The term ‘enchilada’ has its roots from the Spanish word ‘enchilar’, meaning ‘to decorate with chilli or pepper’. The making of a proper enchilada dish therefore entails the wrapping up of some spiced meat, usually in corn tortillas, and then baking them in a spicy tomato sauce.
Nowadays, enchiladas have evolved into a dish with a wide variation of fillings, including not just meat but also vegetables and beans. For those who do not favour spices and chillies, there is also the option of using cream-based sauces to bake the dish with, such as sour cream, cheese or whipped cream. For my recipe here, I’ve decided to adapt an online recipe using a fusion of salsa sauce and cream, plus an added tangy lime flavour. It worked really well and smelt heavenly after the bake.
Mmmm… the guy and I couldn’t have enough of it. It was love at first taste. You should try it too – soon!
Ingredients:
- Rotisserie chicken: 500g after roasting, shredded
- Honey: 1.5 tbsp
- Fresh lime juice: 3 tbsp (juice from 3 medium-sized limes)
- Cumin powder: 1/2 tsp
- Salt: 1/3 tsp
- Enchilada sauce (or mild salsa sauce): 280g
- Light cream: 3/4 cup
- Milk: 3/4 cup
- Floured tortilla: 8 pieces
- Grated cheddar cheese: 1 heaped cup
- Grated parmesan cheese: 1 heaped cup
- Spring onion: 1/2 stalk, chopped
Method:
- Mix chicken with honey, lime juice, cumin and salt. Leave to marinate in fridge overnight.
- Preheat oven at 180 degrees Celsius. Grease baking tray with oil.
- Combine enchilada sauce with cream and milk.
- Spoon 1/5 of cream mixture into tray and spread evenly over the base.
- Divide chicken into 8 portions. Spoon 1 portion onto a piece of tortilla.
- Combine cheese together. Sprinkle 1.5 spoonful of cheese over chicken.
- Roll up tortilla and place inside tray. Repeat for the remaining tortillas and ingredients.
- Line up all the tortillas neatly in the tray till they fill up the base.
- Pour remaining cream mixture evenly over tortillas.
- Sprinkle remaining cheese on top of sauce, then cover with aluminium foil.
- Bake 45min. Remove foil and bake 10min more to brown the cheese.
- Garnish with spring onion. Serve hot.
Trick:
- Try using flavoured tortilla pieces such as onion and chives to make this dish for a different taste and fragrance.
Disclaimers:
- This recipe was kindly adapted from Dessert Now, Dinner Later’s ‘Honey Lime Chicken Enchiladas‘. The recipe calls for the original enchilada sauce. I had to replace this with mild salsa sauce instead as it wasn’t available in the local supermarkets here.
- I also substituted half and half with cream and milk for the sauce, which worked just as well and made the dish even creamier and tastier!
Serving:
8 persons