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April 9, 2019 Recipes

Red Enchilada Sauce

red enchilada sauce

Making a really good red enchilada sauce is an extremely rewarding and messy procedure. Because that I order enchiladas at least once a week, I couldn’t go on any longer without paying proper tribute to this amazing Mexican comfort food. It was time to actually MAKE it.

Upon ordering enchiladas, I almost always choose green sauce. However, when my mom sent me a bag of dried red chilis from the San Xavier Coop in Tucson, Arizona I thought it was a culinary sign to go with red enchilada sauce for once. You can find several types of dried red chiles at any Mexican market, so by all means choose your own unique blend of peppers. I cheated a little by adding a can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce for a more complex, smoky flavor and also took advantage of the vinegar and “spices” in the adobo sauce.

dried red chilis for enchilada sauce

Red chile pods from the San Xavier Coop in Tucson, Arizona

When you want enchiladas you typically want them immediately, and nothing about making enchilada sauce is quick and easy. Therefore it helps to treat the sauce-making as a separate event. Just make it ahead of time (usually a good weekend actitity) and store it in the fridge. The basic steps are quite simple … soak the chiles, roast your vegetables, throw them into a blender or food processor, strain the hell out of it, then add your stock and seasoning and simmer it a little to thicken up.

My first attempts at red enchilada sauce were met with mediocre results because I put in mediocre effort with the lack of straining. To get a smooth, silky texture without seeds it REALLY requires some patience with a cheesecloth and/or strainer. At the end, your kitchen can easily look like a horror movie murder scene if you’re not careful. To avoid this, have a damp, bleached towel on hand to quickly clean up any spills so your surfaces don’t get stained. Or, lay down some newspaper and work on that.

Dried Mexican chili peppers

Assortment of red dried chile peppers at Trade Fair market in Astoria, Queens, NYC.

Enchilada sauce base ingredients

Ingredients for enchilada sauce

• ½ pound dried red chile peppers
• 10 cloves garlic, peeled
• 2 white onions
• 4 medium sized vine tomatoes
• one 7-oz. can of chipotle peppers in Adobo sauce
• 2 tablespoons of Mexican oregano
• 1 teaspoon of cumin
• 1 ½ cups of chicken or vegetable stock
• 1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar
• 1 teaspoon of white sugar
• kosher salt to taste

Instructions

  1. Cut the stems off your chiles and shake out all of the seeds. If needed, you can make in incision lengthwise and open them like a drawer to also cut out the ribs and release any remaining seeds. If you want a spicy sauce, keep some seeds. If you want a mild sauce, simply don’t use the seeds.
  2. Place your dried chiles in a large pot and fill just enough to cover with water. Bring this to a brief boil, then turn the heat off. Let the chilis remain in the hot water for about an hour to fully hydrate.
  3. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Meanwhile, peel and cut the onion into halves or quarters, core the tomato and keep it whole. On a roasting pan, spread the garlic tomatoes, onions and garlic in one layer on a roasting pan. Coat everything with olive oil and sprinkle with a dusting of little kosher salt. Roast these for about 20 to 30 minutes until the onion starts to brown. Remove from heat and set aside.
  4. Transfer into a food processor the hydrated chile peppers, roasted vegetables, and the chipotle peppers in Adobo sauce. Blend until everything is broken down into a chunky salsa-like consistency.
  5. Using a cheesecloth or mesh strainer, you need to extract as much liquid from this mixture as possible. Techniques for doing this may vary from kitchen to kitchen. Pour the blended mixture into a mesh strainer (suspended over a medium saucepan) in batches about 2 cups at a time. I suggest using a sturdy ladle to press out the liquid. No need to press hard, just keep a constant up and down motion to keep everything moving and you will soon be left with nothing but pulp.
  6. Once all batches have been extracted, transfer the saucepan to the stovetop. Add chicken or vegetable stock, Mexican oregano, cumin, sugar, apple cider vinegar and kosher salt to taste. Simmer this for about an hour, stirring frequently. This will thicken and cook down into an amazing sauce, and you’re done!

making red enchilada sauce

Straining enchilada sauce

Yield: About 4 cups of enchilada sauce. If you like your enchiladas completely swimming in sauce then by all means double the recipe. I like mine to be moderately saucy and I found this recipe to be sufficient. The amounts I use are what one standard food processor will allow.

More about red chile peppers

Let’s talk chile peppers. I actually couldn’t tell what type of chiles my mom sent me, because as you could see in the photo … the bag just said “red chiles”. When you shop for dried peppers you might be overwhelmed by all the choices. And really … this should be fun, not stressful. So I’m here to break things down and navigate a decision.

The aroma in the dried red chile section is one that gets all up in your sinuses. Advice is good to have, but it’s also important to trust your own senses as well. Just like wine tasting, you have to try them out. So, start exploring. Bring of each variety up to your nose and inhale to get to know them on an intimate level. Some are spicy and light, others are rich with a savory chocolate-like character, and some are difficult to describe. To make a red enchilada sauce, it’s good to have balance.

dried-red-chile peppers

These are some super common dried chile peppers used in red enchilada sauce. Clockwise from upper left… Guajillo, Ancho, Árbol, and Pasilla peppers.

Luckily, I have an awesome friend of 20 years and Mexican ex-chef who went to culinary school to call up when I’m in the store trying to make Mexican-related culinary decisions. He swears on using a combination of Ancho, Guajillo, and Árbol peppers. Anchos are actually dried, young poblano peppers that are dark in color and mild in flavor, remnant of savory chocolate. Guajillos are earthy and medium-hot in heat. Árbol chiles have a clean, light flavor and REALLY hot.  They’re what you should buy if you really like spicy food, but use them with caution. Do not go crazy with the Árbol chiles. Pasilla peppers have a rich, full-bodied, almost-smoky flavor similar to that of the ever-so-popular Chipotle pepper and probably my favorite. The popular TV personality, Chef Rick Bayless turned me on to Pasilla peppers from watching his video on Oaxacan Pasilla Salsa, so definitely check that out.

Throw back to circa 2008, here is my “personal encyclopedia” Mexican cooking … one of my best friends of over 20 years and professional cook, Gery Lopez. Much of my chile pepper advice comes from him to you, through me.

seeking red chile peppers

Here is the process of seeding the peppers. This time I was using Guajillo and Ancho peppers. It was not a spicy sauce, needless to say.

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Many recipes assume that you have a stand mixer with a dough hook and a thermometer to temp the water ... well I simply don't, and it's not the end of the 🌎. Learning how to knead dough and our teacher making us feel the water temp in 8th grade Home Ec class was certainly handy. 🤓 You can follow anyone's recipe and do these two things manually. 

👉🏻 Bread flour gives you a better chew and it absorbs more water, so use less of it if you want to swap it out. In a recipe calling for 5 cups of all purpose, I used 4 ½ cups bread flour. 

👉🏻 Proof the yeast (active dry, not instant) in a separate bowl because it allows you to confirm that you have the temperature right. Many recipes don't do this because they assume you have a thermometer to make it exact, so their yeast is mixed in with the flour. If you get the temperature wrong in the separate bowl you can simply proof it again without wasting the entire recipe.

👉🏻 The water for the yeast should feel like a warm bath. Your body is 98 degrees and the ideal temp is between 101 and 110, so you don't have too far to go. If it feels warm to your finger then it's at least 99. And do this when you know ur hands are not cold. When the yeast becomes foamy, then you know you did it correctly.

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👉🏻 When the dough doesn't fill your baking pan, simply leave it alone for a while and it will spread on its own. Do not stretch and pull on it. Go do something else! 

👉🏻 Bake at a high heat. Some recipes said 400 degrees and I had more success at 450 to 475.

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If you’re also a cold noodle lover and like spic If you’re also a cold noodle lover and like spicy food, make some Mei Fun noodles sautéed in red Thai curry paste as a #noodlesalad base. 

Mei Fun noodles are super thin, so all you have to do is soak them in hot water for about 20 minutes to hydrate them, then continue flash cooking them in a seasoned broth.

Today’s lunch involved these cold-ish (room temperature) noodles, and my recipe for Date Syrup “Duck Sauce” (recipe on my blog) to use as a dressing for a spicy/sweet flavor profile. Plus a little Sriracha (of course). Here’s how the noodles went down in a nutshell:

▪️Soaked the noodles in hot water for 20 minutes so they were kinda al-dente like.
 
▪️Sautéed Thai curry Paste and fresh shallots in some canola oil.

▪️Stirred in the noodles to sauté them briefly. They will tangle easily, so and just stir the heck out of them quite aggressively. Then I added veggie broth to deglaze everything as well as hydrate the noodles to completion.

🤓 Note: Mei Fun noodles are very resilient, as I let them sit overnight, then took them out this morning to come to room temp until I was ready to make a salad with whatever other ingredients available. Also fried some extra shallots as garnish.

🤓 Another note: If you don’t use all the curry paste, simply wrap the leftovers into a saran wrap log, tie the ends, and store it in the freezer.

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When ya accidentally buy @hellmannsmayonnaise #veg When ya accidentally buy @hellmannsmayonnaise #veganaise and you have extra Mexican red sauce from takeout ... time to make something close to a #chipotlemayo for today’s #grilledeggplant and hummus sandwiches. 

I was moving too fast, meant to grab the olive oil mayo, but this vegan #sandwichspread ended up in my kitchen for a reason … I guess it was meant to be. 
🥪
#condiments #healthiereating #healthierfood #spicymayo #spicysauces #shreddedcabbage
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