Birria Quesadilla is an amazing Mexican recipe of shredded beef seasoned with smoked dried peppers and cheese in a tortilla. A spicy and delicious chuck roast recipe for an appetizer, game day, or main course.
¾cup Oaxaca cheeseor mozzarella, pepperjack, or Monterey jack (per quesadilla)
¾cupbirria(from recipe above) (per quesadilla)
Instructions
Fill a pot with 4 cups of water and bring to a boil. Add all of the dried peppers and boil for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and let soak until soft, at least 15 minutes.
Heat a grill pan over high heat. Blister the tomatoes on all sides until they are starting to peel, approximately 5 minutes. Remove from heat and set aside. (You can also do this by broiling in oven, turning as needed.)
Dry the beef roast with paper towels and season all sides with salt and pepper.
Heat a Dutch oven pot on a stove over medium high heat.
When hot, add the meat and sear on all sides, approximately 10 minutes. Remove the pot from the heat, but leave the beef in the pot. We will be cooking in this later.
Preheat oven to 325°F.
Make the sauce: put the tomatoes in a blender. Add all of the dried peppers (simply pull off their stems and discard stems before adding). Add the vinegar, garlic, black pepper, clove, cinnamon, thyme, oregano, and ¼ teaspoon salt. Add 1/4 of the chile pepper water and blend until smooth. Do not discard the remaining chile pepper water, you will use it later.
Push the sauce through a fine mesh strainer using a spoon or spatula into the beef pot. Once strained, discard the pieces you removed that are in the strainer.(Optional, if you want a smooth sauce. Otherwise you can skip this.)
Toss the beef in the sauce to coat. Add the bay leaves to the pot. Cover the pot and place in oven.
Cook for approximately 3 hours until the beef is falling apart and easy to shred with a fork.
Shred the beef and set aside. You can mix it with some of the pepper sauce, but note the more sauce you use, the spicier it will be.
Making the Quesadillas
Heat a skillet to medium heat. Have all of your quesadilla ingredients ready to go (tortilla, butter, cheese, shredded birria).
Add the butter and when melted, immediately dunk the tortilla into the remaining pepper water and place the tortilla in the skillet.The dunking is optional but adds great flavor!
Immediately sprinkle the cheese across the tortilla, and then the birria across the tortilla.
When the cheese is starting to melt, fold the tortilla in half using a spatula.
Cook 1-3 minutes per side until a light golden brown. If getting too hot, reduce heat to medium low.
Cut into pieces and serve with your favorite condiments like salsa, sour cream, lettuce, and guacamole. Serve the extra pepper sauce (from soaking) in small ramekins for dunking. Repeat as needed for all quesadillas you are making.
Notes
Use more ancho and less chile de arbol for a milder heat, and more chile de arbol for a hotter spice level.Three pounds of roast will give you approximately 16 portions for quesadillas. Use leftovers for anything like tacos, enchiladas, quesadillas, or burritos!