How to Make Nachos in a Microwave

Assignment 7
Technical Writing
August 27, 2014

How to Make Nachos in a Microwave

Making nachos can be fun. You can choose different ingredients and make them your way. Two essential nacho ingredients are chips and cheese. Any additional toppings are up to you. Make them with all of your favorite ingredients or experiment with new ones. The possibilities are endless. Here is a quick and easy guide for making nachos in the microwave.

Ingredients: 1. Tortilla chips 2. Cheese 3. Sour cream 4. Salsa 5. Vegetables of your choice 6. Your preference of refried beans, beef, or chicken
Instructions:

1. Gather your ingredients a. Choose tortilla chips that are fresh. The fresher they are, the better. b. There are many types of cheese to choose. You can use shredded cheddar, mozzarella, or Monterey jack. c. Sour cream is an additional cold topping you can use. d. The salsa you use is your preference. You can use mild, medium, hot, or none at all. e. You can use any vegetables as cold toppings such as; diced tomatoes, onions, avocado, black olives, and peppers. f. Choose from any hot toppings like refried beans, chicken, or beef. 2. Put tortilla chips on a microwave safe plate. 3. Spread the tortilla chips out in a single, thin layer on the plate. a. The more spread out the chips are on the plate, the more space there will be for cheese. 4. Sprinkle cheese on top of the tortilla chips. a. Try to get the same amount of cheese on all of the tortilla chips. 5. Add hot toppings. a. Choose from refried beans, chicken, or beef.
*You will add your cold toppings later. 6. Put the plate in the microwave. 7. Cook the nachos for 2-5 minutes. a. The time needed to cook the nachos depends on the microwave. Watch the nachos and stop cooking when all of the cheese has melted.
* WARNING: HANDLE WITH CARE— TO AVOID BURNING, USE OVEN MITS WHEN REMOVING THE PLATE FROM THE MICROWAVE.
8. Once the nachos have finished cooking, remove the plate using an oven mitt.
*CAUTION: NACHOS ARE HOT, MAY BURN YOUR MOUTH.
9. Let the nachos cool down for a few minutes. 10. Add cold toppings after the nachos have cooled down. a. Add desired cold toppings such as diced tomatoes, avocado, peppers, black olives, onions, sour cream. You can use as little or as much as you like. 11. Enjoy your nachos. a. Depending on how big of a plate of nachos you made, you may need a fork. b. If you made a small portion, you can use your hands to eat the nachos.
Nachos are one of my favorite snack foods. There are several steps that have to be taken to make them just “right.” The toppings you choose for your nachos are up to you.
When creating instructions on how to make nachos in the microwave, my first thought was about all of the ingredients needed to make them. Then, I thought about my audience of third-grade girl scouts and how easily they could make nachos in the microwave. Since they have had little experience in the kitchen, I knew they would need more detailed information about how to make them. I started planning my instructions and listed all of the ingredients that they would need. I then created a flowchart with steps on how to make nachos in the microwave. I wrote what the girl scouts should do in chronological order, step by step. I reread all of the steps back to myself and added additional explanations to the steps. Since the girls may be making nachos for the first time, I knew they may need additional information to make them. I added a caution and a warning statement to two steps to indicate which actions might cause injury. The statements are made prior to the required action to make sure the reader doesn’t do anything dangerous or harmful. Once I listed all of the ingredients and step by step instructions, I formatted the document. I capitalized the entire caution and warning statement to ensure that the statements standout, and the reader reads it automatically before completing a dangerous or harmful step. I used a lot of white space to make the instructions easy to read. I numbered all of the steps using Arabic numbers. For the sub-steps and explanations, I used Arabic numbers and alphabetic letters to correspond to the same step it follows. Lastly, I proofread the instructions again to make sure that I followed the guidelines for writing instructions. I also wanted to make sure that I included explanations that explained the steps further if needed.

References

Smith-Worthington, D., Jefferson, S. (2011). Technical writing for success (3rd ed.). Mason, OH: Cengage.