Potato Chip Chilaquiles Recipe

Chilaquiles is a Mexican dish that uses leftover tortillas, crisped, as the base for a topping of a sauce, cheese, and eggs (or chicken). Just as a frittata uses up extra sautéed vegetables and yesterday’s pasta, or as fried rice makes the most of Sunday night’s dried-out takeout, Chilaquiles takes these ingredients and makes them each transcend their individual taste value into a dish that you would never think was composed of leftovers. I’d had in mind, actually, to make something more like Migas, a Spanish dish of leftovers — stale tortilla chips specifically. In Migas, the tortilla chips (or tortillas or just bread) are scrambled with the eggs, but there was no way I was scrambling my chips in with my eggs. Why? Because, wanting to make use of the mandoline I got for Christmas, I decided to make fresh, homemade potato chips. (I had neither tortillas nor tortilla chips, incidentally. I can’t figure out where the decision to make Chilaquiles or Migas came from in the first place.) The chips were warm, thin, salty — so good — and I didn’t want to sacrifice their crispness to the eggs. So I subverted tradition, made chips solely for the purpose of using them in a leftover-inspired plate of food, and enjoyed the fresh fried-ness of my lunch. — Cara Click here to see 7 Things You Didn't Know You Could Make with Potato Chips.