Chicken Enchiladas!

May 5, 2009 9:44 AM

Recipe filter: Can you help me find or re-create this recipe for Chicken Enchiladas?

I'm a super picky eater. I love this recipe for Enchiladas because it adheres to all my self imposed dietary rules. But, now I can't find it.

Here's what I know:
-Chicken, boiled, shredded
-Corn Tortillas, lightly fried
-Chihuahua Cheese
-Sauce consists of sour cream, tomato sauce, salt, and possibly some peppers blended together. Maybe other ingredients.

There are no onions, cilantro, or diced tomatoes.

I know that I practically gave you the entire recipe right there but I want exact measurements and detailed step by step instructions. I honestly have no cooking skill whatsoever but I'm awesome at following precise directions. The terms "salt to taste" and "until it looks just right" are too vague for me and are wide open to disaster. Tell me to boil the chicken for 11 minutes and 39 seconds 88 milliseconds and to count out 178 granules of salt.
...okay, maybe not that detailed.

I've considered taking an Enchilada recipe and subbing ingredients or modifying others but I know this will lead to a mess. I don't have the mind of a chef--I can barely create a decent salad at a salad bar.

Is this recipe familiar to anyone? Or would anyone be willing to create the recipe?

posted by simplethings to food & drink (12 comments total)

This recipe contains onion salt, but I'm sure you could substitute regular salt if you wanted. It also calls for flour tortillas, but I believe you could substitute corn tortillas here. It doesn't have tomatoes, onions or cilantro.

The reviews are mixed. I would recommend reading them first. The recipe says to make two baking dishes of enchiladas and bake one and freeze one for later. When you are trying the recipe for the first time, you might want to halve it and just make one dish to see if you like it first. Are you okay with halving the ingredients in a recipe?

I hesitate to post a recipe that I haven't tried and probably wouldn't recommend, but if you are really set on not having onions and tomatoes in your enchiladas, I think this is about as good as you're likely to get.
posted by marsha56 at 10:29 AM on May 5 [1 favorite]

Can't comment on ingredients but regarding the tortillas the best would be red. They are still corn but thinner than regular and much better. To prepare them (even if you don't find red) simply add enough oil to lightly cover the bottom of a pan, warm up the oil (but not so hot it's popping and just throw the tortilla in flipping every few seconds. Too long = corn chips.

A healthier alternative would be to steam the the tortilla. Just sprinkle some water on both side of the tortilla and throw the tortilla on a hot pan, again fliping every few seconds.

Good Luck!
posted by doorsfan at 10:36 AM on May 5

Find and follow a good recipe for enchiladas suizas. If there are onions or cilantro in the recipe, just leave them out.

These two are both excellent recipes. The second one is particularly good, and is the one that I use most often. Leaving out the onions and cilantro won't hurt the recipe at all; the tomatoes end up being pureed in the blender, so no tomato chunks. If you're extra worried about chunks, just use cans of crushed tomatoes or tomato puree.
posted by dersins at 11:02 AM on May 5

Are you sure it's tomato sauce? Enchilada sauce has no tomatoes in it—it's made from chiles.
posted by bricoleur at 11:31 AM on May 5

Bricoleur, some enchiladas in Tex-Mex cuisine have red sauce. Ranchero sauce has tomatoes in it. Some times red sauce on enchiladas is just called salsa roja. I'm not too familiar with sauces that have sour cream and tomato, sour cream is more commonly used in green sauces or cream sauces/suiza.

You can start here for complete recipes, but none here have Chihuahua cheese, but you can sub Monterey Jack with good result.
posted by ishotjr at 12:35 PM on May 5

*when I said red sauce in the first sentence above, I meant tomato sauce.
posted by ishotjr at 12:35 PM on May 5

Yeah, I know that tomatoes do turn up in enchilada sauce. What I meant was, traditional enchilada sauce is tomato-less, but it's red, so one might think that there were tomatoes in such a sauce. So if the enchiladas in question did in fact use a traditional sauce, simplethings might conceivably waste a lot of time trying to recreate a flavor with the wrong ingredients. Don't ask me how I know that.
posted by bricoleur at 12:53 PM on May 5

Thanks for the suggestions so far! I'll keep everything in mind when I make my attempt.

@bricoleur: I'm positive it's tomato sauce. And I think I remember peppers... but I have no idea what kind.

Maybe this might help as well: once it's all done baking the sauce ends up quite orange rather than red. And the only words I can think of to describe the texture of the sauce is spongy. It's not a liquid-y sauce at all, it's more of like... a thick, spongier whipped cream?
posted by simplethings at 3:29 PM on May 5

Simplethings, is this a recipe that you once had, but lost? Or is this something you've had in a restaurant and are trying to recreate? If the latter, it might help if we knew where you had this dish?
posted by marsha56 at 4:22 PM on May 5

@marsha56: It's a recipe that I once had but lost.
posted by simplethings at 4:59 PM on May 5

It's not something like King Ranch Chicken is it? Here is one version. Not everyone makes it with tomato, though. Here is another version (scroll down for the actual recipe) that is very specific, and the ingredients sound fairly close to what you described.

Damn, now I need some King Ranch Chicken, mmmm.
posted by ishotjr at 4:59 PM on May 5

The standard proportions for enchiladas are:

12 tortillas
2 1/2 cups filling
2 cups sauce
about a cup of cheese on top if you like, or it can be part of the filling

You could make an easy enchilada sauce by mixing 1 cup of quality canned stuff (I recommend Hatch brand, medium or hot) with an 8 ounce carton of sour cream. If this is too bland, add a small can of diced green chilies, undrained. (Freeze the rest of the canned sauce.)

The filling could be a couple of chicken breasts poached with some minced carrots and celery if you want, or shredded from a deli roasted chicken.

Heat the sauce, and dip the tortillas in one-by-one. Roll up with the filling, and put in a 9 x 13 inch pan, or 2 8 x 8 inch ones. Top with the remainder of the sauce. Top with cheese. Bake until sauce becomes bubbly around the edges. You can freeze a pan for later, too.
posted by zinfandel at 7:52 PM on May 6