Tuesday 23 August 2016

Chicken Enchiladas

Wow, it's completely apropos that my last post... SIX MONTHS AGO... was complaining about juggling work and daycare. I literally have no time at all between waking at 6 (if I'm lucky!), breakfast, nappy bag, changing baby, feeding baby, cycling baby to daycare, cycling on to work, shower, work eight solid hours, cycle home via daycare, empty dishwasher, cook dinner, refill dishwasher, put baby to bed, then crash back to bed at 9pm. I've taken to making my dinners in advance at the weekend, so that the "cook dinner" part of that deluge is just a 5-10 minute reheat and serve. That means a lot of repeated, tried-and-tested recipes, and a lot of pretty boring staple food, like beef stew or lasagne.

I was at a friend's birthday party / pot luck, and another friend wanted to know more about the food I was preparing: huevos rancheros. I explained what I was up to, and she asked me if it was on my blog. I said yes... but I haven't been updating it recently. We had leftover refried beans and I said I'd probably make some enchiladas to go with; so here is the recipe, for my friend who wanted to know what exactly I DO with leftover refried beans :)

Ingredients

  • a medium roast chicken (ready-roast from the supermarket is fine)
  • two red peppers (capsica)
  • a large brown onion
  • four cloves of garlic
  • 1 flat tablespoon ground cumin
  • 1 tsp cocoa powder
  • 1-2 tsp chilli flakes (to taste)
  • a cup or so of tomato salsa
  • 8 tortillas
  • cheddar, colby, or monteray jack cheese
  • 3 spring onions
  • sour cream
Method

Strip the meat off the chicken, roughly chop, and reserve. If the chicken came with stuffing, feel free to eat it, or chop it in, too. Dice the red peppers; halve, and finely slice the onion. Fry them together in a little oil for 10-15 minutes over a low heat until extremely sweet and tender. 

(Or, you could roast a chicken whole, surrounded by halved onions and red peppers, then dice everything up afterwards. Your call!)

Crush the garlic into the red pepper and onions, and fry for another minute, then add the cumin, cocoa, and chilli, if using; fry for another minute, until fragrant. Stir in the diced chicken, and half of the salsa.

Spoon the mixture into the tortillas, rolling them up and pushing them together in a deep roasting tray. Scatter grated cheese and finely diced spring onions over the top. You can cover and refrigerate it at this stage, and it'll keep in the fridge for a few days.

Bake at 180C for about 15 minutes (or 20 from the fridge), until the cheese has melted and the edges of the tortillas are just beginning to crisp.

Serve hot, with the rest of the salsa, sour cream or guacamole, and refried beans, if you like :)