Chorizo nachos are a flavorful twist on the classic appetizer. These fully-loaded nachos are piled high with beans, verde salsa, sour cream, cheese, and fresh vegetables.

What are they?

Chorizo nachos feature crumbled chorizo sausage and fresh toppings piled high on crunchy tortilla chips, rather than using ground beef flavored with taco seasoning, like traditional nachos. Best of all, this awesome recipe can be customized with your favorite nacho toppings.

Idea: Other creative ways to make nachos would be to use Mexican shredded beef or the shredded pork from any leftover posole. Or go a completely different route with my BBQ Irish Nachos.

Nacho Toppings

• Tortilla chips - I prefer to find hearty tortilla chips to use for nachos. Thin chips get soggy and limp quickly when sitting under juice from salsa, beans, and cheese sauce.
• Chorizo sausage - You want to purchase raw pork chorizo in casings, since you are looking to cut it out of the casing to fry up like ground hamburger. If your store sells bulk chorizo without casings, that is even better! Buy extra and make my chorizo chili recipe too!
• Black refried beans - Refried beans go great on any nachos, but black refried beans pair particularly well with verde salsa and chorizo.
• Verde salsa - The tangy flavor of tomatillo salsa is best, but you can substitute traditional salsa or Pico de Gallo instead.
• Nacho cheese sauce - For me, nachos just aren't nachos without a cheese sauce. Adding shredded cheese is nice, but it doesn't give me that warm melty sauce I crave.
• Shredded cheese - Use your favorite cheese, whether that is taco cheese, cheddar, pepper jack, or a mix of each.
• Sour cream - All nachos need sour cream, right? Feel free to dress it up further with my cilantro lime sour cream.
• Fresh vegetables - Red or white onion, green onions, jalapeno, creamy avocado, and cilantro is perfect for finishing off chorizo nachos.
• Optional toppings - Add any of your favorite toppings like black beans, fresh tomatoes, or sweet corn.

How to make them

Make this delicious chorizo nachos recipe by first browning your chorizo in a large frying pan over medium heat with the chopped onion. Break the chorizo apart with a wooden spoon as it cooks.

As the chorizo finishes cooking, bake your tortilla chips on a sheet pan for 3 minutes at 350 degrees to warm them. Then assemble your nachos.

The most important trick for making the best nachos is to layer the chips. This prevents the chips on top from being covered in all the toppings and the chips underneath lie bare. To do this, I spread half of the chips on my serving tray and sprinkle with the chorizo and beans. I then pile on the remaining layer of chips and add the rest of the toppings on top of the nachos.

You can choose to layer more ingredients as well, it is just mainly important you put the chips down in two layers with something else in-between.

Storing Leftovers

Leftover nachos do not store well because the chips will get soggy as they absorb the moisture from the nacho toppings. It is best to refrigerate the leftover toppings in an airtight container and use fresh tortilla chips when enjoying the leftovers.

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This post was originally published on April 10, 2020.