This month was an especially fun challenge to make – enchiladas!  My mom always made the best enchiladas when I was younger, and it was one of a number of dishes called “California style” – though I’m not quite sure what that [...]]]>

This month was an especially fun challenge to make – enchiladas!  My mom always made the best enchiladas when I was younger, and it was one of a number of dishes called “California style” – though I’m not quite sure what that means in terms of enchiladas.  We would have enough to feed an army – not that any of us minded, my mom’s enchiladas were one of those dishes that you looked forward to eating leftovers every night that week for dinner.

Until this Daring Cooks challenge came around I am ashamed to say I had never actually made them before, only been merely someone who enjoyed their cheesy gooey flavorful wonderfulness – ha, surely more than one past English teacher of mine would cringe at that particular selection of adjectives, but I think that description is actually pretty accurate.  I usually pride myself on having some ability to articulate, but then there are just those times that call for half made-up words like wonderfulness.  Enchiladas embrace the concept of “wonderfulness” completely.  Even my spellchecker must realize that about enchiladas because it has no problem with my description

I think they seem intimidating to many to prepare but in principle they are really rather simple.  Their only issue is that they have several parts – roast the chiles, make the sauce, cook the meat, fry the tortillas, fill them, and bake.  But no one part is particularly difficult or time consuming – unless of course you have my kitchen, which involves about an 8″ x 10″ sized counter-space, two tiny burners and a toaster oven.  Preparing these enchiladas took me the better part of 4 hrs, and I only got about 4 servings out of them because I had to make such small portions given the space I had.  I just can’t fit a larger dish in that toaster oven no matter how much I want to.

Living in my parents’ house I probably could have cut at least 30% of the time out, and made a good 20 servings.  Ah, the joys of apartment living….one day, hopefully sooner than later, I dream of having a kitchen with a real oven, 4 full burners, and an actual counter instead of trying to slice veggies on my cutting board placed on a rolly cart that moves causing me to slip and slice part of my finger off.  Did I mention that yet?  I have a sizable dent in my index finger now.  Safety note to self – don’t do your cutting on a rolly cart.  And thank goodness for Neosporin.  My husband then continued the chopping on the rolly cart.  He didn’t injure himself

Ok, onto the food!  Truth be told, when it came time to actually make the enchiladas, I really wasn’t feeling like eating Mexican at all, nor anything cheesy.  I still roasted a bunch of chiles, but instead blended them with some homemade Thai green curry paste and made a Thai version instead.  Chicken was marinated and then sautéed in roasted chiles/green curry, and a sauce was made with the rest of the chiles, curry paste, and coconut milk.

My husband quickly fried corn tortillas that we got from our favorite gluten-free shop while I then raced to fill them with the chicken, some greens, bamboo shoots and sauce before they cooled so much that they risked cracking.  I LOVE the flavor of corn tortillas, but they are hard to bend once they are fried.  I elected to do the filling of the enchiladas because I am more heat tolerant than my husband, so I could arrange them and fill and roll them while they were still hot enough to manipulate, literally right out of the frying pan.  I squished as many as I could all in a row in our little baking dish, topped with more sauce, and baked for about 30 minutes until everything melded together and the aromas of the chiles and fresh lemongrass permeated our entire apartment.

I didn’t use a timer, I just waited until it smelled right.  That’s often how I cook.  It’s almost an instinctual feeling, like a sixth sense sometimes.  I just let them be in the oven and then a while later said to myself, “Hmm, they smell like they’re ready to eat.”  Turns out I was right, they were ready.  So there you have it.  Thai enchiladas, gluten and dairy free.  And they were full of wonderfullness

Blog Checking Lines: Our hosts this month, Barbara of Barbara Bakes and Bunnee of Anna+Foodhave chosen a delicious Stacked Green Chile & Grilled Chicken Enchilada recipe in celebration of Cinco de Mayo! The recipe, featuring a homemade enchilada sauce was found onwww.finecooking.com and written by Robb Walsh.

Also linked to – Slightly Indulgent Tuesdays and Gluten Free Wednesdays

© Jenn Cuisine, 2009 - 2010. | Permalink | 36 comments | Add to del.icio.us

Before I made this, the last time I used a mortar and pestle was in chemistry class.  I felt oddly alchemic (is that even a word?) while making this curry paste, continually turning and grinding – this is a process that is slow, repetitive, meditative even.  I found it [...]]]>

Before I made this, the last time I used a mortar and pestle was in chemistry class.  I felt oddly alchemic (is that even a word?) while making this curry paste, continually turning and grinding – this is a process that is slow, repetitive, meditative even.  I found it surprisingly therapeutic – though I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, as I find most activities in the kitchen relaxing (well, except dishes – dishes are evil).  I sat at my dining table (since I have like 0 counter-space), opened the window, and felt the breezes of the next Spring storm against my face, enjoying the last few bits of sunshine before the rain clouds rolled back in.  Oh and the aromas wafting up from the blending of all of the flavors was incredible!   Ground coriander seeds have a bright fresh, almost even lemony scent – add in some lemongrass, cilantro leaves, a little basil, and one ends up with bright fresh green flavors whose aromas fill the entire room.

The key to using a mortar & pestle is taking your time, and actually not using that much force.  I ground up salt/spices first before gradually adding in the wetter ingredients like onions, garlic, and the herbs – I think the salt/spices helped to act as an abrasive which aided me greatly when working with the other ingredients.  Oh and it’s also useful to mince everything up as finely as you can first – it’s a lot of chopping, but well worth it.  How did this compare to the jarred stuff?  It was more fresh, more vibrant, more full of flavor, and made for one heck of a curry sauce

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Couscous is one of those dishes that seems impossible to replace gluten free.  Quinoa just doesn’t cut it.  Quinoa’s flavor is too distinct, and its texture is not quite right.  I find it very hard to flavor quinoa in a way that lets it melt into other flavors – [...]]]>

Couscous is one of those dishes that seems impossible to replace gluten free.  Quinoa just doesn’t cut it.  Quinoa’s flavor is too distinct, and its texture is not quite right.  I find it very hard to flavor quinoa in a way that lets it melt into other flavors – it’s always standing out above the rest.  This is great for some dishes, but not so much for others, such as cous cous.

I thought I could make couscous myself.  After all, there is nothing really gluten-dependent about couscous – no stretchy dough, no air pockets to trap – and this great lesson on flour from Rouxbe shows that you could basically make it by adding water to flour in a food processor until small pellets form.  Figuring out the right amount of water to add is not obvious though, and I kept going from my starting gluten free flour to a play-dough-like consistency – not really ideal for couscous!  I didn’t feel like wasting flour trying to get this right, so decided I may not just be ready for homemade gluten free couscous yet…

Giving up on making my own, I sought out a decent replacement, and whole millet seemed to be about the right size and shape.  I love using millet flour because of its mild flavor, and was thinking whole millet would be similar in taste.  Besides, if we can find a new grain to use, that opens up my culinary options a lot!  Millet is apparently decently nutritious as well, with a good protein content and lots of great things like B vitamins.  Asking around on twitter it seems that not that many people use millet – is this the “forgotten” gluten free grain?  If so, millet really deserves more credit.  I’ll even admit until this week I had never had whole millet before either, but now we will definitely be having millet more often!

For my first time making it, I really liked it.  It absorbed flavor well and had a very pleasing texture – easy and relatively quick, preparing millet “couscous” made for a convenient week-night meal.  We do need convenience sometimes, especially on those nights where neither one of us gets home from work til 8 pm.  After an a 10 hr work day and lunch having occurred 8 hours ago, dinner needs to be simple!

Couscous dishes are very versatile in that you can flavor them pretty much anyway you want.  For my millet version, I kind of threw together a rather random looking set of ingredients and flavors, but they came together quite nicely.  Ok, I may have gone a little overboard on the paprika, but I love that earthy smoky flavor, and it worked really well with the chicken here.  If you are not such a huge fan of paprika, definitely use whatever flavors you actually like.  This was essentially a one-pot, no frills, no fuss meal – there’s nothing wrong with throwing in your own ingredients or ideas, it’s better to keep things no fuss than to stress about having exactly what is in one particular recipe.  This recipe is just an idea that we happened to eat and love.  I encourage you to make your own variations, and get creative!

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When my sister in law came to visit a couple weeks ago, my husband and I were both ecstatic to receive a gift of a giant jar of peanut butter.  While one can get peanut butter here, it is pretty darn expensive [...]]]>

When my sister in law came to visit a couple weeks ago, my husband and I were both ecstatic to receive a gift of a giant jar of peanut butter.  While one can get peanut butter here, it is pretty darn expensive and, well, there is nutella instead  So the very first oh-so-elegant dish that we made with our new treasure?  It was totally “ants-on-a log”.  You may or may not know of this snack, the last time I was actually served it I was probably in about first grade.  Take a stick of celery, fill it with peanut butter, and line it with rasins.  I know it sounds odd, but it’s quite satisfying.

So what was our next peanut butter adventure after we’d grown up from “ants on a log”?  Making another that is a symbol of home, the buckeye.  A buckeye is actually a tree, which produces nuts that look very much like this dessert (hence the name).  Making buckeyes couldn’t be easier – combine equal parts peanut butter & powdered sugar, roll into truffles, and dip almost completely in chocolate.  Yep, that’s it!  And with another great gift of some semi-sweet chocolate chips (why can’t I find chocolate chips here?), our treat was perfect

It’s funny how much we have gravitated towards comfort foods and flavors since moving abroad.  I figured that we would be reaching out more to try new cuisines, and increasingly we find ourselves preparing the familiar.  I think in a way our cooking has become a psychological outlet for dealing with being thousands of miles away from virtually everyone that we know.  While we love living in a new country and learning how to live in a society with many many differences from what we are used to, and being able to visit mountains and other countries in just a mere weekend getaway, I think we are still constantly seeking something we can recognize to make a bit of a home for ourselves.  And with so many things in life, home begins with food.

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