(Serves 4)
Sometimes I go grocery shopping and get carried away. I’ll grab a bunch of produce that looks great and plan on making salads every day for lunch. I’ll plan on making various recipes for dinner. Then I’ll be running late and not be able to make salad in the morning or don’t have enough time to make the recipe I planned for dinner (aka – why I usually meal prep on the weekend!) This is how I often find myself with some stuff that is starting to pass it’s prime. Maybe you can relate? This is where the idea for clean out the fridge enchiladas came from – the recipe is very forgiving, and you can change out the ingredients for what you have on hand. Different vegetables, cheeses, and any salsa or enchilada sauce will work.
On this particular day, I had partial containers of red and green enchilada sauce in the fridge from other recipes and decided to use them both, the result was quite good. Don’t let all those things go to waste- make up some enchilada filling, grate some cheese, and enjoy your dinner knowing you didn’t throw away any money you spent at the grocery store.
You Will Need:
- 1 red onion, divided
- 1 bell pepper
- About 3 cups fresh spinach
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- 1 teaspoon coriander
- About 2 tablespoons fresh cilantro, plus more for serving
- 2-3 tablespoons of green salsa
- About 2 tablespoons olive oil
- Kosher salt and black pepper
- 2/3 pound Monterey Jack cheese (about 3 cups shredded)
- 8 Corn tortillas
- About 1 ½ to 2 cups enchilada sauce, red and/or green
Instructions:
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- Grate/shred the cheese and set aside. Chop the onion, reserve about a tablespoon for topping. Seed and chop the pepper. Preheat olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat, add the onion and peppers. Season with salt and pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5-8 minutes. Meanwhile, peel and chop the garlic and roughly chop the spinach. Remove any large stems from the spinach and discard. Chop the cilantro and set aside.
- Once the onions and peppers are tender, add the garlic, cumin, and coriander into the pan and stir for a minute or two. Then add the spinach and stir until wilted. Season again with salt and pepper, add the salsa and stir to combine. The mixture should be slightly saucy, but not too wet. Remove from heat and stir in the cilantro.
- Spread a little bit of the enchilada sauce in a 9×13” pan, just enough to cover the bottom. Warm the tortillas in a damp paper towel in the microwave for about 30 seconds to make them pliable.
- Put about 1/8 of the vegetable filling and a little bit of cheese into each tortilla (reserving some cheese for the top), roll and place seam side down in the pan. Top with enchilada sauce. When using a mixture of red and green, I spoon stripes of each on top of the enchiladas for a striped effect instead of mixing them together. Sprinkle the remaining cheese on top.
- Bake for about 20 minutes until the cheese is melted and beginning to bubble. Garnish with the reserved red onion and more cilantro and serve.
To make ahead:
Make the filling entirely ahead of time, let cool then put in the fridge until dinnertime. Grate the cheese ahead of time and store it in a container with a tight-fitting lid. Assemble and bake the enchiladas as described above before serving.
