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This recipe is for a mole sauce which you can use with tortilla’s to make a delicious enchilada casserole. It’s simple and pretty good.
Enchiladas for the new Daring Cooks challenge
When I read what the challenge for this month was going to be I got all excited. I totally love Mexican food!! The original challenge called for making Stacked Green Chili and grilled chicken enchiladas. Sounded like fun and while reading through the ingredients I figured I should be able to get them, if not in my hometown, then certainly in Amsterdam. So one day while half the nation was celebrating Queens day we ventured out to one of the wholesale stores in Amsterdam that cater for restaurants. Finding the green chilis was easy, but then came finding tomatillos…
Tomatillos
Nothing that looked even remotely like it and when we asked if they would have them, the guy at the store said that ‘sure he could order them, if you were willing to buy a plane load!’ You can indeed order them, but they only ship them when they have a certain amount and certainly nothing like the tiny amount that I needed for this recipe. And since I was not willing to buy 500 kilo of tomatillos (he never said 500 kg, I just made that up.. 🙂 ) I figured I try the other store… Also no luck and this time the guy we asked didn’t even know what we were talking about. Green tomatoes then maybe? Certainly not; I got the reply as green tomatoes are poisonous…. Sure… I figured I leave it at that and accept the fact that I would not be able to find tomatillos in the Netherlands. If anyone knows of a source either a store or through the internet let me know, as I would still like to make the original recipe at some point.
Our hosts this month, Barbara of Barbara Bakes and Bunnee of Anna+Food have chosen a delicious Stacked Green Chile & Grilled Chicken Enchilada recipe in celebration of Cinco de Mayo! The recipe, featuring a homemade enchilada sauce was found on www.finecooking.com and written by Robb Walsh.
Mole sauce
So what now to make; I searched for ‘mole’ sauces on the internet, but didn’t find anything that appealed to me or would fit into the challenge until I followed the link that Barbara and Anna had given in the post about this challenge recipe and bingo; that “Quick chicken mole” recipe sounded intriguing with the chocolate and the peanutbutter and all ingredients I could get so that would be the recipe. I still had the green chilis plus I bought an outrageously expensive piece of cheese named “Sparkenhoe Leicester” and it is very bright orange, so that is why the dish looks so colorful. It’s the cheese!
I asked for Monterey Jack cheese but they did not have that and the storeman said that I could try this cheese. What he forgot to mention was that the piece I grabbed was 14 euro! O well, it was a very tasty cheese. Mild but perfect for this dish and great melting capabilities… 🙂
I used half of the challenge recipe and half of the recipe for the chicken mole and combined those to make a stack of enchiladas. And the result? I think I can honestly say that this is by far the best Daring Cooks challenge that I have ever had and by far the best enchiladas I have eaten ever in the Netherlands. Absolutely and completely delicious!! You can tell by the fact that below is the only bit that was left on my plate and you can see how large it is, can you not? Seriously… you should try this; it is soooo good!
I grilled the chicken after first rubbing them with olive oil and then generously seasoning it with salt and pepper. I removed it from the grill and then let it cool and cut into strips.
You also need a generous amount of grated cheese. I used Sparkenhoe Leicester but a good cheddar will be good too or Monterey Jack or another mexican cheese.
Here is the recipe I used for the sauce…
Enchiladas with mole sauce
Ingredients
Mole sauce
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 onion chopped
- 1,5 cloves garlic chopped
- 2 tbsp chili powder
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 can diced tomatoes
- 1 bell pepper chopped
- 2 green chili peppers roughly chopped (seeds removed)
- 250 grams chicken stock
- 2 tbsp peanut butter
- 50 grams bittersweet chocolate
For the complete recipe:
- 6 flour tortilla
- 250 grams chicken fillet
- 100 grams grated cheddar monterey jack and sparkenhoe leicester
- olive oil
- pepper
- salt
How to make the enchiladas
- Preheat the oven to 180˚C/350˚F (conventional oven)
- Heat oil in a saute pan over medium heat. Add onion and saute until translucent. Add garlic and spices and continue to saute to toast and develop flavor. Add diced tomatoes, peppers, chili pepers, stock, peanut butter and chocolate. Simmer for 10 minutes.
- Grill the chicken with some olive oil and pepper and salt and cut into pieces. Grate your cheese and keep ready to use
- Take a casserole dish that is large enough to place two tortillas in next to each other to cover the bottom of the dish. If your dish is smaller you can use just one tortilla. I used a store-bought variety which is fairly large so I could fit only two tortillas in the dish pictured but since we're with two that was perfect. The qty's given above are for two (very) generous portions or three smaller ones. Put some of the sauce in the bottom of the dish and place the first two tortillas on top. Spread with some more sauce, half of the chopped up chicken and 1/3 of the grated cheese. Place two more tortillas on top, top with the rest of the chicken, more sauce and another third of the grated cheese.
- Place the final two tortillas on top and top that with the remaining sauce and cheese.
- Bake until the cheese has melted and everything heated through, about 20 minutes. Take from the oven and let rest for about 5-10 minutes. To serve, transfer each stack to a plate. Spoon any leftover sauce over the stacks and sprinkle with cilantro if you wish. You can also make this in individual gratin dishes.
Disclaimer:
The nutritional values above are calculated per portion. The details are based on standard nutritional tables and do not constitute a professional nutritional advice.
