We always have refried beans in our pantry for quick meals or snacks. If you’re looking for another way to use them, check out our refried bean dip recipe.

Easy Bean Tostadas Recipe

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Bean Tostadas Ingredients:

You can get the full list of ingredients with measurements in the recipe card below.

• Can of refried beans – We prefer the full fat refried beans because they’re smoother when they cook and easier to spread.
• Onion – A white onion is more mild and tastes better in this recipe than a sharp, yellow onion.
• Cilantro – This is a traditional ingredient in Mexican food and adds a lot of flavor if your use fresh rather than dried cilantro.
• Tostada shells – These can be found in the grocery store near the tortillas. They’re usually on the top shelf and come in a crinkly plastic bag. They’re already cooked so you can eat them straight out of the bag.
• Cotija cheese – This crumbly cheese adds a really nice saltiness to the recipe. If you can’t find any, queso fresco will work in its place.

How To Make Bean Tostadas:

You guys. I’m not kidding when I tell you this is the easiest recipe.

If I’m being honest, you probably don’t need a whole recipe post to make this, but I’m going to give you one anyway because, if not, I wouldn’t have a reason to post this and then you wouldn’t have stumbled upon your new go-to easy dinner.

Open the can of beans and put it in a medium sauce pan.

Heat the beans over medium high heat for about seven minutes, stirring often.

Quick note: In my opinion, traditional refried beans cook a little bit slower than fat-free refried beans. Those tend to start to burn if you’re not babysitting them. So using the full fat beans makes this a little bit easier.

Also, one more note about those beans. Many refried beans contain some sort of animal fat in them. So, if you’re hoping to make these vegetarian, make sure to read the back of the can while you’re at the store to make sure that nothing is added.

While the beans are cooking, chop the toppings.

Finely chop the white onion.

Then, finely chop the cilantro.

You can add both the cilantro leaves and the stems in this recipe. Since you’re chopping them fine, it doesn’t affect the mouth feel at all.

Lay out the tostada shells.

Tostada shells are mostly flat, but not completely flat. So if you look at them, you’ll see that there is one side where the outside of the shell points up. You want to position the tostada on the plate that way because it’s easier to hold the ingredients in place.

If you can’t tell, which way is up, it doesn’t really matter.

Spread a large spoonful of the heated refried beans onto the tostada shell.

Add some of the chopped onions on top of the beans.

Since you’re just adding raw onion, this is why you want the milder onion.

Sprinkle the chopped cilantro on top of the onions.

Break up some of the cotija cheese and add that on top as well.

The Cotija cheese is so crumbly so you don’t need to use a knife. Just put it between your fingers and go back and forth to make crumbles.

Add a squeeze of lime on top and you’re done.

Quick note: I say this every time I mention using citrus, but here’s Pete citrus hack: Put the lime in the microwave for 10 seconds.

When you take it out, aggressively roll it on the countertop a couple times to break up the inside. Then, cut it in half and squeeze it.

You’ll get so much more lime juice than you would get out of a cold lime.

That’s it. Your simple dinner is ready.

We always make these when we have leftover cilantro lime rice we need to serve with something. We just reheat the rice while we’re making the tostadas and we have dinner on the table in 10 minutes.

Easy Bean Tostadas: Frequently Asked Questions