Homemade Chipotle

I fucking love Chipotle. (I don't know how Lillet feels about it; they don't have Chipotle in Hawaii. They do have a place called Killer Tacos which is totally awesome though!) I decided that it would be a good idea to try to reproduce it at home, since all the ingredients are super cheap. And it's delicious!

Components:

1. Lime cilantro rice
2. Black beans
3. Cheese, delicious cheese
4. Guacamole
5. Sour cream
6. Salsa

None of these things are difficult to make; I have basically my own recipe for everything. Including the sour cream. (Hell yes, I made my own sour cream, and I highly recommend that you try it as well.)

The Details:
1. The lime-cilantro rice recipe is floating around on the internets, but all you need to know is this: Cook up some basmati rice as you usually would. Add in a small amount of fat (olive oil or butter) and salt as it cooks. When the rice is done, stir in some chopped cilantro and the juice of one lime.

2. You could use black beans from a can, but in the interest of being super-cheap, I made my own. In Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, Deborah Madison claims that you don't have to soak black beans, but I did it out of habit. After a good soak (roughly overnight), cover the beans with fresh water and bring to a boil. Cook until they're soft, which seems to take anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour and a half. Don't salt the beans until about the 45 minute time point, because they'll be tough. But be sure to use a fair amount of salt, otherwise they'll be totally bland. I guess you could jazz them up with some other spices and stuff, but I kept them plain. I also made a big batch and froze some of the drained beans; it worked just fine.

3. I used some shredded jack cheese in this, but my current favorite cheese is a colby cheese with chipotles in it. That would be insanely delicious in here, I think.

4. Guacamole. It's not hard. Avocado, lime juice, a bit of cilantro, garlic, and some finely chopped red onion. This is integral to the Chipotle experience for me.

5. Sour cream. This is how you do it. Get a glass jar with a lid, 1 cup of heavy cream, and 1/8 cup of buttermilk. Place the cream and the buttermilk in the jar, put the lid on, and let it sit out for a day. It will be runny. Place it in the fridge for 4 hours or so and it will thicken up beautifully. Add a bit of salt if you like. It keeps for about a week, and you can scale up the amounts if you want to make a larger batch. This is insanely good.

6. Salsa. Buy it, make it, whatever. In the summer, I throw tomatoes, red onion, garlic, a splash of oil, lime juice, salt, and chilis in a food processor for instant salsa. It can be watery, so if I were less lazy I might chop the tomatoes first and drain them before adding them to the other ingredients.