4 Levels of Fajitas: Amateur to Food Scientist | Epicurious

Hey, what's up? It's Desi, Level 1 Chef. Hi, I'm Lorenzo, and I'm a Level 2 Chef. Hi, I'm Saul. I've been a professional chef for the past 24 years. The best time to have fajita is when you got about $30 left in your bank account because it's a cheap meal to make. Whenever I think of fajita, I think of a sizzling platter coming towards me. It's smoking. I think this is when American food and Mexican food got married. It creates a text mix. I mean, some people use shrimp. Some people like beef. To me, I think chicken's number one. Chicken's like the New York Yankees for the fajitas. For my steak fajita, I use skirt steak. Chicken's all cut up. Now it's time to decorate the chicken. A little salt. Gotta let it snow a little bit. A little red pepper. Two taps. I'm going to be making chipotles en adobo from scratch. Dried chilies we soak in hot water for like 20 minutes. We're going to hydrate them again, and that's going to increase the volume. They're going to taste better because they will be more meaty. Let's start with chopping some garlic. Chipotle peppers, by the way. Now I'm going to do the tomatoes. Taco seasoning. I like to add my own flavor to it. Make it seem swagu. That's what makes mine a little different. The reason why I'm using brown sugar is that's just to kill some of the spiciness from the peppers and also to caramelize this sauce so it can be nice and rich. I'm going to do bay leaf, oregano, cinnamon, cumin, and my secret ingredient, pineapple juice, as my acid in my marinade. The reason why I use apple cider vinegar, two things. It will save you from spoiling fast, and also it will kill some of the spiciness from the chipotle because chipotle is really spicy. For you guys, for me, it's nothing. We're going to cook low and slow for at least 30 minutes. So here we go. One last taste. Delicious. My shrimp are going to be super happy with this. I'm going to butterfly them. Now the reason why I butterfly them, number one, they will cook faster. Number two, the adobo, it will be all over their body. This is what I meant, butterfly. It's like... When you cook something with the bones or the shells, they taste even better. I feel like the juices, they're still inside. We are ready to marinate my skirt steak for a few hours. Here I have my adobo. We just put a little bit because it's not really spicy, but it can be too spicy. I love colorful, vibrant, delicious vegetables. And of course, an onion. Gotta have my onion in a fajita. It's like a party. Jalapeño, poblano peppers. Yeah, it's a real deal right here. A little more pepper. Two taps. Do the salt from high. So like that, when you spread the salt, it's evenly. It's not just one spot. Look. See? This is the marinade I use for the skirt steak. I'm going to use it to coat my vegetables before I cook it. Now it's time for everybody to meet. Everybody got to get to know each other now. All right. I'm gonna throw this in the oven. Go on Hulu with Biswa Sopranos. See you in a second. You cannot have a fajita without a tortilla. I personally like the flour tortillas. They're soft. You don't gotta put that much time into it when you're warming them up. Today I'm gonna be making flour tortillas. Very simple. I'm gonna make like a little volcano. Who doesn't like volcanoes? Baking powder. I'm gonna do a little bit of salt. It's like making pasta but without egg. And I'm gonna let this sit on the fridge for 10-15 minutes. Dampen it a bit. Put it on a plate and then wrap my tortilla. And right before I serve it, I'm gonna microwave it just to warm it up. How do we know the tortillas are ready to flip? As soon as we start seeing little bubbles, I think I'm gonna be making tortillas for the next three weeks. Two more tortillas. I'm only gonna do two for today because I'm trying to watch my figure and try to get right. Doctors know this. Warm these up. See you later. Let's start off with my makeshift pico de gallo. It's gonna bring that fresh element that we need. I use red onion because I feel like when you pickle it, it tastes delicious. A little bit of salt. Now I'm gonna let this sit here. I'm going to cut my tomatoes. Look how beautiful. Cilantro. Mix it, mix it, mix it. Delicioso. Sour cream. I love sour cream. And one of my favorite hot sauces. I love it, love it, love it. Oh, that's so good. Some salsa. A little salsa. Salsa. That adds swag and flavor to the fajita. We don't want to over mix this because if you break the avocado, it will be very messy. We're gonna do a little bit of salt. Pepper. Olive oil. Don't need that much cheese, just a, I want to say a half a fist amount. Make it snow. Cut your lob into four pieces. Some keep the skin on, some let the skin off. I like to do half for half, so you do your own thing at the end. Now I'm ready to go. First things first, I must turn on the grill. And I want it smoking hot. You can tell that it's, the skirt steak's been marinated a bit because it actually changed color. So it's, in a sense, been cooking. That's what marinade does. It kind of tenderizes and cooks it a bit. That is exactly what you want to hear. Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle. I'm going to cover this with this so it cooks evenly. It's like a little trick. I have beautiful grill marks on there. You can see. My shrimp look pretty sexy. Uno. Dos. You hear that? It's talking to me. Now the fun part. Grilling vegetables. Starting with the onions because these are the ones that take the most time. If you don't hear that noise, that means you're not doing it right. I still like that crunch. It's okay if it's not fully, fully soft and cooked. You're just sautéing it. Sautéing doesn't necessarily mean making it like completely mush. Keep it al dente. Low and slow. Looks good. It's ready to go now. Look at the peppers and the jalapeno. Just, I don't even want to touch it. You have a museum around here? Look at that. My lemon, it's ready. All right, now it's time for everything together. Let's start making a fajita. The star of the show. I'm going to do a bed of fried cheese so my vegetables can take a nap and be happy. I put all the chicken and vegetables together because one band, one sound. We come together, we leave together. So they came in a pan together. They're leaving my stomach together. I believe in teamwork. And my shrimp. Beautiful head on prawn shrimp. So as I'm building it, you know, I'm adding different levels of flavor. Avocado, pico de gallo. It's a little bit sour, but so yummy because of the onion. Now, here's my chicken fajita dinner. And here's my steak fajita dinner. Full of colorful, full of flavors. This is how I make my fajita. I ain't gonna lie to you, I can't wait to go to work on this. I do have a technique for my tortillas. I like to slather some sour cream and I do like a lot of it. The foundation of the creation makes everything stick together. That's enough meat right there. Add some salsa. Do a little dance as you add it. I like putting my cheese on so my cheese doesn't move. And it's also gonna be warmed through by the hot steak that I'll be putting on. I like to add mezcal every time I eat just to digest better. It's a digestive. A Mexican digestive. Last but not least, a little lemon love. I'm just gonna put some mezcal there and then just set it on fire. And this is how I make fajitas. Play no games. Now it's time to eat it. Vamos! Now this thing's ready to disappear. Have a good day. My mama would be so proud. This is a fajita. We're missing some iced tea. Finishing it off with a crispy, delicious jalapeno. I love it. It's delicious. I can taste the shrimp. It's not that spicy. The adobo, smokiness, a little mild. Man, these are how you're supposed to make fajitas. Cheers, guys. Thank you. This is delicious. I, listen, I don't know. I think I have a talent. Fajitas are tortillas filled with meat and vegetables served sizzling hot. Let's see how each of our three chefs made theirs. Desi made chicken with a packet of seasoned fajita flavoring. The main ingredients are cornstarch and salt. They also contain oil, ground chili peppers, and garlic, along with silicon dioxide, which is an anti-caking ingredient so the powder doesn't form clumps. The steak that I chose to use for my fajitas is skirt steak. Lorenzo marinated his skirt steak, a cut traditionally used for fajitas, in a combination of sweet, spicy, and savory ingredients with pineapple as a base. My secret ingredient. Pineapple contains bromelain, a proteolytic enzyme that'll tenderize his skirt steak by breaking up collagen and connective tissue that can make his skirt steak a little tough. Saul grilled shrimp that was marinated and intensely seasoned by his adobo. It included a variety of spicy chilies, tomatoes, vinegar, and brown sugar. He included cinnamon, considered a warming spice because one of its main components... Cinnamon. Cinnamaldehyde imparts a spiciness that gives some people the perception of heat or warmth. Lorenzo included a variety of peppers. I love colorful, vibrant, delicious vegetables. All bell peppers start out green. As they ripen, the chlorophyll decomposes, and a variety of carotenoids like lutein and beta-carotene are expressed as yellow, orange, and red. Both Desi and Lorenzo used commercial flour tortillas. They're soft. You don't gotta put that much time into it when you're warming them up. In addition to stabilizers, anti-molding compounds, and other food additives, they contain small amounts of chemical leavening agents that create small bubbles to make a porous and tender tortilla. Saul made his own flour tortillas. I think I'm going to be making tortillas for the next three weeks. Two more. Two more tortillas. That included a small amount of sodium bicarbonate, or baking soda, which gives a lightness to his tortillas without all of the other food additives. Desi added a drizzle of lime prior to baking. Yeah. This is the real deal right here. While this adds a nice, bright, acidic note from the citric and ascorbic acids in the lime, it also added water, which dampened any sizzle that he might have had without it. Lorenzo quickly sauteed his fajitas in a super hot cast iron grill pan. This allowed for a nice sizzle, as well as a lot of brown and crispy parts. Saul doused his shrimp and vegetables with mezcal, a distilled alcoholic beverage from Agave. It has between 40 and 55% alcohol by volume, which is pretty high. And then you set it on fire. When heat energy is added, some flavor compounds are alcohol soluble, so you get an extra layer of flavor this way. And of course, the flame and heat combo caused that fantastic sizzle. I, listen, I don't know. I think I have a talent. Cheers to you. Adios. Fajitas are one of the few foods that announce themselves. There are so many possibilities when it comes to fajitas. Next time you're in the mood for this sizzling dish, we hope you'll get some tips from our three amazing chefs.