Making homemade tortillas (flour or corn tortillas) is relatively easy — once you have the right tools. Choosing the best tortilla maker is difficult, because you have to decide whether you want an electric tortilla maker or a traditional skillet.

Electric Tortilla Maker Options

If you want to purchase an electric tortilla maker, you generally have two choices: the Villaware and the Saachi.

CucinaPro Tortilla Maker

(Buy it and read additional reviews here). The Villaware is considered the best electric tortilla maker on the market. However, they are more difficult to find. If you can find one on Amazon marketplace, then you should buy it.

Saachi Tortilla Maker

People also like the Saachi Tortilla Maker, but reviewers say it doesn’t last as long. If you can find the revel tortilla maker or the VillaWare tortilla maker I would but this one. (You can buy it and read reviews here)

Traditional Tortilla Maker Skillet

Another way to make tortillas is with a skillet. You flatten the dough with a tortilla press and then cook the tortilla on a skillet. There are two options for skillets:

• Round Skillet – For less than $20 you can buy a round cast iron skillet that will allow you to make awesome tortillas. This tortilla maker round skillet gets the best reviews. You must use this skillet over your stove though.
• Lefse or Crepe Electric Skillet – I know people who use lefse makers and crepe makers like this one to make their tortillas. My mom says that this one is the best and it allows you to adjust the heat settings by actual temperature (eg 300 degrees not “high, medium, or low”). Plus the added benefit to buying a skillet like this is that it has multiple uses. Based on the reviews, I would highly recommend buying this electric skillet to make your tortillas because it has so many uses.

Tortilla Press

No matter what sort of tortilla maker you use (be it an electric or traditional skillet) I would highly recommend buying a cast iron tortilla press.
With a tortilla press you don’t have to use a rolling pin to hand roll each tortilla dough. Instead, you just put the ball of dough in and press.
I would NOT buy an aluminum press because they are light and not made as well. The best tortilla presses are cast iron.
This press gets the best reviews for tortilla presses. It’s an 8 inch Imusa Victoria cast iron tortilla press. It costs about $20.

Tortilla Maker Reviews: in Summary

Best Electric Tortilla Maker: See it here
Best Tortilla Skillet: See it here or this one here
Best Tortilla Press: See it here

Today for lunch I made myself a homemade burrito.  It was a delicious veggie burrito with tofu, spinach, cheddar cheese, onions, sour cream, and salsa.  (Two kinds of salsa to be exact.)  But something about it just wasn’t right. (And it wasn’t that it was vegetarian — although some grilled chicken would have been awesome).

And after one bite I knew exactly what that was.  I made my burrito on a whole wheat tortilla bought from the supermarket.  Now, this brand of whole wheat tortillas happens to be one of my favorite types, but it just didn’t taste the same as tortillas I make on my electric tortilla maker.

There, I said it, you just can not get any better than homemade flour tortillas (or homemade wheat tortillas) that are cooked by hand on an electric tortilla maker machine.

One of my very very favorite types of tortilla maker — the Villaware v5955 grand wrap tortilla and flatbread maker — used to be sold on the internet.  But for some reason it’s no longer available.  In fact I searched and searched and ever place I looked this particular electric tortilla maker was out of stock.  In my mind, this was the best tortilla maker that you can buy. Update: I finally found it today. You can buy it from the Amazon marketplace here.

Unfortunately you can no longer buy the Villaware tortilla maker.  (If you happen to know where to buy the Villaware tortilla maker let me know.)

So my next favorite option for electric tortilla maker machines is to buy a Sachi also called Saachi Tortilla maker or Saachi Roti Maker.  I’ll give you a full review of this electric tortilla maker in a future post.  (But the nice thing about this press is that it comes with a temperature control so that you can turn up and down the heat to keep the tortillas and rotis from burning.)

Suffice to say, an electric tortilla maker machine is actually not as easy to buy as you might think.  There are few brands available.

Of the ones I’ve tried the Saachi Tortilla bread roti maker with temperature control is best, and the revel tortilla maker is good too.  If you’re looking for a quesadilla maker that’s a whole other post.  (I’ll tell you about my favorite quesadilla maker then.)

Another of the best electric tortilla makers is the Revel tortilla maker or the Chapati maker press. Another one is the Santa Fe that gets good marks — but this is more of a quesadilla maker. (At least that is what is seems to me.)

If you want a non electric tortilla maker like a cast iron or a true tortilla press I have some thoughts on top options for these too. I’ll post about them in the near future. Until then, I’ll just be eating tortillas that were made on a commercial tortila maker.