It’s the third week of August. I’m not ready for Summer to end. You’re probably not either.
-I’m not ready for my hair to turn a dingy blonde. Blah.
-I want to keep wearing my swimsuit all day and night on the weekends.
-I like the farmer’s market and all their delightful cheap produce.
-Sipping skinnygirl margaritas outside will cease, that’s a problem.
-I will be cold for a good seven months. Boooo.
On the bright side, there are some perks to Fall though. Baking with pumpkin, Thanksgiving, and of course giving out fruit on Halloween. Only kidding.
Anyway I’ve decided I need to make the rest of this Summer memorable. Right now, I feel like Judy Moody and the Not So Bummer Summer. Don’t ever watch that movie. Gingers and Big Foots do not make for a good storyline. Ever.
Now I’ve got gingers and Big Foots in your head. Back to food and normal thoughts…
Lately I’ve started to try to encourage healthy family meals. It’s something that I love to do. People are happy and thankful. Food just has that soulful connection and bringing people together for a great meal is important to me. My family is away in Canada right now. I miss them. I miss cooking for them. Come home family.
Hmmm… What else have I done this summer? I’ve been to a lot of potlucks this summer. Boring.
Oh sorry excuse me; I don’t want to offend any potluck lovers. Potlucks are great for getting together with friends and family, but I mean what’s up with the food?
Maybe it’s just me. Maybe I should get used to potato salad saturated and dripping in miracle whip. Oh, and coleslaw from the deli at the local grocer is supposed to be good? I don’t know… it tastes soggy to me. Wait, what about those weird jello cakes with cool whip? That reminds me of a nursing home. Hold on, this is just the worst: mini wieners blown up and sitting in crockpots for hours. Scary.
Anyway I wanted to make these enchiladas because they remind me of my family get togethers. Typically we don’t make traditional food. We get adventurous, or should I say ambitious haha. We make new meals every week. Everyone contributes to the meal and at the end we sit down happy to be in eachothers company and proud of what we created together.
It’s never boring.
My taste buds love a good adventure. They like to party.
These enchiladas were gone that night. My family didn’t know that these were a healthier enchilada. About 300 calories per serving. They had multiple servings though. We had homemade sangrias, layered taco dip, and lots of chips too. Then we had my Summer Berry Peach Pie for dessert. It’s was the perfect summer meal.
Put a little pizzazz in your next potluck adventure. Make these. They are healthy, yummy, and a great way to share a memory with your friends or family.
Ambitious Kitchen
Cookbook
125 Ridiculously Good For You, Sometimes Indulgent, and Absolutely Never Boring Recipes for Every Meal of the Day
Black Bean Chicken Enchiladas with Spicy Avocado-Tomato Salsa
Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups of shredded cooked chicken breast
- 1 15 ounce can fat-free refried black beans (or regular refried beans will work)
- 1 cup frozen sweet corn
- 2 cloves of garlic, minced
- ½ cup of diced onion, yellow or white
- 1 teaspoon of red pepper flakes
- 1 teaspoon of garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon of cumin
- Optional: 1 large jalapeno, seeded and coarsely chopped
- 1/3 cup chopped cilantro
- 20 oz. can low-sodium enchilada sauce
- 2 1/2 cups of reduced fat Colby jack cheese
- 7 whole wheat 10 inch tortillas (burrito style)
- For salsa:
- 3 Roma tomatoes, diced
- 1 avocado, diced
- ½ cup of yellow onion, finely chopped
- ½ fresh jalapeno pepper, seeded and chopped
- ½ cup fresh cilantro
- 1 teaspoon lime juice
- Salt and Pepper to taste
Instructions
- Spray large pan with non-stick cooking oil and place on medium heat. Add corn, garlic, onion, red pepper flakes, cumin, garlic powder, and the optional jalapeno if you’d like. Cook until onions have softened. Next add chicken and cilantro to mixture and ½ can of the enchilada sauce. Simmer on low for a couple of minutes. Turn off heat and let mixture cool.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray 9x13 baking pan with cooking spray.
- Next warm tortillas in microwave for about 20 seconds so they are easier to roll. Then, place about 1/4 cup of refried beans on each tortilla. Next take about 1/2 cup of chicken mixture and place on top of beans. Sprinkle about ¼ cup of cheese in each tortilla. Fold each tortilla and place seam side down in pan.
- Add remaining enchilada sauce on top of the tortillas and sprinkle remaining cheese on top. Bake for 30 minutes until cheese is melted and edges of tortillas begin to turn golden brown. Allow enchiladas to cool a few minutes before serving and top with avocado-tomato salsa and sour cream.
- While enchiladas are baking, make the salsa. To make salsa: In a medium bowl, combine all salsa ingredients. Stir until evenly mixed. Refrigerate until ready to serve.
- These should make 7 large enchiladas. 1 serving = 1/2 enchilada with salsa.
After reading this, I get hungry for avocados. Thanks for the useful info, how about you drop by and give me a few tips, would apreciate it.
Mmmmm. Sounds delicious (without the jalapeno, because my tastebuds do not like the spicy foods like your crazy tastebuds do). I think the food at potlucks—and backyard BBQs—gets better as you get older. When I was in my 20s we used to grill burgers and hot dogs, now we grill marinaded chicken, steak & mushrooms, and asparagus with olive oil.
found your blog throught mn food bloggers…here’s my MN enchilada post: http://ohmydoodle.blogspot.com/2010/05/one-butt-hot-dish.html
such a great thing to make…it has great color and it’s cool, hot, crunchy, cheesy, meaty. this is now my go-to meal to bring to family events.
I want to make these tonight! Looks amazing! Question. The title says black beans and I don’t see black beans in the recipe. Am I crazy??
Hi Mary! Use refried black beans if you can find them, otherwise you can mash regular black beans. 🙂
I didn’t read that last comment first, so I was wondering about the Black beans too. So I ended up adding a can of Black beans into the chicken mixture and only used one can of refried beans spread on tortillas. These were AMAZING! Thank you!!
So excited to make this for some friends of mine!! What would you recommend for side dishes to serve with this?
Chips and guac for sure! 🙂 You could also try some spanish rice.
Awesome! Thank you so much!! 🙂
Hi, this looks great! What enchilada sauce would you recommend?