Part 2: The Whole Enchilada

The feeling I had and still have while making Chicken Pot Pie is one of love. I really, really enjoy the comfort and deliciousness this dish brings, and the gratification of pleasing my family so much. After feeling such a sense of accomplishment, I began to venture out and when I enjoyed food other people had created, ask them for the recipe. Some were taken off guard by  a fresh faced teenage girl asking for their recipe, but most were willing to give it up. I’m sure they thought, “Oh, she’s a young girl. She’ll never be able to make it as well as I do.” I remember one such instance at a church potluck.

A lady in our church made the best chicken enchiladas. Well, the best for a girl who’d never been to a Mexican restaurant, and Mexican night at home consisted of El Paso boxed taco kit and salad with salsa. So after enjoying these enchiladas many times at the church potluck I decided to ask her for the recipe. She quickly shot off the ingredients and the preparation of those ingredients in a fashion a normal 14 or 15 year old girl would never remember. I went quickly and wrote down all  I could remember and asked my mom to buy the ingredients. After meticulously assembling all the enchiladas and worrying nonstop, we sat down for our first family Mexican night without El Paso tacos. I was so concerned. What if it sucked? Maybe I should have made tacos too, just in case. Worse, what if it was terrible and my family pretended it was good? My worry dissapated as I took the first soft, gooey, cheesy bite of slightly spicy chicken enchilada. It was better than good–it was great!

Over the years I have drastically changed this enchilada recipe, so it is my very own. Not oh so long ago, my sister told me she found the original recipe. I didn’t even recognize it when she read it to me! Gone are the canned ingredients like cream of chicken soup and enchilada sauce, and I have long since said good bye to boiled and picked chicken breasts. The first changes came when I learned how to baste. Slow roasting and basting the legs and thighs gave the enchiladas so much more flavor and the meat was so much more moist. Then, learning how to make sauces (which is a section all unto itself!), and making my own cream sauce and cheese sauce.

And finally, the enchilada sauce. This was the most recent. I worked in a restaurant with a very nice Hispanic guy who made the best pico de gallo I have ever had. One day we were talking about cooking and our favorite foods, and I mentioned how I loved to make enchiladas. He asked me if I knew how to make my own sauce (which I didn’t), and proceeded to explain with his heavy accent how easy it was. Surprisingly–it was easy! And now my enchiladas are my friends favorite dinner to enjoy at my house. Now everyone looks forward to Mexican night-even though it lacks El Paso tacos.