HIC Kitchen Taco Making Tools, Tortilla Press, Heavyweight Aluminum, Forms 6-Inch Tortillas and Artisan Flatbreads

We love Mexican food, especially tacos. We used a corn tortilla recipe that I got off of the internet, which was 2 cups of masa herena, 1/2 tsp. salt, 1/2 tsp. oil (optional) and about 1 1/2 cups very warm water. You blend all of the ingredients in a mixing bowl by hand until the mixture is the consistency of cookie or play dough. If it the mixture is crumbly and won't hold together in one ball it's too dry, add more water a tsp. at a time. If the mixture sticky and sticks to you hands, then it's too wet, add more masa. Once you have the mixture to the right consistency, wrap it in plastic wrap and let it rest on the counter for at least 30 minutes. Do not put it in the refrigerator. While the tortilla dough is resting, take a standard Zip Lock sandwich bag and cut off, cutting as close as you can the zipper part. Then take a sharp knife and split out the rest of the sandwich bag, so you are left with 2 equal size pieces of plastic. You may use a quart or gallon size bag and cut them down, but the sandwich size works best. The sandwich size bag once done as directed, is the exact size that will fit the tortilla press and the sandwich size bag is more pliable than the larger bags, which makes for easier handling. Once your dough has rested, preheat a Comal, which is what we use or a large cast iron skillet or griddle to medium high heat (no oil, use dry). While you're preheating your cooking vessel, take the dough and form it into balls about the size of golf balls and set aside, covered with some damp paper towels to keep them from drying out. Then open the tortilla press and take one piece of the plastic and place it on the plastic on the bottom of the press, placing it slightly closer to the hinge side and then cover it with the other piece of plastic and press it down a little with the heel of your hand to form the ball into a small disc and then close the press and push down until it forms about a 6" diameter disc. Then very carefully peel each piece of plastic from the newly formed raw tortilla and in one motion flip it over onto the preheated Comal and cook about 30-45 seconds on each side or until it puffs up or the edges start to lift. Do not over cook or it will be stiff and you won[t be able to bend it for tacos or roll it for enchiladas. Immediately place the cooked tortillas in a tortilla warmer or on a plate and cover with a dish towel to keep warm. This recipe makes about 12 -15 six inch tortillas. I will never buy store bought tortillas again. There is no comparison. The home made are so much more tender and the taste is far superior to the ones you buy in the store. Also, these are so easy and fun to make. The tortilla press works perfectly and is of high quality. Note! Hand wash only. Placing this or any other aluminum product in the dishwasher will ruin the finish.

Well I love it. I've used it to make corn tortillas and cassava flour tortillas. It does press slightly thinner on one side than the other, but I have a habit of pressing it partway, then turning the dough around and pressing again so it ends up being quite uniform all over. This is very quick, because I place the dough between two halves of a plastic sandwich baggie. I cut the sides of the baggie so that the two halves are only attached at the bottom, then put the dough ball between the two layers of plastic before I use the press. That keeps the press clean and makes it easy to pick up the tortilla.

I should maybe give myself 4 stars (or less) on this one and not the press. The press itself works great and is a good value. It has solid construction, is easy to use, and cleans up quickly. And, despite some of the reviews, it is NOT hard to press down - at all. My 10 year old can make perfectly flat tortillas with zero effort or struggle.My only complaint is that I have had to use parchment paper to make my tortillas, as they stick horribly to the metal. Again, I kind of figured this going in, but it is a bit of a pain. Side note - plastic wrap was a total mess, but the parchment works very well - I cut mine in half width-wise to conserve paper (and you could really reuse it if you had to or are on a really tight budget). I may try spraying it with a non-stick pan spray to see if I can avoid the paper, but I'm also not a fan of all the chemicals in those products.

Works great makes perfect little tortillas. Lightweight compared to its cast iron counterparts. I will be making lots of tortilla with this little baby.

Like many have said, this unit will squash down the 2" balls but it will not give you a flat tortilla. A cast iron version might work better for that. However, I am not returning mine as I wanted a light weight unit so kids wouldn't crack my countertops or floors and we really don't mind doing a quick rolling pin after the unit flattens it before cooking in the pan. It still does a better job of keeping a rounder tortilla than if we just start rolling a hand flattened 2" ball. We use parchment paper and have 2 small pieces to line the press unit and then 1 large to put the flattened tortilla into and then use the rolling pin to get to desired thickness. They are still not all regular in roundness or size, but they work for our family.

I used this tortilla press to make meat pies. They look like a turnover pastry. In the past I would roll out the dough and it would take all day long to get them done. This press worked great. It cut my time in half. Since I didn't want the dough to be as thin as a tortilla, I pressed it lightly, turned it 180 degrees and pressed lightly again. Just perfect. I did take the advise of previous reviewers and used a plastic bag on top and bottom. It was easy to pick up the plastic with the dough, fill it, crimp it, peel off the plastic and move on to the next one. Good value.