Easy Chicken Enchilada
A super easy method for tasty chicken enchilada that the whole family will love.
Chicken enchiladas are one of our favorite family meals. They are easy to make, really versatile, and always a crowd pleaser. The way I make this most of the time is actually more of a layered casserole, or what some people will call Mexican lasagna, but we just call it enchiladas.
You can make this with any kind of meat you like, shredded chicken cooked in enchilada sauce is our favorite so that’s what you’ll see below, but I’ve done it plenty of times with pork or beef as well. It’s nice to mix it up. Or you can leave out the meat altogether and use black beans instead. Or just layer the sauces and cheese for cheese enchiladas.
My favorite way to make enchiladas is with my homemade mild enchilada sauce. You can make this of course with any favorite enchilada sauce from the store, but if you really want to make them in a way that your whole family is sure to love, you’ll want to start with my super easy mild enchilada sauce recipe. I came up with this recipe because I love enchiladas but my little kids weren’t fond of anything spicy, so I needed to come up with a flavorful sauce that wasn’t spicy. I love the results so much that I make it all the time, and even make extra to keep in the freezer.
After you’ve got your sauce, the next step for these amazing homemade enchiladas is to cook chicken in the enchilada sauce. This method of cooking chicken is one of my favorites and I make it probably twice a month. You can again do this with a canned sauce, I do it all the time, or you can use my homemade sauce. All you need to do is pile a bunch of chicken pieces, fresh or frozen, in your favorite cooking vessel, and cover them with enchilada sauce, and cook until the chicken is falling apart. You can do this in a pot on the stove, in a dutch oven or casserole dish in the oven, in the instant pot or a slow cooker. And as I mentioned above, you can use the same method with any cut of pork or beef. It’s a great way to use less expensive cuts of meat, as they need to cook longer to get really tender.
Now lets make enchiladas!
I rarely make “real” enchiladas with the filling rolled inside tortillas- all that rolling is just too time consuming for my lifestyle. You of course can do it that way, but I find this method much faster and easier and just as delicious.
What we make here is an enchilada casserole.
It's basically everything you would put in enchiladas, but layered in a casserole instead of rolled up.
Easy Enchilada Casserole Recipe
Easy Enchilada Casserole
A simple layered enchilada casserole that the whole family will love. Kid pleasing, and great for a crowd.
ingredients:
- 2 cups enchilada sauce
- 3 cups grated cheese (a blend of cheddar and monterey jack)
- Cooked meat: browned ground beef, or shredded enchilada chicken
- 2 cans cream soup (cream of mushroom, cream of celery, etc.), or about 2 cups homemade white sauce (optional)
- 1 can diced green chilis
- about 2 dozen corn tortillas
instructions:
This is a simple layered dish, and the ingredients are very flexible. Use your choice of cheeses (we often just buy a bag of shredded "Mexican blend" cheese.
Mix the green chilis in to the cream soup or white sauce if using, otherwise just spread them between the layers. Or leave them out.
We use a standard casserole dish.
Spread a bit of sauce on the bottom of the casserole dish to prevent sticking.
Cover sauce with a layer of corn tortillas. Break up tortillas to fill in any overlaps or gaps.
Top with meat, if using. Then sprinkle with cheese.
Repeat layers of tortilla, filling, sauce(s), cheese... until the dish is full.
Top with shredded cheese and bake at 350 for about an hour, until the whole thing is bubbly and cheese on top is browned.
This can also be done in a slow cooker. Follow directions the same as above, and cook for 4-6 hours on low until bubbly and melted.
Serve with sour cream, extra cheese, salsa, shredded lettuce, diced avocado & tomato.
Mild Enchilada Sauce Recipe
An easy mild enchilada sauce recipe that the whole family will love.
Scroll down for the printable recipe card
This easy mild enchilada sauce recipe is one of my most favorite original recipes.
Necessity is the mother of invention.
I love Mexican and Latin style foods and I love making them for my family. But my kids, being typical American kids, didn’t like sauces with any kind of spice at all. And it’s not easy to find a pre-made enchilada sauce that isn’t at all spicy but is still really flavorful. It seems like you either get spicy, or you get bland.
So I came up with my own enchilada sauce recipe. This is a kid friendly, family friendly, easy enchilada sauce recipe that the whole family will love.
It’s basically a flavored and spiced gravy - so if you know how to make a gravy, this will be super easy for you. It makes a big batch, and I often even double this, because it keeps well and it freezes easily.
This one is a long post because I’ve combined a few recipes into one. Below the Enchilada Sauce Recipe I’ve also include my recipes for how I make enchilada shredded chicken, and how I use that chicken and the enchilada sauce in my easy enchilada casserole.
Once I gave up on buying enchilada sauce for a while, I needed to come up with my own. After looking at a bunch of different recipes online, I decided to come up with my own version of a simple sauce that suits us just perfectly.
It's really flavorful and gives a nice southwest style flavor to dishes, but it's not spicy at all. I love to use this for enchiladas, or more often just an enchilada casserole, but it's also great for simmering chicken or other meat in, to shred up and use for tacos, burritos, salads, etc.
I make no claims about this being any kind of authentic - 'real' enchiladas would definitely have a sauce made of chilis. But we're not in Mexico and I'm not Mexican, so this is just my American girl version of this style of dish.
I also love that this doesn't require any special or unique ingredients - I can whip up a pot of this sauce very quickly with just ingredients that I pretty much always have in my pantry.
It seems like a lot of spices, and it is.
But what we're doing here is making up for the lack of spice from peppers by adding a lot of other flavor. And, as with all of my recipes, this one is super flexible. The quantities of spices are just a guideline, and honestly most of the time I don't even really measure. I recommend you start out with measuring, and then as you go along and make the sauce you taste it and you can add more spices as needed.
Not sure how to use this sauce? Try my favorite enchilada casserole recipe. This is a regular favorite on our family menu.
Recipe: Lisa's Homemade and NOT Spicy Enchilada Sauce
Mild Enchilada Sauce
An easy recipe for a very mild enchilada sauce that the whole family will love.
ingredients:
- 1 quart of chicken broth
- 1 15.5 oz can of tomato sauce
- 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
- 3/4 cup flour
- 2 teaspoons garlic powder
- 2 teaspoons onion powder
- 4 teaspoons cumin
- 2 teaspoons paprika
- 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
- salt, to taste
instructions:
Basically, you’re making a simple gravy with a butter & flour roux, and chicken broth + tomato sauce for the liquid, and spices added for flavor. Add all the spices (except salt) at the beginning with the butter and flour, so they toast a bit and get more flavorful. Then whisk in the liquid as usual, and taste to adjust seasoning.
- Put the butter, flour and all the spices except the salt in a medium stock pot over medium heat. Stir until the butter is all melted and you have a well blended paste.
- Once the butter and flour are well combined, slowly add your broth, whisking the whole time to avoid lumps.
- Then add the tomato sauce.
- Let it all simmer for about 10-15 minutes, not boiling, stirring frequently.
- Taste as you go and decide whether you think you like the flavor, or you want more garlic, or more chili powder, etc. I hold off on the salt until I have everything else combined, because the saltiness of any particular batch of chicken broth or tomato sauce can really vary. So get it all mixed up and then add salt if you feel like it needs it.
- This recipe is very flexible. The spice quantities are just a guideline and you should totally play with the amounts. If you actually want to make this spicy, add a little cayenne pepper, or a bunch more chili powder.
- You can also make this without the tomato sauce, I’ve had it that way and it’s great too - like an enchilada spiced gravy.
- This freezes great. This recipe makes more than you’ll need for one recipe of enchiladas. Set aside half and freeze for next time.
- Use vegetable broth to make a vegetarian sauce.
- Make it gluten free by using gluten free flour.
Moroccan Spiced Slow cooker Chicken
A super easy dump and forget it slow cooker recipe with amazing flavor.
There is a printable recipe card at the end of this post.
Recipe: Moroccan Spiced Slow Cooker Chicken with Chickpeas and Potatoes
Now that we are back in school and our days are getting really busy, I’ve been looking for more slow cooker recipes. There are more and more days when I need to be able to put dinner together earlier in the day because we are running around and on the go right up until dinner time. I don’t want to get home after all the pick-ups and drop-offs and still have to start cooking, so slow cooker meals are perfect for this busy season of life with kids.
This meal I’m sharing with you today started out as an experiment, when I couldn’t find an existing recipe that was really grabbing my attention so I just came up with something on my own that sounded good. And it was a definite success! Every now and then I come up with something that is an instant winner on the first try.
This recipe has everything you want in a slow cooker meal - it’s literally just layering the ingredients in the cooker, with no pre-cooking or browning required, very minimal prep (really just slicing some onion and roughly cutting a few potatoes), hands off cooking time, and amazing flavor. It does require having a couple of specialty ingredients already pre-made if you want this to come together fast, but fortunately they are items that I keep ready in my kitchen almost all the time and I highly recommend that you do too.
So here’s what’s in it:
canned garbanzo beans / chickpeas (with their liquid!)
onions
preserved lemons
moroccan spice blend
salt
yellow potatoes
frozen chicken thighs
When I first made this I debated about adding the potatoes but I’m so glad I did. They absorb so much wonderful flavor and get melt in your mouth soft and delicious.
The preserved lemons and moroccan spice blend are two items that require advance prep, but they are things I absolutely love for adding a huge punch of flavor to so many dishes. I always keep a jar of preserved lemons in my fridge, and when I mix up this moroccan spice blend I always make a lot so I have it ready for quick meals.
Preserved lemons are very easy to make. They are just lemons and salt, but the process that happens as the salt preserves the lemon creates a really one of a kind flavor that’s hard to substitute. It’s such an easy way to add a huge burst of flavor to your dishes that I highly recommend you make some to keep on hand. I have a short little post about them here, and you can find plenty more online. This is one that you don’t have to be super precise about it, you are basically just layering lemons and salt in a jar. When I make these I like to leave them out on the counter for the first few weeks to let them do their magic, and then I store in the refrigerator. Because you are eating the whole lemon rind when you use this, it is nice if you can find organic lemons, but if you can’t then I just recommend that you wash your lemons first. Most recipes tell you to scrape away the pulp of the lemon before using the preserved lemon peel, but I almost never bother doing that. I love the extra flavor that the pulp adds to my dishes.
My Moroccan inspired spice blend is a version I’ve developed after trying several different recipes I found. This version packs a big punch of flavor without making foods spicy hot, which my kids don’t like. I’m always trying new ways of adapting spices for recipes to capture flavor without heat and this one really fits that requirement perfectly. It’s become one of my favorite go-to seasonings. It’s amazing on all kinds of meats as well as roasted vegetables.
How to make this Moroccan Spiced Slow Cooker Chicken with Chickpeas and Potatoes.
First you’ll want to slice your onions and cut your potatoes into big chunks. It’s good to leave the potatoes relatively large so they hold up to the long cooking time that the frozen chicken needs. If the potatoes are on the smaller side you might even leave them whole. I used yellow potatoes here because I like the hint of sweetness they add and I think they hold their shape better with longer cooking, but feel free to use your favorite kind. You could also decide to add the potatoes in a bit later, but I love all the flavor they absorb and how soft they get in the longer cooking time, and I wanted this to be a dump and walk away kind of recipe, not one you have to come back to and add things.
In your slow cooker you are just going to layer all the ingredients. Start with the canned chickpeas and their liquid. This part is important. You need some liquid to get that slow cooking process going, and the liquid from the can of garbanzo beans is full of flavor you don’t want to waste. So don’t drain - just pour the whole can in there. If you accidentally drain that liquid then you will need to add a little water or broth. On top of that place sliced onions, chunks of potato, then several pieces of preserved lemon, and then the spice mix. Then I put the frozen chicken thighs on top of all that and more spices. Cover and cook.
Quantities and cooking time are in the detailed recipe card below. As with all of my recipes though, the quantities don’t have to be exact. Feel free to use more or less of any ingredient and customize to your liking. If your chicken isn’t frozen you’ll want to cook this for less time. You could certainly also do this with bone-in thighs, or with breasts, and I’m sure it would be equally delicious. I also think this would be amazing as a vegetarian dish leaving out the chicken altogether and just using more beans and potatoes and maybe even adding other veggies like cauliflower. The frozen chicken adds a lot of moisture, so if you aren’t using that then you’ll probably want to add a half cup or so of broth or water.
I served this over couscous with a dollop of plain yogurt, but we also ate it leftover both just by itself and over some leftover pasta. It was amazing no matter how it was served, and only got better after it sat in the fridge overnight.
I hope you enjoy and let me know if you try it.
Moroccan Spiced Slow Cooker Chicken Thighs with Garbanzo Beans and Potatoes
Ingredients
Instructions
Notes
Feel free to adapt any of the ingredients to your preference - more or less of any ingredient will work out just fine. If you choose to use fresh instead of frozen chicken you will want to cook this for shorter time, I suggest about 3 hours. See the original post on whatlisacooks.com for more suggestions and notes.
Simple Poached Chicken + Garlic Broth
Poached chicken often gets a bad rap. A lot of people think it's bland and flavorless. But it doesn't have to be that way. I think poached chicken can be a kitchen lifesaver. You may have heard me say before that I always have cooked chicken in my fridge. There are so many quick and delicious meals you can make in just a few minutes if you already have cooked chicken. I often will roast chickens and pick the meat off, but if I haven't gotten around to doing that and I want some cooked chicken to use for a recipe (or just to eat!), then poaching is my next best go-to.
Poached chicken often gets a bad rap. A lot of people think it's bland and flavorless. But it doesn't have to be that way. I think poached chicken can be a kitchen lifesaver. You may have heard me say before that I always have cooked chicken in my fridge. There are so many quick and delicious meals you can make in just a few minutes if you already have cooked chicken. I often will roast chickens and pick the meat off, but if I haven't gotten around to doing that and I want some cooked chicken to use for a recipe (or just to eat!), then poaching is my next best go-to.
Poached chicken doesn't have to be bland or dry. I think the mistake most people make when poaching chicken, or when cooking chicken in just about any other method as well, is not enough salt. I was looking around the web at a few poached chicken recipes just to see how other people do it, and I was shocked at how little (or no!) salt most people use. Yuck. Of course you're going to end up with chicken that tastes like nothing. Chicken needs salt. It just does.
I needed some chicken today for the enchiladas I am planning to make for dinner tonight. So I poached some and thought while I was at it I would share with you how I do it. By adding some extra ingredients to the pot, not only do you get a more flavorful piece of chicken, but you also get a really delicious light broth.
My ingredients are just a guideline - you can put in whatever you like for flavoring, but this is just what I had handy today. Other veggies would be great, or parsley, or other herbs. I used green onions because I had them and I like the flavor, but a quarter of a yellow or white onion will work fine too. Add whatever flavors you like. Just don't skimp on the salt.
Here are the basic ingredients I used today:
1 carrot, broken in a couple pieces
1 stalk celery, cut in half
2 green onions, trimmed
1 1/2 T salt
1 T (about 3 cloves) crushed garlic, or more
a splash of white wine
2 chicken breasts
3 -4 cups of water - enough to fully cover the chicken in the pot
Put everything but the chicken in a medium stock pot and bring to a slight boil. Taste it. Your poaching liquid should taste salty. Not like drinking a mouthful of ocean water salty, but maybe slightly saltier than you would want a good broth to be - the chicken is going to absorb a lot of the salt and will leave your broth tasting just right. If the liquid doesn't taste salty, then add a little more salt.
Gently place your chicken breasts in the broth, making sure they are fully covered. If they aren't fully covered, add a little more hot water, or more wine. Now simmer for 10-15 minutes, depending on the thickness of the chicken. The pieces I got today were from some kind of mutant monster chicken - they were super thick, so I cooked them for 15 minutes. But small breasts might only need 10 minutes.
When you think they are done, take them out of the pot to rest. The way I tell if chicken is done is by pressing on it. If it really gives and feels very soft still, then it's not cooked, so put it back for a few more minutes. But if you press in the middle and it feels fairly firm, then it's done. This method requires a bit of practice and trial and error, but after you do it a few times you will get a sense for what a cooked piece of meat should feel like. I really try to avoid cutting into meat to check for doneness - that lets all the juices out and you end up with a very dry piece of meat. If you think it's cooked enough, then let it rest for about 10 minutes on a plate. It will finish cooking a little, and stay much more juicy.
Now you can slice or dice the chicken to use in salads or on sandwiches. Or you can pull it apart into shreds for a soup or a casserole. The lightly flavored broth makes the basis for a delicious mild soup, or it's wonderful to just drink a cup on a rainy afternoon. You can also use it again - I actually added two more chicken breasts to my pot and cooked them in the same liquid, so now my broth has more chicken flavor. I will be using some of it as a base for a spiced tomato gravy that I use in my enchiladas, and the rest I will probably just drink.
Weeknight Lemon Dijon Chicken Thighs
This is my favorite weeknight chicken recipe. I've made this for years without a recipe, but the last time I made it I finally took the time to scribble down what I put in it, and take a few pictures for you. It's so easy, once you've made it you don't really need a recipe.
Hands down my favorite way to cook chicken. It's so easy. This recipe has instructions for the oven below, but you can also let this marinade and then throw them on the grill for a summer dinner. I do them for about 7 minutes each side over medium heat. Use the leftover marinade to baste them a couple times on each side.
This is my favorite weeknight chicken recipe. I've made this for years without a recipe, but the last time I made it I finally took the time to scribble down what I put in it, and take a few pictures for you. It's so easy, once you've made it you don't really need a recipe.
The quantities are just a guideline - it really doesn't matter how much of each thing you add. It's all good.
Ingredients:
3-4 pounds chicken thighs (you can use other pieces as well, but thighs are my favorite)
1/2 cup white wine (and a little extra for the cook)
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice (and the squeezed lemon halves)
1 teaspoon salt, and a little more to sprinkle on top
a heaping tablespoon dijon mustard
1 teaspoon (or more) crushed or chopped garlic
fresh round pepper, to taste
Directions:
Preheat oven to 400.
Put chicken pieces in zip top plastic bag. Add all the rest of the ingredients. Don't for get to add the pieces of lemon that you squeezed, they add great flavor. Close the bag securely and just massage it all around so it's well mixed and the chicken is well coated. If you have time, let this sit for an hour or more. If not, that's fine too. When you are ready to cook, just dump it all in a casserole dish or other oven safe pan. I like to sprinkle a little more salt on top, because I love that salty, crispy skin.
Cook for 35-45 minutes - depending on how hot your oven is (mine runs a little cold) - until all the juice looks clear and cooked (no red or pink juices from the chicken), and the skin is nicely browned. The nice thing about thighs is that it's harder to overcook them, you have to really overcook them in order for them to not be good. Also cooking with all this marinade helps too, it really keeps them juicy. If you decide to do this with white meat you will need to watch it more closely.
I like to serve this with some white rice or plain pasta on the side. The juices from the chicken, combined with the lemon juice, wine, and mustard, make the most amazing and delicious sauce, so you really don't need to do anything else. Steam a veggie or make a quick salad, and you have a super easy weeknight dinner.
After you're done - don't throw out those bones! Take the meat off the bones and save, and dump everything else that's left into a pot, cover with water, and simmer for a couple hours until you have broth. It's the most amazing lemony flavored broth and it is perfect for making soup.
Chicken nugget meatballs
A few weeks ago I had an idea to make some simple chicken meatballs. Most of my kids will eat meatballs, so it's usually a good easy weeknight meal for us. With some pasta and a salad, we've got a good dinner and it isn't much work. But I wanted to lighted them up a bit this time, so I thought I'd make them with chicken instead of my usual combination of beef & pork (or frozen!).
And in doing so, something magical happened...
I mixed these up and started browning them, and tasted one. I realized that it tasted an awful lot like a chicken nugget (in a good way!). I have one super picky child who eats nothing, but chicken nuggets are on her very short list.
So I asked her if she would be willing to taste this thing I just made that tastes just like a chicken nugget.
She agreed. And she liked it! I was giddy!
If you have an extreme picky eater, then you understand the joy you feel when you discover something they will eat that is homemade and relatively healthy.
I've made homemade chicken nuggets before, but it seemed so labor intensive that I didn't do it again. They had to be shaped like nuggets, and rolled in breading - a lot of work for nuggets. But for these I just used a cookie scoop to get the rough balls, and then finished rolling and dropped in a pan with some oil. I think because they had bread crumbs in the mix then they had a feeling of a crust, without having to actually crust them. It was easy and quick!
My original plan had been to plop all of these in a pot of sauce to finish cooking, but since she liked them I decided to not do that. I instead cooked them through and then put in a couple of oven proof dishes. I kept one dish of them plain, and the other I topped with sauce & cheese - so it had a bit of a chicken parmesan taste to it.
This is definitely one of those guideline type of recipes. This is the approximate ingredients that I used, but these quantities are not mandatory and really it's more of an eyeball type thing.
Ingredients:
- ground white meat chicken - around 2 pounds
- Italian style seasoned bread crumbs - a cup or so
- eggs - 2 or 3
- garlic powder - a teaspoon or so
- onion powder - a teaspoon or so
- fresh ground pepper
- oil for cooking
Directions:
Mix all ingredients together except the oil. The consistency should be bit like dough - you should be able to form it into shape without it falling apart or seeming too wet. It's the combination of bread crumbs + eggs that help hold this together. If your mixture seems too wet, add a bit more bread crumbs. Too dry, add another egg.
Generally for this kind of thing it's a good idea to cook a little bit to taste and check for seasoning before you cook the whole lot. Seasoned bread crumbs can often have a lot of salt in them, so I wouldn't salt this much if at all until you've tasted. Pinch off a bit and put it in a hot pan to cook, and then taste. Then add salt as needed. Then when you are happy with the seasoning you can shape into meatballs. I use a small cookie scoop, drop the scooped bit into my hands, finish shaping into a ball, and then put in my pan.
Brown on all sides in a pan with a bit of vegetable oil over medium heat. They likely won't be cooked all the way through, so you'll need to either turn down your heat and cook for another 5-10 minutes, or you can put them in the oven at 350 for 10-15 minutes.
You could also cook these from star to finish in the oven - I'd do a foil lined baking sheet, at 350 for probably 20-30 minutes.
We had ours with sauce & pasta. They'd be great just dipped in ketchup too.
Enjoy!