Chicken Enchiladas

If you want to make the best chicken enchiladas with homemade sauce then you’ve got to check out my chicken enchilada recipe.

These enchiladas will be ready before you know it so let’s get started.

Homemade Enchilada Sauce

First off we’re gonna make a homemade enchilada sauce. You could use store-bought but the enchilada sauce you make at home is so easy and it’s perfect for eggs in the morning, over rice, the works.

Spice Mix

We’re gonna mix our spices in a small bowl starting with the chili powder. I like mine fairly spicy but the rest of the family is on the mild side of life so normally I would add three tablespoons of chili powder; today I’m gonna add just two and a little blessing of extra. One teaspoon of cumin. Brian only bought whole cumin seeds so I painstakingly minced this up—couldn’t find my mortar and pestle. One quarter teaspoon of cinnamon; this has a little something extra, I really love it in here. You can skip it if you hate cinnamon for some reason. We’re gonna add one teaspoon of garlic powder in here. There you go. And finally a quarter teaspoon of oregano, dried. Please give that a little bit of a mix.

Roux & Sauce

Now we’re going to be on the cooktop. I’m going to make a simple roux. Into a medium saucepan I’m adding three tablespoons of oil. You could use vegetable oil or olive oil; I’m using olive today. We’re gonna get the oil nice and hot over medium-high heat. Once that oil is dancing in the pan we’re gonna add three tablespoons of flour and whisk as you go. This is gonna be the base that’ll thicken everything up and give us a nice rich mouth feel. Just whisk it for a minute to cook the flour; you don’t want to burn the flour so whisk, whisk, whisk. Now we’re going to whisk in the spices. That is a lot of flavor; it gets smoky and you’re really blooming them. One cup of tomato sauce—whisk, whisk, whisk, whisk, whisk. It’s beautiful spices, it’s a beautiful dark color. The chili became atomized; it’s really thick and luscious. We’re gonna pour in two cups of chicken stock. Right now, if you want to do a veggie version of this for whatever reason, then you can use vegetable stock of course. Whisk that in just like when you make any sauce and you’re adding the liquid to your roux: whisk and pour slowly, whisk fast, pour slow. This is basically done. I’m going to let this kind of hang out over here; I’ll whisk occasionally as I go. It’ll thicken up and become really delicious. We will be adding some salt and pepper to taste and a little bit of vinegar, but first it has to thicken up. I’m gonna add in probably about half a teaspoon of salt and then whisk in about two teaspoons of apple cider vinegar. This can feel very flat; you need the vinegar, the acid, to wake it up. There we go—it’s starting to thicken up too. This looks very deceiving because it doesn’t look thick, but it thickens up as it cools down and after the bake. I will let this simmer for a bit.

Chicken Filling

Garlic & Onion

While that bubbles away I’m gonna be mincing about five cloves of garlic and one medium onion—maybe not all of this because this is kind of a large onion. Give your onion and the garlic a smash, get that skin off. It also helps release the oils and then start mincing it up. My mom is from Mexico and we grew up with a version of this. This is not an authentic enchilada though; it’s just kind of like what we like making at home and I like making it so much I wanted to share it with you too. All right, give these a good mince, set that aside, and we’re going to mince up the onion. You don’t have to use a full big one; I do love onion though. Watch those fingertips when you’re chopping—cut like this. You don’t want to have your little fingers out; you want to have your knuckles guiding the knife.

Sauté & Combine

We’re going to place this larger skillet over medium-high heat, add three tablespoons of oil. Once that oil is nice and hot we’re gonna add our onions in. These will cook for about five minutes while mixing somewhat frequently so they become translucent, not burnt. As you go you can season with salt and pepper; I like to add a little bit in the beginning. The onions are becoming translucent; they’re almost ready for the garlic. It’s a good time to go ahead and get your shredded chicken out so it is ready to dump in. Let’s add all the garlic in. Okay, now I’m adding a pound and a half of my shredded chicken right here. At this point the chicken’s ice cold; I shredded it a while ago so you want to warm it up, mix it in with those onion and garlic flavors. If you’re in a hurry you could definitely just buy a rotisserie chicken and shred it up yourself. Now I’m going to add this magical enchilada sauce right over here and just mix that in. You can see the chicken has absorbed so much delicious flavor from it. Okay, that’s good. Let’s take this off heat, get our casserole dish out and our tortillas.

Assembly & Baking

Tortillas & Cheese

I have something to tell you about the tortillas though—it’s very important. Before you assemble you want about three cups or so of a Mexican blend: it’s going to be cheddar, Monterey Jack, and the other two can kind of change—queso quesadilla, asadero—but it’s really up to you. You can just use whatever delicious melty cheeses you like. That’s about three cups; you want to be generous with the cheese. Don’t kill me: I know the authentic way to make chicken enchiladas is with corn tortillas, but I do not love corn tortillas unless they are fresh or a couple brands I really love, but I cannot get them at my local store so I’m gonna do flour today.

Rolling the Enchiladas

On to each tortilla we’re gonna add a generous spoonful of the enchilada sauce—almost like you’re making a little pizza. Now we’re gonna add a generous amount of the chicken mixture; it’s like one eighth of the total. You don’t wanna be unkind and not share all the chicken. Top with the cheese, then we’re gonna roll this up and place that into our casserole dish. There we go—nice and cozy. Repeat for the other seven enchiladas. It’s actually easier if you set up a little assembly line.

Final Toppings & Bake

Now we’re gonna spoon enchilada sauce over the top or just pour it over. I like to see a little bit of the tortillas poking out, but I want a lot of sauce on there. We have a little bit of cheese left so let’s just gracefully add that on—a little blessing of cheese. This is ready to go into the oven: 350 °F for about 20 minutes or until the cheese is really nice and melty.

Serving

Into the oven. Garnish with cilantro, sour cream, avocado—whatever you enjoy—and it’s time to eat.