ENCHILADAS WITHOUT A STORY
The Meal:
Appetizers: Tortilla chips with Black Bean/Corn/Feta Salsa
Main Entree: Spinach & Chicken Enchiladas
Let me begin with an apology regarding this meal: It has no interesting story! Heather and I often exchange meals that tend have some neat back stories…where we learned how to make the dish, what the meal always reminds us of, etc. Of course the first meal I document for this blog, doesn’t! It’s just a creamy spinach and chicken enchiladas recipe that both K & A seem to love. And so I make it from time to time. The recipe is a combination of several recipes for spinach and chicken enchiladas that I have seen over the years. The first time I ever had a version of this meal (very different from my own rendition) was the first time Dave’s best friend and his then girlfriend (now wife) had us over for dinner after moving in together. It was a yummy meal and I always meant to get the recipe but somehow never did (even though we see this couple so often!).
I ended up revisiting the idea of spinach and chicken enchiladas after having kids…trying to come up with new ways to feed them spinach. My little ones tend to enjoy chicken in a béchamel-like sauce, so I decided to try it out in an enchilada filling. In the end, both kids enjoy the filling quite a bit and don’t mind the enchiladas as a delivery system for it.
As for the appetizers…the salsa, that is…it is actually a recipe that I got from the same couple who fed us the spinach and chicken enchiladas (may be this meal has a theme after all!). I think this recipe can also be found on-line on other sites, but for me it comes from this couple. It’s really quite yummy. It’s a bit sweet and feta-ish, so you have to be prepared for that…and if you are, it’s completely yummy. My kids haven’t had this salsa before, so I’m curious as to how they will like it.
So, here’s a rough guide as to how I made the salsa (first) and then the enchiladas…and towards the bottom, my instructions for reheating them.
Black bean/Corn/Feta Salsa:
Very, very simple.
– 1 can black beans (drained and washed)
– 1 can corn (yellow or white, drained)
– 1 tub feta crumbles
– 1/3 cup each of olive oil, apple cider vinegar and sugar
– 1 bunch scallions (chopped)
Directions:
Mix and refrigerate. Makes a ton…perfect for a swap!
Black Bean/Corn/Feta Salsa
Spinach and Chicken Enchiladas
Just a bit more work. Ingredients (for roughly 8 servings):
– About 12 oz of baby spinach
– 2 tablespoons butter
– 1 large onion, chopped
– 4-5 cloves of garlic, chopped
– 1 ½ tablespoon chilli powder
– 2 tablespoons flour
– 1 ½ cup milk
– 1 ½ pound of boneless chicken, cubed
– Salt & pepper, to taste
Directions:
– Boil water and (in batches) add spinach for 2-3 minutes. Remove from boiling water and shock in ice bath. Once all spinach is done…squeeze excess water (don’t have to be too thorough) and roughly chop.
– Sautee onions in butter.
– Add garlic, chilli powder (decent amount), spinach. Cook for a couple of minutes.
– Add flour. Stir & cook some more.
– Add milk (whole) and stir till sauce thickens to desired amount. Will have to add chicken to this, so don’t thicken too much.
– Add salt and pepper. Remove from heat.
– I happened to have some grilled peppers around (had made a grilled vegetable salad for dinner) so I added them at this point too.
– Sautee cubed chicken in a little bit of vegetable oil. Add chilli powder, salt and pepper to flavor chicken.
– Once cooked, remove from heat and add to the spinach in white sauce. Mix and let cool before storing in fridge.
That’s it for the enchilada filling. Here’s what it looks like after mixing with the spinach:
Spinach and Chicken Filling
Now for the sauces that goes over the enchiladas…I use two types: a tomatillo sauce and a sour cream sauce.
Tomatillo Sauce:
– ~8 tomatillos
– 3 cloves garlic
– Good handful of cilantro
– Salt & pepper, to taste
Directions:
– Boil tomatillos for a couple of minutes (mostly without husks…leave one or two with husks).
– Remove from heat and place in blender.
– Add garlic, cilantro and salt and pepper to blender and blend to a sauce consistency.
– Let cool before storing in fridge. (Incidentally, this makes a great salsa in and of itself.)
Tomatillo Sauce
Sour Cream Sauce:
– 1 tablespoon butter
– 3/4 cup sour cream (not the fat-free kind)
– 1/2 to 3/4 cup chicken broth
– 1 tablespoon flour (may be a bit more)
Directions:
– Melt butter over medium heat.
– Add a bit of flour and stir for a few minutes.
– Add chicken broth and make into a thick sauce (remove lumps, i.e., whisk, whisk, whisk).
– Add sour cream, more whisking. Remove from heat. Let cool before storing in fridge.
Sour Cream Sauce
All done!
Here’s the full meal (for the Johnson-McCormicks) in its Tupperware finest:
Swap Meal for Johnson-McCormicks
Besides the salsa, enchilada filling and the two sauces, I also packed tortilla chips, cheese, and tortillas.
How to Reheat:
1) Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2) Reheat enchilada filling.
3) Place filling in tortillas, layer on some cheese.
4) Roll up tortillas and line up in a lightly greased baking dish.
5) Drizzle the two sauces on top of the rolled-up tortillas. Sour cream sauce might need some help from the microwave to soften up.
6) Heat in oven for approximately 10 minutes.
7) In the meantime, there are tortilla chips with the black bean, corn, and feta salsa to eat!
ENJOY!
The Verdict:
Tuesday: The first day of the new semester. Fortunately, no cooking! As usual, kids enjoyed this meal. Here are our enchiladas before they went in the oven:
Now, for the salsa…my son (bean lover) picked all the beans out and just ate them. Kavya on the other hand like the “soup” in the salsa. So, not a huge hit with the kids (not a bust either) but definitely enjoyed by the adults!
Wednesday: The family feasted on the curried Haitian chicken salad pita sandwiches and loved them! Alex picked and ate the raisins and chicken pieces…kept asking for more. Kavya was floored by the concept of having apples (a favorite of hers) in a dinner meal and gobbled it all up. As for Dave and I…we LOVED it!! Thanks, Heather!
Thursday: We had more of the pita sandwiches for dinner tonight…loved them again! We also had the peach cobbler!! YUM! (Decided to save it till we were done with the lecture week.) Wish I had remembered to take a picture of Alex with ice-cream and cobbler remnants on his nose and cheeks!