Friday 14 May 2010

THE DARING COOKS MAY, 2010 CHALLENGE: STACKED GREEN CHILE & GRILLED CHICKEN ENCHILADAS


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.

When I first read the details of this challenge I honestly did not think that it would be all that challenging (this months daring bakers has been the one giving me nightmares!). How little did I know. My first challenge was sourcing ingredients. The only tomatillos that I could find ANYWHERE were the tinned variety. As i have never seen these before let alone used them in my cooking I was not certain that these would suffice, but I did not really have much of a choice. The next challenge was the chillis to use for teh green chilli sauce. Nowhere I hunted had large, no-so-hot green chillis of the type described in the recipe and in all my online research I could not find any alternatives locally available. So I had to get creative with the ingredients.


I also thought that I'd make my own tortillas which was not a requirement but I thought would be fun (ha!) and not that hard (ha ha!). This, was a disaster, to say the very least. The first batch were a total write off and the 2nd batch were barly passable because we were so tired by that stage that we did not much care what we were going to eat as long as we could eat and then go to bed! I don;'t know whether it was my lack of tortilla pan that was the issue or some part of my dough-mixing technique but the tortillas did not look pretty and they tasted barely edible.


But, it was a good laugh so I can't really grumble. My chilli sauce ended up being a red chilli enchilada sauce rather than a green one due to the (un)availability of ingredients but it had a good flavour and packed quite a kick which went really well with the chicken, tortillas and cheese (although I ran out of cheese so had none left to put on the top). I also made mango salsa and guacamole to go with the enchiladas as no mouthful of enchilada is complete without them. My final verdict? I do love a good enchilada, but (and I know its complete and utter sacrilege) I may stick to the Old El Paso kits in future!


Or at least that is how I was feeling at 9pm after making overly hot chilli sauce, bizarre tasting mole sauce and the ugliest tortillas that I have ever seen. Honestly, I will probably attempt these guys again some time, maybe when I have a whole day to spare and not feeling under the week-day pressure. I may resort to store-bought tortillas though as mine were just too horrendous for words.  That will teach me to underestimate the challenge of a DC challenge!


I am now determined that next month will be better and I will NOT underestiamte the challenge and I WILL make a sucess of it!

10 comments:

  1. I also made corn tortillas without a press - they were not round at all, but tasted great. Did you use the special tortilla corn flour (masa harina)? Couldn't find fresh tomatillos here, either, so I used canned ones, but I thought the sauce was great. But I agree, finding the right chile peppers was quite an adventure - actually, I wasn't able to find anything but peperoncini. But still, everything was delicious!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Loved reading your post - lol. Sorry it was a struggle for you. Your mango salsa and guacamole are the perfect toppings. Thanks for cooking along with us.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Even though you had a difficult start,you came through. Great job and this sure looks delicious.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Glad you stuck through it through the unexpected challenges! I would definitely give some of the aspects another go, if you enjoyed it overall, because who knows how they'll turn out next time... And I agree that sourcing the ingredients was one of the biggest challenges of this challenge! Your mango salsa and guacamole look fantastic, by the way. Excellent job on the challenge.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Thanks for your comments and support everyone! These things do not always go smoothly but I certainly always learn something which makes it all worth it! :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. WOW wonderful that you did the challenge even with so many setbacks and great to learn that you learnt a few tricks along the way. Nice looking red sauce and the avocado dip looks gorgeous. Cheers from Audax in Sydney Australia.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Well, if it all went smoothly it wouldn't be a challenge, right? :-) Sorry the tortillas gave you such a hard time but your sauce, salsa and guac look delicious!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Wow! What an adventure you had! i think they look good, despite all the challenges. Did you end up using the tomatillos? Thanks for sharing all the photos--it's actually refreshing to see one that's not perfect! p.s. the DB challenge isn't revealed till the 27th, so best to remove the name of it!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Despite the challenges your enchiladas look great - and believe me, I sympathize with the tortilla disaster! I managed to make them for the challenge, but I've had a few disasters of my own in the past!

    ReplyDelete
  10. I have come to really appreciate the Daring Cooks that come hook or crook still put out the challenge recipe regardless of the obstacles.

    If I had to guess, I think your tortilla dough was too dry. They are still rather wet when you roll them out. Still your meal does look delicious.

    ReplyDelete