Holy Mole...

OK, sorry about the title...I had to! When we were in Chattanooga over the weekend (the source of leftover Lasagna) we went on Sunday afternoon to a great market in the downtown area, near UTC. One of the vendors was actually from Atlanta and selling wonderful salsas, and tamales. I love Mexican food and two things are at the top - Tamales and Mole Sauce. I find a lot of people don't know about Mole sauce (pronounced Mole-a) but it is wonderful. A very complex sauce and a bear to make. It has about 3-4 dried and reconstituted peppers, tons of great spice and at the very end, you melt in good Mexican Chocolate. It makes for a warm (but not hot) spicy sauce that you just can't quite figure out. I don't make it...maybe one day when I am retired...but now, when I see it and know its good I buy it. Thus, what we had last night was Chicken Enchiladas Mole. I froze the tamales I bought and I'm sure they will make an appearance here soon. To shortcut, I take a supermarket rotisserie chicken and shred it. In my opinion, Costco is the best tasting, biggest and best value...if you are there buy several and take the meat off when you get home, freeze each bag of chicken meat individually...SOOOO much better than the already processed bag of chicken.


Chicken Enchiladas Mole

Meat from one Chicken (appx 2-3 cups)
1 small red onion, halved
8 corn tortillas
2-1/2 cups shredded mozzarella or Monterrey Jack cheese
1/3 cup fresh cilantro
2 Tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil
3/4 cup crumbled queso fresco cheese
1 jar prepared Mole Sauce

Preheat the broiler. Slice half the onion into thin rings and set aside. Place the other half on a pan in the broiler until charred and soft. Set Aside.

Stack the tortillas on damp paper towels and microwave for 1 minute. Meanwhile, add 2 cups of the cheese to the chicken and mix it up. (If you want to add a small amount of salsa here you can, we didn't need it). Add 1 tsp of salt to the chicken and cheese. Spoon a portion of the chicken and cheese into the center of each tortilla. Wrap tightly and put in a lightly oiled 9 x 13 pan. Once all 8 have been rolled, brush them with olive oil. Broil until crisp and golden - 3 to 4 minutes. Pour the mole sauce over the top, top that with 1/2 cup of remaining Monterrey Jack cheese. Return to the oven and broil until the cheese is melted and the sauce hot (3 to 5 minutes) Then top with the broiled red onions and queso fresco.

I served this with "green rice" which is my normal rice with Salsa Verde and fresh Cilantro added.

We could have licked the plate....

On a budget note...I had easily enough Chicken and Cheese left over to make another meal.  So they went right back into the freezer for one of those "I really don't have it together" nights.  If you had leftover turkey, steak or pork this would work great also...and it doesn't take that much meat.  I probably used 1-1/2 cups of chicken.