Recipe: Vegan Baked Sweet Potato Flautas With Cashew Queso

From vegnews.com

Fried cashews lend a deep umami flavour to this simple queso, making it the perfect accompaniment to flaky, sweet potato-filled baked flautas

The key to getting crispy flautas in this recipe from the Plant Powered Mexican cookbook is to warm the tortillas before filling, a preheated oven, and a generous brushing of oil.

                                                         Photo credit: Kate Ramos

What you need:

For the flautas: 
1½ pounds sweet potato (1 large or 2 small), peeled and cut into ½-inch thick pieces
1 tablespoon plus ½ teaspoon salt, divided
1 tablespoon lime juice
12 (6-inch) corn tortillas
2 tablespoons avocado oil

For the cashew queso: 
2 tablespoons avocado oil
¾ cup raw cashews
¾ cup hot water
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 (4-ounce) can diced green chiles, with juice
¼ cup nutritional yeast
½ teaspoon smoked paprika
2½ teaspoons salt

What you do:

1. 1.  For the flautas, preheat oven to 450 degrees. Place an oven rack in top of oven. 
2. 2.  In a saucepan, filled about three-quarters of way with water, add a tablespoon of salt. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook until sweet potatoes are tender, but not falling apart. Drain and let sit in colander for a few minutes to dry.
3. 3.  Return to saucepan with remaining salt and lime juice. Mash with a potato masher until smooth.
4. 4.  In a cast-iron skillet over medium heat, warm pan for at least 3 minutes, or until hot but not smoking. Warm tortillas one at a time on until soft and pliable, but not toasted. Keep warm in a clean kitchen towel or in a tortilla warmer.
5. 5.  Place about 2 tablespoons of sweet potato filling on one edge of each tortilla and roll up to close. Repeat with remaining ingredients.
6. 6.  Grease a baking sheet with cooking spray. Lay flautas, seam-side down, on baking sheet and generously brush tops with avocado oil. Bake until crispy and toasted, about 20 minutes.
7. 7.  For the queso, in a large frying pan over medium heat, warm oil. Add cashews and fry, stirring occasionally, until nuts are really toasted. Transfer to a blender with remaining ingredients and blend until smooth. Return to frying pan and heat until just warm.
8. 8.  Serve flautas warm with queso.

https://vegnews.com/2021/11/vegan-sweet-potato-flautas-cashew-queso