I have always had a rather tumultuous relationship with chorizo sausage. It is not that I don’t love the spicy flavor, the gentle kick you get from cooking it in any dish. Because I do. What I don’t love is the grease, that slick of orange oil that seeps out of the chorizo and onto, say, your huevos rancheros, giving them a gleaming orange cast. Not good. But when I saw celebrity chef Rick Bayless, use chorizo sausage meat as a robust filling for tacos, I knew that I would have to give it a try– grease be gone!

It turns out the taco filling was not greasy at all, and there were a few reasons for this. It wasn’t simply chorizo that I was frying up for the tacos, it was a myriad of other things as well, giving the grease a purpose for being there. There were mushrooms (shitake and oyster), an onion thinly sliced, and the main soaker-upper, a grated Russet potato. The potato all but disappears upon frying, lending body and starch to the filling.

I began the filling by frying loose chorizo meat with the sliced onion, knowing that this would take the longest to cook. It sizzled in the skillet, and the flood of shiny grease began, but I labored on. Next I added the sliced mushrooms. The minute they hit the pan, they began to saute, and to soak up some of that omnipresent orange puddle. I let the filling saute for a moment, waiting for the slick to return…and it didn’t! The grease was acting as the frying medium. Oh, happy, grease-free day! Lastly I added the grated potato, and slurp– no more grease at all!

The chorizo filling was perfect for the tacos. Warm, steamed, corn tortillas acted as the base. Spooning in my taco filling, I knew I was in for a treat. A sprinkling of shredded cabbage, a squeeze of lime, and the whole taco topped off with a healthy dose of queso fresco, it was like I was having my own, private fiesta in celebration of the grease-free nature of my chorizo.

I guess that each ingredient has a good and bad way to be prepared. It just took being introduced to the good way with chorizo, to make me a enthusiastic convert. The answer to the problem of greasy, oily chorizo, is to just give the chorizo grease something to do. Sometimes even ingredients need to feel important…