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Homemade Enchilada Sauce
Step away from the store bought enchilada sauce. I repeat, step away from the store bought enchilada sauce 🤪 All jokes aside enchilada sauce is WAY too easy not to make. It’s great to prep ahead of time and I bet you’ve already got half the ingredients on hand.
Red Enchilada Sauce
Enchilada sauce typically comes in the ‘red’ or ‘green’ variety. Today we’re going red. To make the base of the sauce you’re essentially making a roux, which will help thicken the sauce. However instead of using your regular butter, flour and milk, you’ll use oil, flour and stock.
Tomato Puree
I.e. Tomato Paste. This will not only give you that gorgeous colour, but it also offers a nice base flavour for the sauce. One tip is to ensure you fry off the tomato puree. This will take the ‘bite’ out of it and ever-so-slightly sweeten it. So, once you stir the flour into the oil, stir in the tomato puree and fry before whisking in the stock.
Chilli Powder
This gives the bulk of the flavour. You can easily work to your spice preference and just add in as much as you’d like. Just absolutely make sure it’s regular mild chilli powder NOT cayenne pepper. Process shots: heat oil (photo 1), stir in flour (photo 2), add tomato puree (photo 3), stir into paste (photo 4), gradually whisk in stock (photo 5), add seasoning (photo 6), simmer until able to coat the back of a spoon (photo 7).
Ground Beef Enchilada Filling
The beef filling again is very simple. I usually go for beef that’s around 5% fat – that way it doesn’t leak out too much fat and make the enchiladas oily. Alongside the beef and spices, I throw in some red pepper, onion and garlic and some of the enchilada sauce to keep the filling nice and juicy!
What else can I add to the beef filling?
To make them extra spicy you could add jalapeños, to bulk everything out a bit more consider adding black beans. Process shots: fry pepper, onion and garlic in oil (photo 1), add beef (photo 2), break up and brown (photo 3), stir in seasoning (photo 4).
How to wrap enchiladas
Refried beans
These will not only add flavour, they’ll not only stop the filling from drying out, but they’ll all keep everything in tact. I highly recommend adding these – you’ll find them in most mainstream stores.
Cheese
Because why only put cheese on top of enchiladas when you can stuff cheese through the centre? 🤣 Here I sprinkle a pinch of Mexican/Spicy cheese blend in the centre, you know, just to be extra. Process shots: lay tortilla flat and spread with refried beans (photo 1), add beef (photo 2), add cheese (photo 3), roll (photo 4).
Baked Beef Enchiladas
To kick things off you’ll want to pour around 1/4 of your enchilada sauce into the base of the dish. You’ll also want to pour a little in between each enchilada and between the outside enchiladas and the pan, just to stop everything from sticking together. From there it’s just a case of pouring over the rest of your sauce, sprinkling over infinite amounts of cheese and popping in the oven until golden and delicious.
What cheese to use for enchiladas?
In reality you can use most ‘melty’ cheeses. As mentioned earlier, I use spicy cheese blend in the centre, and here I top with cheddar. Monterey Jack also works nicely! Process shots: pour sauce in dish (photo 1), stuff in enchiladas (photo 2), pour over more sauce (photo 3) top with cheese and bake (photo 4).
Serving Beef Enchiladas
Once they’re fresh out the oven I go in with a good sprinkling of fresh coriander/cilantro. From there I usually serve individual portions with the following toppings:
Sour Cream Avocado Tomato Spring Onion Lime Wedges (optional)
Can I prep these ahead of time?
I don’t recommend prepping them fully because they’ll go soggy, but you can definitely make the sauce and roll the enchiladas in advance, which actually make up the bulk of prep!
And there we have it! All my top tips for the most glorious ground beef enchiladas. If you’re after more ground beef Tex Mex recipes check out my Ground Beef Tacos and Ground Beef Quesadillas! For more similar recipes check out these beauties too:
Delicious Tex Mex Recipes
Chicken Fajita Nachos Sweet Potato Black Bean Quesadillas Chipotle Chicken Taquitos Mini Burrito Tortilla Cups ALL TEX MEX RECIPES
Alrighty, let’s tuck into the full recipe for these beef enchiladas shall we?!
How to make Beef Enchiladas (Full Recipe & Video)
