion and add to a large frying pan with the 3/4 cup of oil. Heat on medium, stirring regularly, until nice and bronzed. Strain and set aside until nacho assembly time.
Quick pickle the jalapeños. I used a mason jar for this but anything similar will do. Combine the vinegar, water, and salt in a saucepan and bring to a boil. While waiting for the boil, slice the jalapeños. Place the jalapeños in the jar and pour the boiling mixture over it. Seal with a lid and then set aside until nacho assembly time.
Go back to the queso. Using a blender or food processor combine all the ingredients and mix until as smooth as possible. Your mixer should have the potatoes, the sautéd onions & garlic, oat milk, nutritional yeast, adobo sauce, garlic powder, onion powder. Set aside until nacho assembly time.
Open the cans of black beans and corn. Strain and add to a saucepan to heat. Season with a little salt and pepper (& cumin if you want). Let heat on low until nacho assembly time.
Fry the plantains. Begin by heating the coconut oil in a deep frying pan (or large sauce pan) on medium/high heat. Peel the plantains and slice long ways. Plantains don't peel like bananas. You'll want to first cut off each end and then make a score through the peel from top to bottom. Then peel from that score. I got four cuts from each plantain.
Test that the oil is hot enough before you begin frying. The plantain should sizzle immediately when it touches the oil. If it doesn't, wait a few minutes and try again. Depending on the size of your frying pan, you'll have to fry all your plantain strips in 2-3 batches. Fry each strip for 1-2 minutes on each side. You want a deep golden color. Place the finished strips on a plate with a paper towel to absorb the excess oil.
Turn on your oven to 300 degrees. You'll be heating the assembled nacho plate so all the ingredients are similar in temperature when you serve it.
Assemble your nacho plate on a oven safe dish or baking sheet. First the fried plantains, then the beans & corn, then queso, then caramelized onions, then repeat until all the ingredients are used. You might have some leftover beans & corn and queso. Strain the pickled jalapeños and add to the top of the nacho pile along with some cilantro.
Place the nachos into the heated oven and let heat for 10 minutes.
Juice the fresh lime or lemon on top of the nacho pile. Optional - drizzle with a bit of coconut oil.
Serve and enjoy!
This recipe idea, like oh so many of my recipes, came from an Instagram poll. I asked my followers if I should make a sweet or savory dish next for the blog. The voter turnout was fabulous and it was a very close race with "sweet" winning by just two votes. After a weekend of eating an ungodly amount of cake scraps I was pretty sugared out and was really craving something healthy and packed with the vitamins I had been neglecting. Does beer have vitamins? Anyways. Nachos are my favorite food, which I'm sure I've mentioned 1,000 times in my life so I decided to make nachos with some of my favorite sweet - yet healthy - foods: plantains and sweet potatoes. Surprisingly, it was very easy to find plantains. This recipe has multiple steps that will overlap but it can come together quick and is absolutely delicious. Watch and listen to my quick video before you start to get a better idea of how this all comes together. This dish is warm, impressive, and like nothing else. I hope you'll give it a try and enjoy!
(Oh, and thanks to my quick google search, I now know that beer DOES have vitamins. What's up potassium, calcium, thiamine, iron, and zinc! Thanks for the nourishment.)