The perfect Enchiladas

I just had these last night and I was not planning on making this a recipe, since I had never made them before. I have to rave about these though! It takes a bit of time, but these enchiladas are much tastier than the boring wraps I've been making for months.

I do not have pictures of every step of the way, but it's pretty simple. I made these dish for 4 people which means 2 enchiladas each. I served them with some lettuce, sour cream and some guacemole I made myself. We were all pretty full by the time we were done so you should be good with 2 each.

Let's get started. Grab a pot and fill it with water. Make it boil and then add the chicken. How long it needs to boil depends on your chicken. Are you using big chicken fillets? Make them boil for about 10 minutes. I used some diced chicken, which I cooked for 10 minutes but it was not necessary. 8 would have been ok too. Keep stirring every now and then.

In the meantime, grab a pan and fill it with olive oil. Add some capsicum and stir it around for about 2 minutes. Then add your onion and garlic (everything diced of course!) When that's all done add your can of diced tomatoes. I felt it wasn't enough and I blended up two big tomatoes as well and it added it to the sauce. 

By the time I had done all that, my chicken was done. I put the chicken on a plate to cool off for about five minutes. Back to the sauce! I stirred that around for a couple of minutes and then added the kidney beans and corn. Make sure you don't add the liquid from those cans. I never really like that! So drain well.

Stir it around for a couple of minutes on low heat. I wanted to pick apart my chicken with a fork but it did not really work out. Lazy as I am, I grabbed my blender and just blended up the chicken. Yep, sounds weird but worked surprisingly well. Then I put it back on the plate.

Then it was time to preheat my oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Then I grabbed an oven dish and my tortillas. The sauce was done so I grabbed a tortilla, dipped it in my sauce and made sure some of the sauce went on each side of the tortilla. This took me about 20 seconds each. All of the veggies in the sauce fell off, but that was fine. Then I put the tortilla on the plat, put some sauce on it (with the veggies!) and then also put some chicken on it. Then I folded the tortilla and put it in the oven dish. Repeat until all the tortilla are sitting in the dish, nice and snug.

If all is well, you will have some of the sauce left and you can drizzle that on the tortillas in the oven dish. Then top with some fresh coriander/cilantro. Finally, grab some cheese to top it off with. Then put it in the oven for about 15-20 minutes. Mine went in for about 18.

I hope you'll enjoy this as much as I did. It's pretty straightforward, but you'll still be in the kitchen for a little bit.

Ingredient list (serves 4)

- 8 tortilla wraps

- 2 chicken fillets or about 300 grams of diced chicken

- 1 red capsicum/bell pepper

- 1 onion

- 1 garlic clove

- 2 big tomatoes

- 1 can of diced tomatoes

- 1 can of corn

- 1 can of kidney beans

- 2 tablespoons of chilli powder or other herbs you like

- some fresh cilantro/coriander

- cheese

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Goat's cheese portobello with creamy pasta

I assure you, this might look difficult to make but it's absolutely not. It's not very low-fat but oh so delicious. It's also a dish you can really adjust to your own tastes. Leave some ingredients out if you want, or add some! This dish combines all of my fasvourite ingredients together: tomatoes, onions, mushrooms and goat's cheese. It's easy to make but looks fancy enough to serve to guests as well.

I made this recipe for four people, and they all seemed to really enjoy it. The key ingredient here is the portobello mushroom. Most supermarkets in my country did not seem to sell these. When I finally stumbled upon them after searching for them for months I was in mushroom heaven. They're very delicious and nice to fill up and throw in the oven.

That is also what you need to start with here. Grab your portobello mushroom(s) and make sure all dirt is removed. Do not and I repeat DO NOT rinse these mushrooms with water. They will soak up the water and that's not what we want. Put the mushrooms on a tray. Make sure you boil some water for your pasta and preheat the oven (about 200 C/400 F).

Now we're going to make the mushroom filling. Grab whatever goat's cheese you prefer, I added goat's cheese with honey. Mash it in the bowl a little bit. This could also go well with other soft cheeses such as roquefort or some other nice blue cheese. Then, chop up a small onion (I used a Spanish onion) and throw it into the mix as well. Add a diced tomato and dice up some sundried tomatoes. Add some pine nuts and a chopped up garlic clove. Next, add some olive oil and some parsley. Many people dislike parsley and I'm sure basil could have worked too. Remember to just adjust the recipe to your preferences. Finally, you should add some peper and a few tablespoons of cream to make the mixture a bit more moist and to bind the ingredients together. Not to mention, cream is simply delicious.

Back to the mushrooms. Brush a little bit of olive oil on them and then put the mixture in them with a spoon. Then grill the mushrooms in a preheated oven. They should be ready in about 10-15 minutes depending on the oven. Make sure to check up on them often.

Now it's time to boil some of your favourite pasta. I chose seashells here because I think they look a little bit more exciting than just penne of spaghetti. Make sure to add some salt to the water too.

Now, in a different pan cook up some cream and add a little bit of the leftover goat's cheese. I also added some extra diced tomatoes and some salt and pepper. This mixture should be ready within 4 minutes. When the pasta is ready, stir it through the sauce. You don't need much sauce as the mushrooms have a lot of flavour already.

When your mushrooms are ready, take them out of the oven. Now grab your plates and serve the pasta on each plate with a mushroom on top. I added some extra chives, but that is completely optional. I hope you'll enjoy this as much as I did!


Ingredient list (serves 4):

- 4 portobello mushrooms
- 200 gram goat's cheese for mushroom filling + 100 gram for the sauce
- about 250 ml of cream (about 70 for the mushroom filling, the rest for the sauce)
- 2 handuls of pine nuts
- 2 large tomatoes
- about 4 sundried tomatoes
- small onion
- 1 garlic clove
- some parsley
- olive oil
- salt
- pepper
- seashell pasta

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