Freezer-friendly breakfast tacos or breakfast burritos

October 2, 2022 at 9:35 pm (Beans, breakfast, C (2 stars, okay, edible), Mexican & S. American, Necessarily nonvegan) (freezer-friendly)

I really want to find a recipe for a breakfast taco or breakfast burrito that I can make in advance and freeze, then pull out on rushed mornings. I love the idea but I just never seem to get around to trying any recipes. But finally today I tried these vegetarian breakfast burritos from Cookie and Kate. I wanted to have enough to freeze so I bought ingredients for two whole batches. (Enough for 12 8″ tortillas.) We made the first batch for breakfast, but unfortunately, they weren’t a hit, and we didn’t bother to make the second batch. So I’m still on the hunt for a good freezable breakfast taco. Maybe next time I’ll try this Love and Lemons breakfast burrito recipe.  Or if anyone has a recipe they love and can recommend, please post a comment!

The first step is to make hash browns. I was a little worried about freezing burritos with potatoes inside them. (Don’t potatoes get kind of mealy when frozen?) But I figured so many people have commented on the recipe. Someone would have said something if the potatoes don’t freeze well. I started by making 1 full batch of Cookie and Kate’s crispy homemade hash browns. She suggests rinsing the grated potatoes before squeezing the moisture out. I’ve never tried that before, but I did it. Boy did a lot of potato starch wash away! It took a long time before the water was clear. Her recipe calls for 1 pound of potatoes and 1/4 cup of olive oil. That seemed like way too much, but Derek said I should follow the recipe the first time. I wish I hadn’t though, because the potatoes came out way too greasy. They were rather offputting. I am curious though to try her technique again, rinsing and drying the potatoes, that tossing them with salt, garlic powder, onion powder and black pepper. I wonder how they would compare to my mom’s hashbrowns, which everyone here loves.

After you make the hashbrowns you make the scrambled eggs. You beat 6 eggs with 1/4 tsp. salt, several dashes of hot sauce like Cholula, and 1 cup cooked beans. Wait, what? I had made a whole pot of black beans in preparataion for my double batch of breakfast burritos, but each recipe (serving 6) only calls for 1 cup of beans? That seemed like way too little, but I followed the instructions. I was curious about adding the beans to the raw eggs. Would that make the scrambled eggs kind of hold the beans in, and not fall out of the burrito? Nope. Even with the addition of cheddar to the eggs, the black beans still fell out, and the scrambled eggs turned a rather unappealing grey color from the black beans. You’re supposed to add scallions and cilantro to the scrambled eggs at the end. But I didn’t have any Cholula, plus I wanted Alma to eat the dish, so I didn’t add any hot sauce. And I couldn’t get any cilantro, but I did add the scallions, and we ate our burritos with avocado.

After the eggs are made you add hash browns and scrambled eggs and salsa to a warmed tortilla. (I didn’t try out her tortilla softening technique since my tortillas were warm and soft already, but I’m curious to try it if I get some less soft tortillas.) Neither Derek nor I liked our burrito. The flavor wasn’t bad, but the filling was just too soft in my opinion. (Maybe you have to have all soft filling if the burrito is going to freeze effectively?) Besides being too soft, the burrito was way too rich. Between the extremely greasy hash browns and the eggs and cheese and butter and avocado, the balance was off. I’m sure cilantro would have helped a bit, but I can’t imagine that just adding cilantro would have salvaged this recipe. Alma wouldn’t eat her burrito at all. She ended up having a bean bowl with avocado for breakfast.

I really wanted something green in my burrito. I think next time I pick a recipe I will try to find one with spinach in it.

Given how much we disliked these burritos, it was an awful lot of work! I hope we have better luck with our next attempt.

That said, I did actually like the scrambled eggs. The eggs are cooked with 1 Tbs. of butter and 2/3 cup packed cheddar, so they end up pretty rich. I actually liked the eggs and beans (with extra black beans added as well as lots of scallions) better as a side dish than in the burrito. I finished the rest of the eggs the next day for lunch and quite enjoyed them.  Maybe we should add scrambled cheesy eggs with black beans and scallions to our morning rotation.