Spinach and mushroom enchiladas with tomatillo sauce

I've only been to Mexico once, and it wasn't what I'd consider a "real" travel experience. I went to a conference in Cancun with my husband. He was a keynote speaker and the conference organizers had offered to bring the spouses of the main speakers to the conference all-expenses paid. At first I declined the invitation, not being a fan of large resorts in artificial settings, but then I had a last minute change of heart, and decided it would be more weird to not go than to go. After all, it was January and cold here, and January and warm there.

The resort was pretty much what I expected, but I did my best to be friendly and join the other spouses each day for beach going, shopping and relaxing. I took the bus to the tourist malls and bargained for jewelry (a bracelet that I still wear every day), and soaked up the rays and breezes on the beach. I do love to walk for a couple of hours on a beautiful beach, but the previously storm-battered and sadly eroded beach was not what I had envisioned. It was very narrow and filled with cabanas, and the sand at the water's edge, where I like to walk, slanted at about a 45˚ angle and was mushy instead of firm. After a short stroll, one leg hitting the sand at a much higher point than the other, my hip began to ache, and instead of enjoying the sight of miles of ocean lapping at sand, I envisioned a chiropractic adjustment table in a sterile room, and knew it was time to return to my cabana.

The resort was unwilling or unable to make vegan food accommodations beyond plain pasta with no sauce, so we opted to bus into town for our meals. We found a small chain of natural foods restaurants that served amazing local foods. The meals were so delicious that we tried repeatedly to lure other conference attendees to come with us, but they were all frightened of the word "natural" and chose to eat at the hotel instead. Interestingly, a large number of the group started disappearing. We later found out they had succumbed to dysentery and were recovering in their rooms. Although we ate enthusiastically, neither one of us ever had any problems. I just wish I had taken notes and photos so I could remember and recreate the wonderful traditional Mexican food we ate.

And this brings me to Rick Bayless. At first glance, Mr. Bayless seems to cook only animal-based Mexican dishes—with lots of chorizo and lard. Not exactly vegan food for thought. But, if you look beyond that first impression, you can find lots of inspiration for amazing meals. He was recently in Madison for a fund-raising event at which I was supposed to help, and I was really excited to meet him and watch him cook in person. At the last minute, I was unable to attend. I was very disappointed, but had a post-event opportunity to purchase one of his (signed) cookbooks for half-price. There were two choices, and I poured over each one, trying to determine which I was more likely to use. I chose "Mexican Everyday" instead of "Authentic Mexican 20th Anniversary Edition," because it contained meals you could make in 30 minutes. But the latter contained a treasure trove of information and would be a wonderful reference book. He provides so much insight into the flavors, ingredients and techniques involved in authentic Mexican cuisine, it's relatively easy to adapt the dishes into vegan versions without losing the fabulous taste. Plus, for many of the dishes in the book I selected, he offers vegetarian alternatives. And the side dishes and vegetables sound amazing. For example, you can skip the pork but make the Smoky Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Guajillo Salsa. I'm looking forward to substituting tofu, tempeh, seitan, beans, avocados and eggplant or other veggies for the animals, and using the preparation methods and sauces from the book, to create exciting flavors.



Our first try was Tomatillo-sauced enchiladas with spinach and mushrooms. We had only a few tomatillos in the house so we supplemented them (as per Rick's suggestion) with bottled tomatillo salsa. For the spinach we used a 12-ounce bag of chopped frozen spinach. We used eight ounces of white mushrooms, and we substituted vegetable stock for chicken stock and left out the shredded chicken (which is listed as optional in the recipe). We have lots of frozen jalapeños and other hot peppers from our garden, and we used those instead of fresh. This dish was easy to make and so delicious I had to force myself to stop eating. And following Mr. Bayless' easy method for softening corn tortillas, the tortillas were so much better than any we had prepared before. If you would like the revised recipe, e-mail me.

Spinach Enchiladas with ranchero sauce

I recently posted about making quesadillas for the first time after being inspired by a Public Television cooking show. The TV chef (TVC) was really into shredded chicken and cream, but he cooked enough stuff that I was able to take a little of this and a bit of that and concoct my own version of his dishes. One of the things he made was ranchero sauce. He used the ranchero sauce for a spinach-stuffed poblano pepper dish, but I decided to stuff corn tortillas with spinach and use the ranchero sauce (no cream) to make enchiladas.

I try to stick to a theme of "easy vegan cooking" when I prepare food for these posts. This doesn't always translate to "fast" vegan cooking. This dish truly is easy, and can be made faster with jarred ranchero sauce, but I was staring at a giant bowl of plum tomatoes just picked from the garden, and was not about to go buy a tomato-based sauce. So I'm going to give a recipe for the sauce and then the enchiladas, and anyone who wants to make this can make or buy whatever. However, if you have access to fresh, ripe plum tomatoes, please make this sauce.



TVC said to use 3 pounds of roasted, peeled and cored tomatoes, but he didn't say how to roast them. I love roasted veggies and make them often, but would you believe I've never roasted just tomatoes for the purpose of making sauce? I tried to find a recipe, but all the ones I saw were for slow-roasted and reduced tomatoes. I filled a 9 x 12 pan plus a 9 x 9 pan with tomato halves drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with oregano. These I put into a preheated 400˚ oven for about one hour. (Cooking time will vary with the size of the tomatoes. Larger tomatoes will take longer.) Maybe because I used plum tomatoes which have a much lower water content, or maybe because I didn't slow roast them for hours, my tomatoes really didn't reduce much. The picture you see is how they looked when I removed them from the oven. Although they didn't reduce, the flavor was intensified to the woohoo stage! I let them cool a little and started to remove (and eat) the skins but the skins were so tender and delicious that I abandoned that idea and decided to just puree the whole lot.

After pureeing, I froze one pint unseasoned, and used the remaining 2 to 2-1/2 cups for the recipe below.



Ranchero sauce

• 3 pounds ripe, roasted tomatoes, peeled if the skins are tough (see above text)
• 2 serrano chiles or jalapeños (or unidentified medium hot peppers!) I used 2 jalapeños and the unidentified choice
  
• 2 large cloves garlic
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 2 tablespoons olive oil (TVC used 1/4 cup)
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
• fresh black pepper
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon sugar

1. Puree the tomatoes, peppers and garlic until smooth.
2. Cook onions in oil until translucent (about 4 minutes) and add to tomatoes.
3. Stir in salt, cinnamon and sugar.
4. TVC said to simmer the sauce 30 minutes until slightly thickened. Since I was planning to bake my sauce, I skipped this step. Besides, my sauce was already really thick and delicious beyond belief.

Now for the filling. Normally I use fresh vegetables but TVC suggested using frozen spinach to save time. He said it would take 2-1/2 pounds of fresh baby spinach and you'd have to wash, chop, steam and squeeze it. This sounded like a lot of work so I decided to make the project seem more manageable by taking his advice and using frozen spinach. My bags of frozen spinach were from Whole Foods and really, when it was cooked, I couldn't tell it wasn't fresh. Anyway, the spinach was supposed to be defrosted and squeezed out, but of course, I planned poorly and was faced with using the spinach frozen or not making the enchiladas. It worked perfectly so I don't know what to say about this step. Here's what I did.



Spinach with pine nuts and raisins

• 20 ounces frozen chopped spinach
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 1/2 cup pine nuts
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• salt and pepper
• 1/4 cup plain unsweetened soy yoghurt (optional but recommended)

1. Sauté the pine nuts and raisins in the oil until the pine nuts begin to brown and the raisins plump up. BE CAREFUL NOT TO BURN THEM. Stir in the spinach and cook until fully defrosted and dry.
2. Season if desired.
3. Stir in the yoghurt if using.

We're almost done. And really, I think it's taking longer to write this post than it did to make the enchiladas. The last part involves softening corn tortillas, stuffing them with the spinach and baking them. TVC used 1/4 cup of oil in a skillet to warm each side of the tortillas before draining them on paper towels. I sprayed them with a little olive oil, heated them in a small cast iron skillet, flipping them over until they were pliable. If you know a better way to soften corn tortillas, please let me know.

Assembly

• 12 softened corn tortillas
• spinach filling
• ranchero sauce
• vegan cheese
• plain unsweetened soy yoghurt (optional, but creates a sour-cream-like effect)

1. Divide the spinach filling in the pan into roughly 12 parts.(you know, spatula lines)
   
2. Place the ranchero sauce in a 9" x 12" heavy baking dish.
3. Soften, then fill the tortillas with spinach and roll up.
4. Place the tortillas in the dish and spoon a little sauce over them.
5. Place shredded or thinly sliced vegan cheese over the top.
6. Drizzle soy yoghurt here and there.
7. Bake at 350˚ for 30 to 40 minutes until cheese is melted and sauce is bubbly.

Post Script I mentioned before and I'll mention again that we just had our first taste of Teese. That's what I used on the enchiladas. I sliced rather than shredded it and it didn't quite melt all the way but it was totally my fault. I probably should have waited a little longer or covered it for a few minutes. No matter. It's really in a class by itself as far as vegan cheeses go. It's scarily like the real thing. I was actually a little embarrassed at work when I reheated my lunch and it smelled like actual cheese!

On the other hand, the nutritional value of Teese is somewhat suspect in my mind. According to their Web site, there is zero protein, 9 grams of fat and zero everything else, per serving. I see it as a condiment rather than an actual food. Kind of like drizzling olive oil on hummus. It does taste great though!

Enchiladas

If you asked my three kids what their favorite food was when they lived at home, they would all say, "enchiladas." I know this because I asked, but I kind of knew it anyway. It was the food always requested for birthday dinners or other special events. The version I made was based on a recipe in an old copy of "The Farm Cookbook" I'd found at a garage sale. Making this dish was a big production for someone who mostly cooked on the fly and used cookbooks for inspiration, not recipes. It involved cooking beans, making cheese sauce and chili gravy, and then assembling the whole thing and baking it. One of the kids didn't like corn tortillas so I used whole wheat, and sometimes I made the tortillas, too. So many pots and pans and bowls and baking dishes. At some point I started using Fantastic instant refried beans for the filling, but the whole process was still labor intensive. I must say, though, that those enchiladas were really good!

Recently, after I'd revisited the cheese sauce from "Uncheese Cookbook," I got to thinking about those enchiladas and told my husband that I really wanted some. What do you know - he surprised me with a huge pan of them, and after stuffing myself at dinner and two lunches, I'm sated. No more enchiladas for a while for me. He didn't make the same ones I used to cook. He watched a video of someone cooking a simpler version of enchiladas and adapted the recipe. He used canned beans, fresh potatoes and zucchini, canned enchilada sauce, packaged corn tortillas and no cheese, and the end result was really good. It was a bit too salty for me (all those cans of things) so I've reduced the added salt in the recipe. I've also added some green chilies.

Enchiladas (based on recipe from chooseveg.com)
12 corn tortillas
1 cup onions, chopped
1 cup potatoes, 1/2 inch dice
1 cup pinto beans, drained
1 cup zucchini, diced
1 cup olives, sliced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 small can green chilies, chopped or (optional)
3 cups canned enchilada sauce (or chili gravy - recipe below)

Sauté the onions and potatoes in the oil in a heavy skillet or wok until the onions are transparent and the potatoes begin to soften. Season with salt and oregano near the end of cooking. In a large bowl, combine the cooked mixture, beans, zucchini, olives and chilies. Mix well and taste for seasoning.

Lightly oil a large (10 x 13 x 2) baking dish. Cover the bottom of the dish with 1 cup sauce. Spread a spoonful of sauce on a tortilla, fill with about 1/4 cup of the bean mixture and roll up. Place seam side down in the baking dish. Continue filling and rolling until all the tortillas are in the baking dish. (If the tortillas need softening before rolling, heat each one briefly on each side in a non-stick pan. Stack on a plate until all are heated. Then proceed with filling and rolling.)

Cover the rolled tortillas with the remaining sauce. Cover the dish with aluminum foil and bake in a preheated 350˚ oven for 45 to 50 minutes. Serve with green salad and avocados.

note: When I had this for lunch the second time, I added a little vegan mozzarella on top.

As an alternative to canned sauce, you could make chili gravy. It's the Tex Mex version.
1/4 cup oil (I'd probably cut this back to 2 tablespoons)
1 large onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped fine (or 1-1/2 teaspoons garlic powder -more authentic, apparently)
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon ground cumin
6 tablespoons good chili powder
6 tablespoons unbleached flour
1 quart water
Fry onions in oil until soft but not brown. Mix in everything but water. Slowly whisk in water to keep from lumping. Bring to boil and cook for 20 minutes at slow boil. Use instead of enchilada sauce. There will be leftover sauce for another recipe.