This is one of the recipes from my cookbook Baking Bread with Kids that we cook the most in my house. We love taco Tuesdays (I know we’re not the only ones!), and making sourdough tortillas is a great after-school project. I often recommend these tortillas when people ask me what recipe to start with in the book if they’ve never opened a bag of flour before. They don’t call for many ingredients, the dough is easy to handle, and honestly, they’re pretty hard to mess up. Even a wonky-shaped and uneven homemade tortilla fresh off the griddle is better than any tortilla from a plastic bag.
The original recipe in Baking Bread with Kids doesn’t call for a sourdough starter, but I often add some because I always have it around and it adds a tangy layer of flavor that’s delicious. I encourage you to try a batch with starter, though the recipe works equally well without it. You can even easily try batches with and without to see which version you like best.
I recently added the step of freezing the rolled, stacked sourdough tortillas before cooking them on the griddle (see Step 5). This brief chill time helps them peel off the paper more easily–plus you can griddle as many as you want and save the rest in the freezer for later. They keep well for up to a month in the freezer (no need to thaw, just drop them straight onto the griddle from the freezer), but after you’ve griddled them, they’re best eaten immediately.
Flour For Sourdough Tortillas
While I also love tortillas made with corn, I am a huge fan of soft, tender flour tortillas. For a while, my kids didn’t realize that there’s a difference between the words ‘flour’ and ‘flower.’ They started calling these “bumblebee tortillas” because they associated bumblebees with flowers and thought we were making ‘flower’ tortillas. The name may just stick for forever in our family.
The flour you use makes a huge difference here. In Northern Mexico, tortillas are often made with the local Sonora wheat, which is a very low-protein, soft white wheat. I often use pastry flour since it gives you a similarly soft and tender tortilla. If you’re able to find Sonora wheat flour (Hayden Flour Mills is a great source), it will make the ideal tortilla. If you can’t find either, all-purpose flour will work just fine (they will not be quite as tender but will be just as delicious).
Sourdough Tortilla Recipe
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Sourdough Tortillas
- Prep Time: 3 hours 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 3 hours 50 minutes
- Yield: 18 tortillas
- Category: Lunch, Dinner
- Cuisine: Mexican
Description
Easy and delicious sourdough tortillas made with few ingredients, an easy to handle dough, and honestly, they’re pretty hard to mess up.
Ingredients
- 350 g pastry flour, Sonora wheat flour, or other soft white wheat flour (or all-purpose flour)
- ½ cup cold lard or coconut oil
- 175 g (3/4) cup ice-cold water
- 9 g (1 1/2 teaspoons) fine sea salt
- 50 g (1/4 cup) ripe sourdough starter or discard (optional)
Instructions
- Put the flour into a medium bowl. Add the lard and, using your fingers, blend the lard into the flour until the mixture is crumbly and the pieces of lard are pea-sized.
- In a small bowl, combine the water and salt, stirring until the salt is dissolved. Stir in the starter, if using. Pour the water mixture into the flour mixture. Using a spoon or your hand, stir until well combined. Knead the dough by hand a few times, just until the dough holds together and forms a cohesive ball.
- Wrap the dough in a clean kitchen towel or beeswax paper, or put it in a sealable container. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours and up to 2 days.
- Remove the dough from the fridge and unwrap it. Divide the dough into 18 equal pieces, each about the size of a small apricot. Roll the pieces between your palms or against the table until they are evenly round.
- On a very lightly floured work surface, use your hands to flatten each ball into a disc. Then, using a rolling pin, roll each disc until it is about 6 inches in diameter. (If you have a tortilla press, you can use it to flatten the balls, but you’ll probably want to finish them with a rolling pin anyway—these are best when they are pretty thin.) Transfer each tortilla to a sheet of parchment or waxed paper, stacking the tortillas between sheets of paper so that they are flat and not touching. Freeze the tortillas for about 1 hour.
- Preheat a cast-iron skillet, griddle, or comal over medium-high heat (if you’re using a cast-iron skillet, you may want to smear a little vegetable oil very lightly on it before preheating). The baking surface needs to be plenty hot, so give it a few minutes to preheat.
- Griddle the tortillas one at a time until both sides have golden-brown blisters, about 60 seconds per side. The tortillas may puff (not quite as much as pita, though) up a little as they cook, but they will flatten as they cool. Keep the finished tortillas in a covered dish or wrap them in a clean kitchen towel to keep them warm while you work.
- The tortillas are best served right away. If you have some left over, you can store them in an airtight container for a few days and quickly reheat them in a hot skillet before serving, or freeze for up to 1 month.
Notes
- After all the dough balls are rolled out into discs and stacked on parchment paper, the dough can be frozen and kept for a month. Take them out and cook directly on the griddle as desired.
What’s Next?
After making these sourdough tortillas, if you’re looking for more ways to use up your discard, check out the roundup of all our sourdough starter discard recipes.
Also, be sure to read through the guide to keeping a sourdough starter discard cache in the refrigerator for instant access to discard (and to avoid waste!).
46 Comments
if I used fresh milled sonora, would i need to increase the water?
These taste great but we had tremendous problems with them sticking to the greaseproof paper, even though they were in the freezer for two hours before they were to be cooked. Any suggestions, Maurizio, brown rice flour on the sheets?
Hi! What is the trick to get these round when flatting? Having a little trouble. Thank you guys ♥️
Practice! Really though, it takes some practice rolling out evenly 🙂 But it all starts with the ball they're formed into, make sure that's very even to begin with and that helps tremenously.
Hi Maurizio
Quick question, are there any option of oil other than lard/butter/coconut oil. Trying to reduce oil with high fat content.
Any kind of liquid fat should work!
I’ve just made coconut oil dough! It seems as if I still have small chunks of coconut oil in dough. Will this be an issue when rolling out? Making for a group so might redo if I need to! 😬😱
It should melt as youre mixing!
Would 00 flour work in this recipe?
Yes, I think it would be just fine!
Hey, i know it might be sacrilege, but instead of lard or coconut oil, could you get away with a bit of butter and maybe some olive oil or soemthing?? Or does it have to be something that will go hard with cold?
Thanks
D’oh, should have read the earlier comments!!! My answer would be yes. butter is fine.
Yes, butter is fine 🙂 Have fun!
In Mexico, we press on the tortillas after flipping the second time. This makes them puff up, which ensures that they are cooked through.
Great tip, Gina!
This is a great recipe (I use butter because it is always around), I have been trying to make malleable and tasty corn tortillas for enchiladas, and found that using 40% Masa Harina (I use Bob’s Red Mill) and 60% AP flour I can make tortillas that are deliciously corny and easy to work with. Also, I cut the butter in half because it just seemed right given that many corn tortilla recipes don’t have any oil.
Corn tortillas never contain fat.
Right on! As Gina pointed out below, usually corn tortillas are just masa + water. Give it a go next time and see the difference!
Will spelt flour work ?
Yes, but be cautious with the liquid in the recipe, it might need a reduction.
Nothing fancy here… Just ALP and Coconut Oil and these are fantastic!!!
Simple is often best 🙂
question: can i use butter instead of lard?
Yes!
Fantastic! A keeper for sure. I used cold duck fat and local (Carolina Ground) “75 Bread flour” (NuEast Hard Red Winter Wheat). Just fabulous, delicate but toothsome, flavorful with the perfect amount of salt. Thank you!
Gosh I love Carolina Ground flour. Thank you for reporting back Donna!
One question I’ve had on my mind is, could I make these with fresh milled whole grain white Sonora flour or would it be best to sift some bran out first? I’ve assumed g would be best but figured I’d ask about this since I wasn’t sure with Jennifer mentioning Sonora flour in the article.
Honestly, I would try them with the whole grain flour!
Yeah, I think I’ll be trying it with sifted flour first. Then maybe add some of the bran back little by little.
How did they turn out? Did you end up using non-sifted flour?
It’s been a while but I think I cut it with all purpose flour. I’ve been meaning to come back to this but haven’t had the time.
Would ghee work in place of lard?
I haven’t tried using ghee but I am sure that will work just fine!
Maurizio, congrats on the James Beard and thank you for sharing this recipe! I have the Hayden Flour Mills x Masienda 50/50 blend of white sonora wheat and corn flour, do you think this recipe / the fermentation would still work with that blend? Thanks in advance!
Thank you so much, Nicky! Yes, I would use that flour, it’ll work super well with this recipe 🙂
Would another fat like tallow or duck fat work the same as lard for these?
Can the lard be substituted with another fat like tallow or duck fat for these?
Yes, I would imagine that would work just fine!
These were wonderful! The dough seemed sticky after mixing even after weighing, but after an overnight refrigeration and flour dusting, the dough was very easy to work with. Instead of 18 tortillas we made twelve 10 inch ones. I used pork lard. I rolled them out and my 9 year old daughter cooked them on an electric skillet. Very yummy. Perfect vehicle for our bean burritos lunch.
Thank you!
These were wonderful! The dough seemed very sticky after mixing even after weighing, but after an overnight refrigeration and flour dusting, the dough was very easy to work with. I used pork lard. Instead of 18 small tortillas I made twelve 10 inch tortillas. I rolled them out and my 9 year old daughter cooked them on the electric skillet. Perfect vehicle for our bean burritos lunch.
Fun and yummy, thank you!
Awesome, so glad you liked these, Renee! Yes, the dough is very soft (which is why I was able to use my Masienda Tortilla Press). They are definitely a fun activity for the kiddos 🙂 Enjoy!
All measurements are provided in grams, except the coconut oil. Do you have a conversion for 1/2 cup coconut oil in grams? Looking online, I am finding conflicting answers. Thanks!
It was a little challenging to weigh that because I had to scoop in! For me, it was around 105 grams (more or less) for 1/2 cup.
Let me know how you like these!
Hey I’m wondering about the pros/cons of lard vs coconut oil in this recipe? I’d love to NOT use pig fat but, hey, if it tastes much better…? any thoughts? thank you for all your beautiful recipes and energy
I found with coconut oil I got a slight coconut taste, though that could be overcome with refined coconut oil. In the end, I preferred lard. While I don’t use lard often in my cooking, it gave these the best texture and flavor!
I tried them today!!! It is by far the best tortillas ever!! thank you:)
Super glad to hear that! Enjoy 🙂