This Week in Cultural Appropriation: Rarebit Fundido

A beery cheese sauce spiced up with salsa and completed (if desired) with leftover taco meat, cooked in the microwave in the bowl you're going to eat it from. Perfect for a night when the lady of the house is out doing something and you're fixing a fast, simple, tasty for yourself for while you watch old horror flicks on Svengoolie wearing an old T-shirt (because you'll dribble).

Ingredients:
Beer, one bottle: I suggest a strong, dark one like a porter or stout
Cheddar cheese, probably 6 ounces (150 grams)
Salsa: maybe half a cup. Check the expiration date on the jar.
Flour: about a quarter cup
Tortilla chips
Optional:
Garlic, one clove, crushed
Leftover taco meat, to taste


Procedure

Use a microwavable bowl, and--important!--it needs to be tall enough to hold the cheese and beer and still have about an inch of room left at the top. You don't want it to boil over in the microwave.

Grate the cheese into the bowl. Toss in the flour. Shake the bowl up and down and toss the cheese with the flour with your fingers. The goal is to coat the cheese with flour and hopefully not have much flour left. The fat from the cheese and the flour make a kind of roux, without needing butter.

Pour enough beer over the cheese to cover it and stir it around. This will not require all the beer in a bottle, so you will have to find another use for the rest of it. Sorry, forgot to mention that. Hope it doesn't make difficulty. If using garlic, crush it into the mix. Then put it into the microwave for one minute.

After one minute it will be a little melted but not smooth yet. Stir it with a spoon and then microwave it for another minute (take the spoon out).

After the second minute, stir again and it should be smooth. If it isn't, you can try mending it by sifting in a bit of flour, stirring to incorporate it, maybe a bit more, stirring again, and then microwave another minute. It's hard not to get lumps doing this. But usually it comes out pretty well for me.

After you have it smooth, pour in salsa to taste: I glop in a good half cup.

Then stir it up and microwave for another half minute or minute, and remove from the microwave.

If you want to add leftover taco meat, heat the meat in the microwave till hot through, and then pour a layer onto the top of the cheese sauce. Arrange chips around it on a plate if taking a picture for a blog, otherwise just grab the bag and head for the TV set.