Make your own Enchilada Sauce

Traditionally enchiladas are made with corn tortillas, but there's no reason you can't use tortillas de harina instead. In fact, for many who grew up north of the border, Tex-Mex style enchiladas with flour tortillas are what they grew up on. And here's a hot tip... don't put enchilada sauce in the bottom of the pan or your tortillas will get too soggy... only sauce the top of the enchiladas for flavor.

And why not make your own enchilada sauce... it's easy and better than pre-made store bought sauce:

Salsa para Enchiladas (Enchilada Sauce):

8 dried California chiles
Water
1 1/2 Tablespoons lard or vegetable oil
1 Garlic Clove
1 Tablespoon flour
1 tsp vinegar
3/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp dried leaf oregano - crushed
1/4 tsp ground cumin
1/8 tsp garlic powder

Wash chiles thoroughly. Place in a large saucepan and cover generously with water. Cover and bring to a boil. Remove from heat and let stand 45 minutes or until softened. Drain chiles, reserving soaking liquid. Pull of stems, slit chiles open and rinse out seeds. Place chiles and 1 cup of soaking liquid in blender for food processor. Process until pureed. Turn into a sieve and rub through sieve into bowl to eliminate small bits of peel. Rinse blender with an additional 1 cup of soaking liquid and pour over remaining pulp in sieve. Heat lard or oil and garlic in a medium saucepan. When lard or oil is fragrant with garlic, discard garlic clove. Stir in flour until mixture is smooth. Cook about 1 minute. Add pureed chile mixture and remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil; reduce heat. Cook and stir until slightly thickened. Taste and add more salt if needed. Makes about 1-1/3 cups sauce.

Variations:
-For a hotter sauce, substitute 2-3 dried New Mexico chiles for 2-3 of the California chiles
-Substitute 1/2 to 1 cup broth for an equal amount of chile soaking liquid (will reduce spicy heat of sauce)
-Substitute 1/2 cup tomato juice or sauce for 1/2 cup of the soaking liquid (will reduce spicy heat of sauce)

We said the above recipe was easy, and it is, but if you don't have dried chiles or the time to soak them, we'd like to share an equally easy, but much simpler and quicker version of homemade enchilada sauce.

Salsa de Chile en Polvo (Chili Powder Sauce)

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
2 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/4 cup mild or California red chili powder
2 cups beef broth
2 (10.5oz) cans tomato puree
1/2 teaspoon dried leaf oregano, crushed
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
Salt

Heat oil in a large saucepan. Stir in flour and cook 1 minute. Stir in chili powder. Add beef broth, tomato puree, oregano, cumin and garlic powder. Taste and add salt if needed. Simmer 15 minutes. Makes about 4 and 2/3rd's cups of sauce... enough for 12 enchiladas