Tostadas with warm guacamole and salsa

I don’t really know where my love of the tostada has come from, but I’ve started to make this dish fairly regularly. This is in no way a bad thing! I’ve started to make a Mexican three course feast every couple of months and I always, always use this dish as the starter.

It’s so simple to make. The problem I find with this dish is that I always make (and eat) way too much and then struggle to eat the remaining two courses!

I started to write this post nearly a month ago.  I was finding it really hard to concentrate as there was building work going on next door and there was a constant hammering and drilling sound. Well, the building work is still going on, but now they’ve starting hammering and drilling on the other side now too, so I’ve finally learnt to live with it and if I don’t just get on with it then I will probably never write another post again!

As I was saying before I had my month away, I like to eat this a lot. It’s easy to make and they are the sort of ingredients that I have in the fridge most of the time so can really just knock it up whenever I fancy it.

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 250g cherry tomatoes, chopped by hand.
• 1 red onion, finely chopped
• Small bunch of coriander, finely chopped
• Juice of 1 lime
• 1 red chilli, finely chopped
• Olive oil
• 2 ripe avocados
• 8 small tortillas, 4 large tortillas
• Olive oil for brushing.

1. Firstly you need to make the salsa. If you have all of your ingredients prepared then you just need to mix together three-quarters of the cherry tomatoes with half of the onion, half of the coriander, half of the lime juice and the red chilli. Add 2 tbsp of olive oil and mix together and set aside.
2. Once you have your salsa set aside, its time to make the tostadas. The first thing you need to do is turn the oven to 180°C.
3. I like to cut my tortillas down to about 12cm rounds. To do this, I lay them down on a work surface and place an upturned glass on top and cut around it with a knife. I can usually get 3 out of a large tortilla. I tend to leave small tortillas as they are, unless you want to use them as canapes and then you can probably get three bite-size portions from a small tortilla.
4. Once you have your desired size, brush them with olive oil and place onto a lined baking sheet. Place in the oven and cook until golden and crisp. This will take around 5-10 minutes depending on the size of your tortillas, if you are not using a fan oven, make sure to turn halfway through.
5. Whilst the tostadas are in the oven place a frying pan onto a medium heat and add a little olive oil. Scoop the flesh of the avocado directly into the frying pan and mash with a fork. Don’t over mash it, I think its nice to have a few bigger chunks of avocado. Once warm, add the remaining cherry tomatoes, onion, coriander and lime juice and mix to combine and then remove from the heat.
6. I like for people to make their own at the table, but alternatively, place a piece of tortilla onto a plate, top with a teaspoon of warm guacamole and then top this with a teaspoon of fresh salsa.