Spicy Beef Quesadillas are an easy and delicious meal of gameday food to make with leftover short ribs or brisket. Caramelized onions and peppers are combined with chipotle peppers and crushed red pepper flakes to flavor and spice these crispy, cheesy quesadillas. Quesadillas don’t get any meatier or better than this.
Great Way To Use Leftovers
For these Spicy Beef Quesdaillas, I like to use leftover short ribs. Leftover brisket also works well.
As far as leftover meat recipes go, I love these Spicy Beef Quesadillas every bit as much as these Brisket Grilled Cheese Sandwiches.
It’s great to cook up a big batch of short ribs and get at least 2 meals out of them. They only taste better with time.
Spicy Filling
Chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, crushed red pepper flakes, and smoked paprika give a ton of flavor and spice to the filling. The spicy filling with onions and peppers is combined with shredded Mexican cheese in a flour tortilla and pan-fried in butter until golden and crispy.
How To Serve Spicy Beef Quesadillas
Cut into wedges and serve Spicy Beef Quesadillas either as a game day appetizer or a quick and easy family meal.
More Quesadilla Recipes
- Shrimp, Bacon, and Corn Quesadilla
- Philly Cheese Steak Quesadillas
- Ground Beef Quesadillas
- Chicken, Bacon, and Ranch Quesadillas
- BBQ Pork and Mango Quesadillas
Spicy Beef Quesadillas
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 1 medium yellow or sweet onion, chopped
- 1 green bell pepper, chopped
- 2 chipotle chile peppers in adobo sauce,, finely chopped
- 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
- salt and pepper
- 2 cups leftover Shredded Beef Short Ribs or Brisket
- 8 (8-inch) flour tortillas
- 2 cups shredded Mexican cheese
- 2 tablespoons butter
Instructions
- Melt butter over medium-high heat in a large pan. Add onion and bell pepper and cook until they are starting to soften but still have a little crunch.
- Add chipotle peppers, red pepper flakes, paprika and season to taste with salt and pepper.
- Stir leftover short ribs into onion mixture and transfer to a bowl.
- Wipe pan clean. For each quesadilla, sprinkle about 1/4 cup cheese on a tortilla, top with 1/4 of short rib/onion mixture, and cover with another 1/4 cup cheese. Place a second tortilla on top.
- Melt about a 1/2 tablespoon butter in the pan, add quesadilla and cook until golden brown on each side and cheese is melted. Repeat for remaining 3 quesadillas.
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Originally posted February 8, 2018.
More Short Rib Recipes
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I tried this spicy beef quesadilla recipe and it turned out amazing—especially the seasoning balance and crispy texture. I usually like pairing recipes like this with a good movie night at home. Recently I’ve been exploring different sites where I can watch movies online during dinner time, and found this one pretty useful:
https://kissmovies.mom/
It has a variety of content if anyone else enjoys combining food and movies 🙂
Yum this looks better than most fast food honestly makes me think I should skip checking the McDonald’s menu prices on https://mcdomenuprices.com.ph/ and just make this at home instead!
This looks insanely good the cheesy crispy tortilla with that spicy beef combo is everything. Kinda reminds me of when I crave Crumbl Cookies https://crumblcookiesthisweek.com/ after something savory definitely trying this!