Tostadas are toasted or fried corn tortillas, topped with a layer of refried beans and other things such as cheese, lettuce, and salsa. Growing up, my mother made tostadas or tacos for us at least once a month, the main difference being that tostadas are flat, crispy, and layered with beans, and tacos are folded and usually without beans. This food is kid heaven – messy, choose your own topping, and incredibly tasty. This month we found a recipe in Fine Cooking for Smokey Refried Bean Tostadas. This recipe called for a slightly different approach to the beans – they suggested adding cumin and Chipotle Tabasco sauce. The chipotle added such a terrific smokey chile flavor to the beans, no salsa was needed on the tostadas. I think they are the best refried beans we’ve ever had. We make our beans from scratch, so I don’t know how it would taste with canned beans, but the smokey flavor of the chipotle is wonderful.

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