Black Bean Enchiladas

These were fabulous, mainly because of the fantastic flavour of the simmered beans that are used as both filling and topping.

To save a little time, I took a potato masher to the beans while they were simmering with the added spices instead of puréeing a portion of them. The mixture was quite dry and it didn’t seem to matter how much of the reserved cooking liquid I added, it was absorbed. I hoped that some of the liquid would be released during baking, but that wasn’t the case – the beans became even drier. It wasn’t too much of an issue as I served them with a fresh tomato-corn salsa.

I wasn’t sure of the purpose of combining the tomato sauce for the tortilla dip with oil so I omitted it. After the first one disintegrated, I found that lowering the heat on the sauce to med-low gave me a little more control over softening each tortilla.

This is the most time consuming recipe I’ve come across so far in this cookbook; it does take planning, especially if you’re cooking your own beans, but it can be made in stages in advance and it’s certainly well worth the effort.

You need to think ahead on this one as the beans take some time. I did try to shave some time by starting the beans early , doing a quick soak method and cooking in crockpot except for the last hour. After I cooked them the last hour , I ended up adding some chicken broth as the did not seem as "saucy " as recipe made me think they should be. Also, tortillias do make a difference! I had bought one pack of 8 and realized that I needed more. The first pack was "LaTortilla" Brand and the second was Mission" Brand. The Mission brand wanted to fall apart when I was trying to soften them. Had to be really quick with them. LaTortilla brand were way better! When I think of enchiladas I think of tomato saucy ones. That being said , I definately wanted the homemade salsa on top and feel it did add to them. I would definately make these again. Very hearty and tasty !