Recipe Notes: Ground Beef and Cheese Enchiladas

21 January 2018

Recipe from Cook's Illustrated, January 2018

Not too long ago I made enchiladas for the first time.  The verdict was positive, these chicken enchiladas were good, held up well as leftovers, and took just 90 minutes to make. Thus the recipe for a "quicker, but still deeply flavorful" recipe for beef enchiladas in Cook's Illustrated was appealing and worth trying.

Preparing these enchiladas took me 105 minutes. The sauce was first, prepared with dried ancho chiles that were gently toasted then softened with beef broth. These were blended together with sweated onions and garlic, tomato paste, and cumin. I skipped the chipotles in adobo for fear they would make the sauce too spicy. The filling was made from ground beef that was fried with cumin, coriander, and salt then mixed with sweated onions. Shedded Monterey Jack cheese, cilantro, and some of the sauce were added to finish the filling. Tortillas (five-inch white corn tortillas) were coated with oil and baked to soften them, though I am not convinced this step was necessary for the tortillas we were using.  The filled enchiladas were placed in a baking disk, covered with the sauce and Monterey Jack cheese, and baked. The recipe made 11 enchiladas

We enjoyed the enchiladas when they were fresh. As before, two was too many for us, our serving size is about one enchilada each for dinner. The sauce was a little bland and might have been better with the chipotles. The filling was beefy and tender and the sauce had a pleasant chile flavor. As leftovers, these enchiladas were not so good. The sauce soaked into the tortillas making the tortillas mushy and the dish dry overall. These enchiladas were not good enough, especially as leftovers, for us to make again.