I live in Chicago, there aren’t more than a couple million Mexicans here. I am describing how I make delicious food in my kitchen, not applying for certification from the Mexican Culinary Institute for Prescriptivist Dorks.
I was trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. If any place, certified or not, served me “enchiladas” with salsa instead of enchilada sauce, I would ask for a refund. It would be akin to putting salsa on spaghetti and calling it marinara sauce.
Thanks for this. I’m planning to finally make these for dinner tonight, and I want to recreate as fully as possible the traditional original Taco Bell Enchirito. I checked three copycat enchirito recipes and they all call for refried beans and not sour cream, so that’s how I’m going to make mine. Oh, and I’m going to season the ground beef. I didn’t pick up any Old El Paso taco seasoning, just the enchilada sauce, so I’ll make my own taco seasoning. I should probably try to find a copycat recipe for Taco Bell style seasoning…
ETA: I found three Taco Bell copycat seasoning recipes online (I like to triangulate when I’m trying a copycat recipe). They are all pretty much the same, and not too different than how I would normally season my taco meat. Looks like all systems go for enchiritos.
So I made the enchiritos yesterday. Were they tasty? Sure. Were they reminiscent of the Taco Bell enchirito flavor I remember from days gone by? I…don’t think so. I think it may have been the Old El Paso enchilada sauce I used. I didn’t expect it to be like authentic enchilada sauce, I expected it to be similar to whatever Taco Bell used back in the day. But it was even more insipid and flavorless than I expected. I think whatever Taco Bell used for their sauce was, not exactly spicier, but.. a little-- zestier? I don’t know 
OK, so here’s the last thing I’m going to say on enchiritos-- I had the leftovers for an early lunch just now, and, maybe overnight in the fridge to merge the flavors helped, or maybe I wasn’t judging with such high expectations of recreating a flavor of my youth, but I think, just now, it did taste more like my memory of an old fashioned Taco Bell enchirito. A little added hot sauce helped. And I think I was too hard on my judgement of the Old El Paso enchilada sauce in my last post-- it does kind of have the ‘taste of 1979’ as @AHunter3 put it so well.
Thanks @AHunter3 ! I’m adding this recipe to my comfort food collection. I think it’s also the perfect dish for potlucks!
Anyhow, I don’t think I ever had an original TB enchirito, so I didn’t feel too much like a desecrator when I made a few modifications to your recipe. I had a pound of ground Italian sausage in the freezer, so I used that in place of ground beef. There was also a 1/2 a package of Southwest style vegetables in the same freezer, so I threw them in too, plus a small can of diced green chiles I found in the cupboard. The addition of these vegetables instantly converts TB junk food into A Healthy Meal, right?
Everything else was “by the book.” I had 1-1/2 enchiritos for dinner and froze the rest. They were very tasty! The sausage had a milder flavor than beef, and I think beef would have been better. But I’d really like to try shredded chicken (did TB offer a chicken version?)
I used Old El Paso enchilada sauce, but it was a bit tame for my taste. Do other brands have a little more kick?
You know, Taco Bell sells its seasoning in packets at the grocery store.
Anyway, on the topic of enchilada sauce, the kind I grew up eating at 'Berto’s style taco shops in San Diego was almost entirely red chiles and water thickened with roux, with little if any tomato in it. It’s got a consistency a little thinner than gravy and it tends to be a dark reddish-orange and slightly bitter. I’ve never found a good copycat recipe for it.
Personally, I like the Hatch enchilada sauce. Not sure how widely available it is though. They offer a “medium” version of their red that has a lot more flavor than Old El Paso.
505 red enchilada sauce is my favorite brand, but the store I work at discontinued it a few years back and it’s hard to find around here.
It’s good for making New Mexico-style enchiladas - the kind with soft-fried corn tortillas stacked three or four high, with cheese and onion (and optionally meat) in between, smothered in sauce, and topped with a fried egg.
Planning on making one of those for dinner later tonight, actually.
FTR, the enchirito is back at Taco Bell for a limited time. I just picked one up. Same delicious saucy cheesy junk as it ever was.
No olives! Taco Bell is cheaping out.
I don’t think they’ve had olives on anything in like 25+ years at this point. And I don’t like 'em anyway, so good riddance.
That was my first reaction to the pic too. It’s got to have black olives! I will have to either bring my own, or order takeout and add the olives at home. But thanks to Smapti for alerting us to the return of the enchirito.
Yeah, without black olives, it’s just not an enchirito, IMO.
Checking out Taco Bell’s online menu, it looks like the Mexican pizza is also back for a limited time. Judging by the picture on their website, it also appears to also lack olives. It used to have olives, too, right? I haven’t had one since college, but I remember them having olives.
Darn it, now I quiero Taco Bell.
Ok, this post made me do it – I went to Taco Bell for lunch today. Got an Enchirito and a Cantina Veg Mexican Pizza.
The Enchirito was a big pile of gooey, cheesy goodness. Since I got it to-go I considered opening a can of olives, but I decided against it. The olives seemed like more of a garnish, anyway, and I don’t think it really needs them. But I don’t think I ever had the original version, so I don’t have any sort of nostalgia for them (We didn’t have Taco Bell in our area when I was a kid, so I never really ate there until I was in high school, at which point I’m guessing it was already gone from the menu).
The Mexican Pizza, however, is something I feel nostalgia for. This one was ok, but it was definitely not the Mexican Pizza I remember from my college days. The old version, as I recall, had a layer of ground beef and refried beans. This version has a layer of black beans, and optionally chicken (which I did not get). This version is probably healthier, which is probably what they were going for, but I prefer the old version. Maybe I should have tried it with one of the sauce packets it came with. I just ate it without any sauce.
I made Enchiritos, following more or less the original post.
They were fine. I’m not sure I remember the real thing well enough to get real excited about it
How dare you 
Now here’s someone who gets it!
So I finally scored my own enchirito for lunch today. I was somewhat disappointed with the relative lack of cheesy saucy smothering, and the overall wimpy size of it, especially compared to the pics @Smapti and @WildaBeast shared. But I have to admit it was pretty tasty, and did ping the ol’ nostalgia meter just a little bit.
And yes, I got it as takeout, took it home and added my own damn black olives! Shame on you, Taco Bell, for neglecting the olives!
I hadn’t eaten at Taco Bell for a year or two, but I went a couple of days ago to get an enchirito and added my own olives. But mine was drenched in sauce and cheese. I would have sent the one in the picture above back and told them to try again. How pathetic.
Yeah, I should have looked at it before I drove off. Oh well.