Thursday, May 7, 2020

Quarantine Cuisine: Restaurant Style Cheese Enchiladas with Green Sauce


Restaurant style cheese enchiladas with green sauce.
I have a limited repertoire for home cooked dinners. Up at the float cabin, Wayne cranks up the BBQ almost every night in all seasons. My job is to fix salads and sides.

With stay-at-home orders to protect against the Coronavirus, I've had to plan entrees to go with my sides.

We usually walk to the La Gloria Mexican food restaurant here in Bellingham. Wayne gets the cheese enchiladas with green sauce so I decided to make some while we are still waiting to go out to eat.

Cheese Enchiladas with Green Sauce

I've made enchilada's before, but during baking the tortillas get hard on the edges and soggy in the middle. I went online to find a recipe for restaurant style cheese enchiladas. I chose to use Jessica Fisher's recipe for Easiest Cheese Enchiladas on Good Cheap Eats.

Assembly line ready to go.
Ingredients for 24 Enchiladas:

oil for frying the tortillas
2 dozen corn tortillas
3 1/2 cup enchilada sauce (red or green)
20 oz cheddar cheese (shredded) can also use jack
1/4 cup sliced black olives (optional)
2 green onions chopped (optional)

Instructions:

This recipe is easy to scale up and down. I chose to make 15 enchiladas to have five for dinner, and two sets of five to freeze.

Lightly fried tortilla with cheese filling.
Grease two 9×13-inch baking dishes. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Heat one inch of oil in a small frying pan. Fry tortillas for a few seconds on each side in hot oil until they are pliable. Drain on paper towels. I fried the tortillas one at a time and let them cool slightly before filling and rolling.

I used a 28 oz. can of La Victoria Mild Green Enchilada Sauce. Put a small amount of enchilada sauce on the bottom of each dish.

Spooning sauce on rolled enchiladas.
Reserve 2 cups of cheese for the topping.

Place a small handful of cheese down the center of each tortilla, roll and place seam side down in the baking dish. When the dish is full, spoon sauce to cover the top of the rolled enchiladas.

Sprinkle the remaining cheese over top. If desired, add sliced olives and chopped green onions. I chose not to.

Bake in a 350 degrees F oven for 20 minutes or until heated through, bubbling and the cheese topping is melted.

Ready to bake, one with cheese topping for tonight's dinner.

I didn't put cheese on top of the enchiladas that were going into the freezer. I'll do that when they are reheated. You can freeze the extras either cooked or uncooked.

Wayne said these were the best enchiladas I've ever made. Thanks Jessica for the inspiration. -- Margy

16 comments :

  1. Thank you for the recipe, Mom loves enchiladas and we do too. Maybe I will make them for Mom's day

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    1. I grew up in Southern California with great Mexican food. It's a favourite of mine. We have a great little restaurant inside of a Mexican grocery store here in Bellingham, much like the ones I'm used to down south. We were missing their special enchiladas so I tried to make some of my own. They aren't quite as good as the original, but turned out to my liking. - Margy

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  2. Nicely done! We had burritos, from frozen. Shopping is just a pain these days. There isn't much Mexican influence around here!

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    1. I used to love the frozen bean and cheese burritos when I was in college. A quick meal on a study night. - Margy

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  3. I had a swimming burrito from a new Mexican place that opened during covid this week. It was amazing! And owned by an ex Marine. A win, win for our hood.

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    1. I'm not familiar with a swimming burrito, but I assume it is one with sauce on top and you eat it with a knife and fork. One of they guys I used to work with liked them that way when we all went out to lunch in El Monte, California. - Margy

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  4. That sounds like a nice and easy tasty supper dish. Will have to try it sometime soon :)

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    1. We have two good Mexican food restaurants up in Powell River, but here in Bellingham there are a lot more to chose from. - Margy

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  5. Oh, this looks so good. I was thinking of making Black bean enchiladas for supper soon.

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    1. I love black beans, not sure why I quit buying them. I followed a recipe for taco salad that called for pinto beans and have been using them exclusively for about two years. Thanks for the hint, I'll get a can of black beans in my next online grocery order. We have been picking up groceries in the store parking lot since March to reduce the risk to exposure. - Margy

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  6. Well, Margy, you've inspired me to make enchiladas this week. :-)

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    1. Usually when I cook I have a few tried and true recipes, mostly in my head. With so much cooking at home right now I've tried to branch out to make meal time less boring. - Margy

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  7. It is good to treat ourselves in the quarantine: well done! :)

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    1. So true! We are trying to exercise more so it doesn't result in too much weight gain. - Margy

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  8. Those look real tasty. Just my sort of ingredients too. I'm growing chillies on the kitchen window sill right now.

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    1. In years past I grew jalapeno, bell, anaheim and banana peppers. This year I'm not home to plant so it's going to be a very different summer without my own fresh produce. - Margy

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Thanks for stopping by. Comments, questions, and suggestions are always welcome. - Margy