Chicken Enchiladas Verdes

The tomatillos in my garden are all ripening at once. Have you ever cooked with tomatillos? They look like little lanterns, with their green papery husks.

Sometimes people mistake them for green tomatoes (doesn’t help that their Spanish name is “tomate verde”); they are related to tomatoes (same family, different genus), but the taste is quite different.

They are used to make the distinctive Mexican salsa verde or green salsa. In this chicken enchiladas recipe, the sauce is made with boiled tomatillos (you could also roast them), serrano chile peppers, and sour cream.

The filling is made with shredded meat from chicken thighs; the deeper flavor of the dark meat holds up much better to the chile and tomatillo sauce than chicken breasts.

I made these for dinner tonight and even the kid, my young nephew, went for seconds. Not a smidgen of sauce was left on any of our plates.

Chicken Enchiladas Verdes Recipe

A shortcut for this recipe is to use already prepared bottled salsa verde (heat the sauce and add sour cream at the end) which should be available at any market that carries Mexican foods. Use 2-3 cups. You can also use rotisserie chicken instead of poaching your own.

Packaged tortillas vary in their thickness and quality. Thicker corn tortillas will hold up better to the frying, softening, and dipping in sauce than thin ones, which can tend to fall apart.

Ingredients

• 4 skinless chicken thighs, boneless or bone-in (about 1 1/2 pounds boneless or 1 3/4 lbs bone-in)
• 1 1/2 lbs tomatillos, papery husks removed, rinsed
• 4 serrano chile peppers, top cut off to expose interior and to remove stems
• 3 cloves garlic
• 1 cup white or yellow onion, chopped
• 1/4 of a whole white or yellow onion
• Salt
• 1 bunch cilantro, rinsed and chopped, stems included
• High smoke point cooking oil such as canola oil, peanut oil or grapeseed oil
• 12 corn tortillas
• 3 Tbsp sour cream
• 1/2 cup crumbled Mexican Cotija or Queso Fresco cheese

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