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Learn how to make homemade enchiladas with a flavorful from-scratch red enchilada sauce. This easy recipe is perfect for family dinners, get-togethers, and weeknight meals!
A Quick and Easy Crowd-Pleaser
This homemade enchilada recipe is always a huge hit with my family! The enchiladas begin and end with our flavorful homemade sauce, which takes only a few extra minutes to throw together, yet tastes like it has been cooking all day! The ingredients are simple, the method is speedy, and the flavor is out of this world! You can double or even triple the batch, and freeze for later or share with family and friends. This is perfect potluck dish to share. Everyone loves these from-scratch enchiladas, and I’m confident that you will too!
Ingredients in Homemade Enchiladas
- Tortillas: An enchilada is only as good as its wrapping. See below for my thoughts on flour vs corn tortillas.
- Chicken or Beef: For chicken enchiladas, use our easy recipe for shredded chicken or you can just boil a couple of chicken breasts and shred them. However, if you are running short on time, grab a rotisserie chicken and use that for your filling. You can also make beef enchiladas with ground beef, sliced steak, or you can use our delicious recipe for Mexican shredded beef. For easy ground beef enchiladas, in a large skillet brown the hamburger on medium-high heat, then drain any excess fat. Use any protein you like, or keep them vegetarian with sliced vegetables.
- Refried Beans: I love spreading a layer of refried beans as the base of these homemade enchiladas; it adds substance and flavor, and helps all the other filling ingredients stick together. You can substitute pinto or black beans for the refried beans for a slightly different texture and flavor.
- Corn: This is my favorite ingredient – I love the sweet crunch that corn adds to this recipe. Fresh from the cob, frozen, or canned corn all work just fine.
- White Rice: For even more flavor, use our recipe for cilantro lime rice.
- Shredded Cheese: Sprinkle cheddar, Monterey Jack, Pepper Jack, or a Mexican cheese blend.
- Toppings for Serving: Top the enchiladas with cool sour cream, hearty guacamole, extra cheese, shredded lettuce, tomatoes, diced avocado, or diced green onions.
Best Red Enchilada Sauce Recipe
Canned enchilada sauce gets the job done, but homemade is just so much tastier! The spices blend together perfectly to create a savory sauce that will elevate your enchiladas to the next level! At first it might sound a little intimidating to create a sauce from scratch, but it’s SO much easier than you think (and totally worth it)! All you need is a handful of simple pantry ingredients:
- Tomato sauce
- Chili powder
- Ground cumin
- Beef broth, chicken broth, or vegetable broth
- Oregano
- Olive oil, canola oil, or vegetable oil
- Salt and pepper
This delectable red sauce comes together in just a few minutes. It will simmer on the stove while you assemble the other enchilada ingredients. Plus, your house will smell wonderfully spicy and fragrant!
Flour or Corn Tortillas for Enchiladas?
This homemade enchiladas recipe calls for flour tortillas, which are usually a little bigger and can hold more filling, but you can easily swap them out for white corn or yellow corn tortillas. It’s just a matter of personal preference and taste. My husband is partial to corn, so I usually make a pan of those and a pan of flour. I love buying the raw flour tortillas from Costco, then frying them up in a skillet. They taste homemade and much fresher than the flour tortillas you would buy at the grocery store. To make the flour or corn tortillas a little more pliable, wrap a few at a time in a damp paper towel and microwave for a few seconds until they’re soft. It’ll make rolling the enchiladas so much easier.
Frequently Asked Questions
Typically, the filling of an enchilada consists of meat (beef, chicken, pork, or seafood), cheese, beans, salsa, and sauce. Enchiladas are commonly topped with sour cream, guacamole, diced tomatoes, diced onions, cilantro, and salsa.
A Mexican cheese blend works great, or you can also use Monterey Jack or cheddar.
Yes! Make a double batch, and use one for dinner tonight and store one in the freezer for later! To freeze, prepare the enchiladas, but don’t add the cheese on top or bake. Store them in an airtight container or cover your baking dish with cellophane wrap, then a layer of foil. Thaw enchiladas in the fridge overnight, and then bake at 325 for 1 hour. Add shredded cheese the last 10 minutes of baking.
What to Serve with Homemade Enchiladas
Serve these irresistible enchiladas with a huge green salad and plenty of chips and salsa. Or, round out your menu with these easy Mexican recipes:
Restaurant Style Mexican Rice
Cafe Rio Cilantro Lime Rice
Restaurant Style Refried Beans
The Best Guacamole
Charro Beans
Mexican Street Corn
Enchiladas with Homemade Enchilada Sauce
Video
Equipment
- Conventional Oven
- 9 X 13 inch Pan
Ingredients
Enchilada Sauce
- 3 tablespoons oil
- 2 tablespoons flour
- ¼ cup chili powder yes, you really use that much
- 1 tablespoon cumin
- 2 cups beef broth
- 2 cups tomato sauce
- ½ teaspoon oregano
- 1 clove minced garlic
- salt to taste
Enchiladas
- 8 tortillas corn or flour
- 2 chicken breasts cooked and shredded ahead of time
- 14 ounces refried beans
- 1 1/2 cups white rice we cooked it with some lime and cilantro
- 14 ounces white corn drained and rinsed
- shredded cheddar cheese
Enchilada Toppings (optional)
- sour cream
- sliced avocado or guacamole
- salsa
- shredded lettuce
- diced tomato
- sliced black olives
Instructions
Enchilada Sauce
- Stir oil, flour, chili powder and cumin in a saucepan on low heat until bubbly. Add beef broth, tomato sauce, oregano, garlic and salt.
- Simmer for 15 min over low heat stirring occasionally.
Enchiladas
- Pour some of the enchilada sauce over the chicken and stir. Layer beans, chicken, corn, and rice in the center of each tortilla.
- Spray the bottom of a 9×13 pan with cooking spray and add the rolled up enchiladas, seam side down. (You can fit about 8 to 10 enchiladas in the pan).
- Cover the enchiladas with the sauce then top with cheddar cheese.
- Bake in the oven at 325 for 1 hour.
- Serve with toppings on the side.
Notes
Alternative methods for preparing tortillas:
- If using corn tortillas, fry them in hot oil for about 10 seconds on each side before filling and rolling. This keeps them from getting soggy when cooking in the enchilada sauce.
- Completely coat the tortillas in sauce before filling and rolling.
- If using raw tortillas, cook them before filling and rolling.
Sorry but I don’t know anyone who puts cumin, oregano or tomato sauce in their enchiladas. Real enchiladas are simple, red chile, tortillas, cheese and onions tomatoes and lettuce on top to be enjoyed with fresh pinto beans.
I am a Hispanic cook and was raised on authentic Mexican recipes and this is not one of them but I’m going to tell you that these are the best enchiladas that I’ve had. My family loved them. We do not put white rice or corn in enchiladas let alone tomato sauce, these were amazing my family will not eat chicken enchiladas, so I just added cheese rice and used corn corn tortillas will not make enchiladas with flour tortillas because they are slimy. Other than that this is an amazing recipe. Thank you so much a great change to a traditional dish. I’ve always put cumin & oregano in my enchilada recipes also lots of garlic. I’ve also use this sauce for chicken mole. Also used it in my Posole very versatile.
Have you ever made the enchiladas with Beef. ?
Yes! Beef enchiladas are delicious!
This was the first time Ive ever made enchilada’s and thank you for making the directions so easy to follow. My family loved them and thats good because the pitchers looked so yummy on line I made an extra one to freeze. You just gotta try these enchiladas there the BOMB!
Unbelievable! I’ve been looking for a new recipe to add to our rotation for dinner and this is a new favorite! Thank you.
SO good!!!!!! This is a family favorite! My sister in law always asks me to make it when they come into town! Such a simple recipe! Thank you for sharing!
This is really easy to follow, loved this enchiladas recipe! It’s really tasty and very flavorful! Will surely have this again! Highly recommended!
this was sooooo good
I made this for dinner tonight and followed your recipe for homemade enchilada sause and I I made the suggested lime & cilantro rice also. I found the sauce to be a little to bland and have bit of a burnt taste, even though I didn’t burn it. I ended up only using half of the homemade sauce and = in a can of store bought red sauce. The other problem I ran into was when I checked on the cooking progress about 20-22 minutes in, All cheese on top had already burnt. =/ I ended up removing the burnt cheese layer, adding back fresh grated cheddar, then I cooked it for 45 more minutes covered with time foil. Cheese still burnt a little and could have used about 5-10 more minutes to finish cooking. The taste was EXCELLENT though. Since I made everything from scratch but already had the cooked, shredded chicken on hand, prep time alone before the enchiladas were ready to go into the oven took 2+ hours plus another 2 hours cook. =/ A little too many steps and unexpected time extensions for me. I planned on serving dinner according to the time frame shown on the recipe, but I didn’t have dinner on the table until almost 3 hours later which kept me kids up way past their bedtime. =(
Oh no! It sounds like something went wrong. What shelf in the oven did you place the enchiladas on? Usually 325 is low enough to not burn the cheese and yet still cook the enchiladas all the way through.
I cover my enchiladas with foil for half the cook time, just use your judgement. Then uncover the remainder of the time. Cheese won’t burn and is cooked through.