What’s black and white and read all over? These Sonoran-style nachos with queso blanco sauce, black beans, and bright red chiltepin salsa. The flavor contrast is even better than the color contrast! Creamy, mild white cheese, earthy black beans, and bracing hot chiltepin salsa.
The queso blanco sauce cooks up in five minutes on the stovetop. It’s a simple béchamel base with shredded white Mexican cheese melted in along with onion flakes and a splash of pickled jalapeño juice. Any smooth red salsa works, but my chiltepin version is worth making specifically for this.
What Is Queso Blanco?
Queso blanco in the context of this recipe it refers both to the style of cheese used in the sauce and to the finished sauce itself, which is a creamy white nacho cheese sauce rather than the yellow cheddar-based variety. The flavor is milder and cleaner, which lets the other ingredients come forward rather than getting buried under a heavy processed cheese flavor.
Which White Cheese to Use
The recipe gives three options; Monterey Jack, pepper jack, or queso quesadilla. They produce noticeably different results. Monterey Jack melts most smoothly and has the mildest flavor, making it the most versatile base. Pepper jack adds heat and flecks of chile that make the sauce visually interesting. Queso quesadilla is a mild, creamy Mexican melting cheese. It’s softer and more supple than Jack, with a buttery flavor and exceptional meltability that makes it the preferred choice in many Mexican restaurant queso sauces.
The Pickled Jalapeño Juice Secret
The one teaspoon of pickled jalapeño brine in the queso sauce is doing important work here. The vinegar in the brine adds brightness that cuts through the richness of the butter and cheese, prevents the sauce from tasting flat, and adds a subtle background heat that’s different from fresh chile heat. It also helps stabilize the emulsion slightly, reducing the chance of the sauce breaking and going grainy. Save the brine whenever you finish a jar of pickled jalapeños – it has dozens of uses.
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 tablespoon flour any variety
- ½ cup milk any variety
- 1 tsp onion flakes
- 1 tsp juice from pickled jalapenos
- 2 cups tortilla chips any variety
- ½ cup finely shredded low-fat melty Mexican cheese Jack, pepper-jack, queso quesadilla etc.
- ½ cup black beans drained and rinsed
- Jackie's chiltepin salsa or other smooth red salsa
- jalapeno slices
- 1 oz Queso Anejo, cotija or other hard Mexican cheese for garnish
Instructions
- Melt butter in a nonstick skillet over low heat add milk. Slowly whisk in flour to thicken. Mix in cheese, onion flakes and jalapeno juice, stirring constantly for 3 or 4 minutes until the cheese melts into the milk mixture and forms a smooth sauce.
- Arrange chips on a large platter. Spoon a bit of sauce on each chip followed by the black beans, jalapeno slices and salsa. Crumble the queso Anejo on top. Serve immediately.
