Overview
I used to make these by steaming strips of thighs in the Thermomix while the sauce cooked underneath or slow cooking in the sauce in the oven. Not any more! This version uses sous vide chicken.
I often make beef enchiladas at the same time, more kicking up the flavour so that there’s something for everyone.

This is even better with home-made tortillas.

The chicken section of this recipe makes enough for 3 trays of enchiladas – 6 per tray with 2 big spoons of filling each. The sauce makes enough for 2 trays – so either make a double batch or save some meat for nachos the next day! One batch of my tortillas makes 16… the maths here didn’t work out very well!

Time
2 hours to sous vide the chook… Use this time to whip up some tortillas. Then there’s an hour or so while you make the sauce, pull and flavour the chicken and finally assemble and bake the enchiladas for 22 minutes. So worth it though!

Ingredients: Dry Spices 1 TB garlic powder 1 TB onion powder 2 TB cumin 2 TB sweet paprika 1 ts smoky paprika 4 TB brown sugar 4 TB dried oregano 2 TB dried coriander leaf 2 ts cayenne pepper

Ingredients: Sauce ½ cup oil ½ cup plain flour 1½ cups beef stock 700g passata (1 bottle) ½ of the dry spice mix

Ingredients: Chicken filling Shredded cooked chicken, approx 1½- 2 kg ½ of the dry spice mix 1 ts ground black pepper 1 -2 ts peri peri powder 1-2 jalepeno chiles, finely diced 1 onion, diced 1 capsicum, sliced (I use ½ red, ½ yellow for colour) 1 tin refried beans 2 spring onions 4 TB tomato paste or pizza sauce

Assembly ingredients:
Mexican cheese mix, grated
12-15 flour tortillas

Method
Dry spices:
1 – Mix all dry spices together in a bowl.

Chicken:
2 – Sprinkle thighs with a Mexican-inspired herb/spice rub. Make some extra rub for this if you like, or use a commercial mix, or do what I do – take the containers from making the dry spice mix and sprinkle at will!
3 – Place in vacuum sealed bags and sous vide at 65° C for 2 hours.
4 – When cooked and ready to make the chicken filling, pour out the bag juices to add to the enchilada sauce.
5 – Shred or finely chop the meat. Chunks are fine, as they are all soft and juicy.

Sauce:
6 – Heat oil in a medium saucepan.
7 – Add flour, whisk for about a minute to combine.
8 – Add stock in small amounts while whisking.
9 – Add passata and spices, whisk to combine.
10 – Simmer for about 10 minutes to thicken.

Preheat oven to 180° C

Chicken filling:
11 – In a large bowl, combine all ingredients

Assembly:
12 – Spread a little of the sauce on the bottom of a Pyrex casserole dish
13 – Place a tortilla on a clean work surface
14 – Spread about ⅓ cup of the filling across the bottom of the tortilla. Sprinkle generously with grated cheese, and roll tortilla up tightly from the bottom.
15 – Place enchilada, seam-side down in the tray. Repeat until tray is full.
16 – Cover with a generous serve of sauce and sprinkle with cheese
17 – Bake covered with aluminium foil for 12 minutes, then a further 10 minutes uncovered