Fresh Chilaquiles w/Fried Eggs

So long as you have stale chips, you have everything.

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Season: Spring, Winter
Dosha: Kapha, Pitta

One month ago, I was making chilaquiles on a camp stove, overlooking a surf break in Baja. Cobbled together with remnants in our coolers after 6 weeks on the road, it was one of the most delicious and memorable meals of the trip.

It’s amazing how far away the carefree mornings of cooking in a bikini on an empty beach feel now. So much can happen in a month. We didn’t get the chance to “reintegrate,” really. We left our routine of camping on the beach, riding mountain bikes on wild trails and living simply on the road to the uncertainty of a global pandemic. As I strive to finally find some calm amidst this swirl, I’m starting to truly process this life-changing trip.

And the reason was so simple: we wanted for nothing more elaborate, more certain, more precious than each other, a road we could navigate together, and the promise of a hot meal.

No moment, opportunity, or precious bit of beauty went to waste on us during the trip. And the contents of the cooler were no exception.

The chilaquiles I’ve enjoyed in Mexico are simple; comprised of tortilla chips smothered in refried beans and a canned red chile sauce. But we didn’t have any cans on the beach that morning, and yet we already had everything we needed; the imperfect ingredients we had leftover by happenstance.

The cooler contained a pint of perky little tomatoes and a handful of tiny crookneck squash from the previous weeks’ market. There were a two nopales paddles I couldn’t resist bringing home, having watched a woman cleaning them of their needles. Plus a splash of coconut milk and the crumbles of chips with nothing to dip them in. We cooked it all down to perfection, using flavors and textures from memory to make something new. It was perfect.

I found nopales at the grocery store last week. It was on.

And I knew we had half a bag of tortilla chips begging to be crumbled and sauced; both signs that we were due for chilaquiles. So, I whipped them up as a lazy, special breakfast for a Sunday morning. It was so good, sitting in the sunshine at our dining table, the smells of the ingredients mingling with newspaper ink and coffee grounds. Even in this swirling dust storm of the unknown, we’re all facing, we didn’t want for anything, even in a storm of uncertainty.

The idea that something so excellent came from near-wilty leftovers, otherwise easily discarded, is the highlight of our beachside chilequiles meal. The simple goal of taking what you have and making it awesome, is the ingredient that will make your chilaquiles perfection, no matter where you enjoy them.

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