This new Mexican restaurant here in town is delicious, but much more costly than your average Mexican place. We’re talking $20 a person for a drink and entree, as opposed to the usual $12.
But damnit, they have this one dish that is just INSANELY good. I’d love to know how to make it at home. Pepperjack enchiladas.
I don’t know how to make regular enchiladas, so these being different, I’m not sure what to do at all.
Ok, so, I get the carne asada ones and the steak seems pan fried, not grilled. Thin strips with a little bit of a savory kick, almost somewhat crispy around the edges. Yum yum.
Then it’s all wrapped up like an enchilada, but it’s served with a white pepperjack sauce instead of the red sauce I hate. Oh my GOD. So good.
Help?
This is the closest recipe to your description I could find, substituting carne asada for the ground beef of course:
Beef & Rice Enchiladas With Pepper-Jack Sauce
1/2 lb. ground beef
1/4 onion, diced
2 c. fully cooked brown or white rice
2 T. chili powder
1 T. cumin
2 t. salt
2 t. garlic powder
1/2 t. cayenne pepper
1/3 - 1/2 c. water
10 tortillas
2 T. butter or margarine
2 T. flour
1 c. milk
1 1/2 c. Pepper-Jack cheese, shredded or cubed
1/2 c. sour cream
-
Combine ground beef and onion in a large skillet. Cook completely and drain. Add rice and seasonings to the skillet. Stir in water. Bring water just to a boil and simmer just until absorbed, about 5 minutes.
-
Fill each tortilla with beef and rice mixture. Roll up and place in a 13x9 casserole dish.
-
In a small saucepan, melt butter or margarine over medium heat. Whisk in flour and cook for 2-3 minutes, stirring frequently. Whisk in milk, bring to a boil and cook until thickened. Remove from heat and stir in cheese. Continue stirring until cheese is completely melted. Stir in sour cream.
-
Pour sauce over tortillas and either cover and refrigerate or bake right away. Cook at 350 degrees for 20 minutes, until heat through and sauce is bubbly.
For the carne asada - those crispy edges are probably key to the flavor, too.
For the “spicy kick” you’ll need to play around with marinades. A very basic beef marinade we use in the Horseshoe household consists of about half soy sauce and half pineapple juice with a large amount of Worcestershire sauce.
Add a bunch of red pepper flakes and hot sauce, maybe some honey for balance, see if that does it.
I’d slice the meat, THEN put it in the marinade. More surface area to absorb the flavor.
Pat the meat dry with paper towels once it’s out of the marinade and ready to be cooked. Moist meat surface = steaming. Dry meat surface = browning. You want browning.
I recently got a cast-iron grill pan (it has ridges on the cooking surface, unlike a flat, smooth cast-iron skillet) and it’s great for quickly searing strips of beef. Cook the meat quickly, briefly, over as high a heat as possible without making too much smoke.
Hope that helps!
Oh God! Not to zombie-fie this thread (I don’t think it counts as that yet, right?), but I just realized I never replied! Boo!
Anyway, thank you so much for those ideas. Both sound wonderful, particularly the ideas about how to get the meat crisp on the edges. My friends keep saying the crispy meat sounds terrible, but I just keep telling them that they can’t understand until they try it!
I’m actually near an outlet mall that regularly has tons of cast iron pans, so I’ll pick one up. Should I get one with the grill lines on the bottom or am I better off with something flat?
The marinade also sounds great!
As does the idea for the cheese sauce- I wouldn’t have thought to mix in sour cream at all.