What’s For Dinner: Sofritas So Good

My name is Victoria, and I’m somewhat obsessed with Chipotle’s sofritas.

I first tried sofritas a year or so ago, when my (then) office had lunch catered by the neighborhood Chipotle. This was one of the first times I had something made with tofu that wasn’t cut into flavorless blocks with the texture of a kitchen sponge.

I was hooked.

Being a vegan freelancer on a budget, frequent trips to Chipotle are not feasible, so I set about deconstructing their sofritas so I can make it at home. And, hey, while I’m at it, how about taking a shot at making my own cilantro lime rice, right? And no burrito bowl is complete without black beans–at least no burrito bowl in MY house.

I soaked and cooked up the black beans in the Instant Pot the day before. That left the IP free to make the rice. Since I only had the dried cilantro (I’d prefer fresh cilantro, added at the end of cooking), I added that to the pot with the rice and water and let the IP do its thing.

For the sofritas marinade, I used about 2/3 of the can of chipotle pepper, a roasted poblano pepper plus a roasted green pepper. I had about a teaspoon left of the chile-lime seasoning and the Mexican oregano, plus I added a couple of teaspoons of cumin, a little bit of salt, and some olive oil. I blended the mixture up in my bullet blender, while the tofu was drying out in some paper towels.

Once I got the excess moisture out of the tofu, I shredded it in a bowl and then poured the marinade over it and mixed it well. I snuck a tiny taste of the marinade and proceeded to spend two and a half excruciating hours waiting for the tofu to marinate.

About to roast these peppers!

Marinating sofritas

I used part of the time to throw together a batch of guacamole.

At last, it was time to cook up the sofritas. I put a little oil in the pan and heated it up while I got a small pot out to cook up the beans.

The kitchen smelled amazing while the sofritas cooked. I added a little bit of red onion, some salt, and a tiny bit of cumin to the beans and heated the pot up while the sofritas cooked. I opened up the warm pot of rice and squeezed the juice of a lime into the cilantro and rice and gave it a few good stirs.

Then it was the moment of truth. And the truth is…

Oh My GAWD! I’m making sofritas ALL THE TIME!

Yep, fam. It was that good.

Cilantro Lime Rice

Rice and beans…

My Sofritas Burrito Bowl