Give Guacamole A Major Flavor Upgrade With One Extra Step

Guacamole is one of the simplest and most delicious dips around. If you've checked out several recipes, you'll notice there are as many ingredient variations of this dish as there are cooks who prepare it. The most basic version includes avocados, lime juice, and seasoning. You can level this up by adding aromatics like red onions and garlic, or make an even more elaborate version that has all these other ingredients plus tomatoes, cilantro, jalapeños, and other spices for a delightful taste and color upgrade. However, the secret to a super flavorful guac isn't just adding more ingredients to the recipe. Instead, use this one extra step in your preparation process: grilling.

For the uninitiated, this might come as a big surprise. Can you grill guacamole? Well, yes, you can grill the avocado before mashing it into the beloved dip. Believe it or not, avocado is an unexpected food you should be grilling. It imparts a unique smoky flavor to the already delicious fruit while enhancing its creamy texture. When you use the roasted version to make a guac, you'll end up with a silkier, creamier consistency of the spread. However, note that when grilling avocado, the target is not to cook it through and through but rather to simply get the color and flavor enhancement. So when you place your avocado on the grates, leave it just long enough to get those beautiful grill marks and not any longer.

The first step to making tasty grilled guacamole is picking the right avocados at the grocery store — aka they should be ripe. These offer the most flavor and have the creamiest consistency the fruit can offer. As you preheat the grill, wash and cut each avocado in half and remove the pit. You can either peel or leave them unpeeled for the grilling step. Apply some oil on the flesh, then place them on the grates with the cut side facing down. Give the avocados a couple of minutes to char then flip them to do the same on the other side (if peeled). Once the halves are slightly charred, they're ready. Avoid leaving them for too long on the grill, or else they'll become black and will have an unpleasant bitter taste.

Transfer the grilled avocado to a bowl and let them cool for a few minutes. By this time, you've already squeezed your limes or lemons and diced the onions, tomatoes, jalapeños, and cilantro. So you can mash the avocado as usual, add in all the other ingredients, and mix them well to combine. Finally, taste and season with salt and pepper as you like.

Instead of just grilling avocados for your guac, you can grill the other ingredients as well. Cut the tomatoes, limes, and jalapeños in half, and slice onions into rings, then grill them in the same way you did the avocados. Once they're ready, let them cool before dicing the veggies and squeezing the limes, then mix everything into the mashed grilled avocado. The compounded smoky notes from all the charred ingredients will make your dip even more flavorful and unique.

Now, if you don't have a grill, don't fret. There are other ways you can still create a smoky guacamole. The easiest alternative is using a grill pan which you place on a stovetop. This method will result in charring and grill marks on the ingredients just like with a grill, hence creating the same smoky notes. Another option is to broil the ingredients in an oven, just remember to keep a close eye on them since broiling can easily take your food from slightly charred to burned in a matter of seconds. Lastly, if you'd like to make your grilled guacamole ahead of time, we recommend only grilling the ingredients, then leaving the dicing and mixing until you're ready to serve. This won't take you too long so doing it on the same day is preferred so your dip is as fresh as can be.