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Making this easy homemade enchilada sauce in the blender is super fast. Once you make your own enchilada sauce yourself, you'll never want to buy canned sauces again.
And if you can get your hands on some fresh garden tomatoes - that tangy, sun-ripened burst of flavor will spoil you for any other version of enchilada sauce!
How to Use it
This easy sauce can be used when a recipe calls for red enchilada sauce. Try it in:
- Ground beef enchiladas (or any favorite enchilada recipe)
- Low carb cheese enchiladas
- Creamy chicken enchiladas
- Black bean enchiladas
- Or you can add some to spice up the flavor of chicken tortilla soup
- Stir some of this homemade sauce into refried beans to make a bean dip: Sprinkle with shredded cheese, heat until cheese melts, and serve with chips.
Ingredient List
This great recipe can be made entirely from simple pantry ingredients or a quick trip to your local grocery store. Or if you're lucky enough to have a garden, make it from pantry staples plus fresh tomatoes and garlic.
- Tomatoes: fresh from the garden is top of the list for this recipe, but if you don't have those, canned tomatoes will do just fine
- Chicken broth: Whether homemade or canned, this will control how thick or thin the sauce turns out so you can make it the way you like it.
- Tomato paste: It adds sweetness and thickens the sauce without using any starch or flour
- Apple cider vinegar: This adds just the right touch of tang to this sauce
- Chili powder, cumin, oregano, salt: Spicy, delicious flavor!
- Fresh garlic cloves: The flavor of fresh garlic is so good in enchilada sauce! And it's not "garlicky" at all. But you will not get the same flavor from garlic powder for this recipe - it really has to be fresh.
Get the full ingredient amounts in the recipe card (keep scrolling).
How to Make this Easy Homemade Enchilada Sauce:
step 1. Wash the tomatoes, remove the stems, and peel the garlic.
Step 2. To a blender or food processor, add the tomatoes, garlic, chicken stock, tomato paste, apple cider vinegar, chili powder, cumin, oregano, and salt.
Step 3. Turn the blender on high and blend until smooth.
If You Don't Have a Regular Blender
A blender is my favorite way to make this easy recipe, but you can whip this up in a food processor or an immersion blender.
For the immersion blender, I recommend adding the ingredients to a saucepan. On medium heat, bring it to a simmer, then use the immersion blender. Heating the sauce will make it easier to blend.
Here's What I Use
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Let's Talk Tomatoes
Why do home-grown tomatoes taste better than store bought tomatoes? Here are some reasons why:
- Tomatoes that are able to ripen in the sun have more developed flavor compounds than grocery store tomatoes, which must be picked before they are ripe and are often grown under grow lights.
- Heirloom tomatoes (which you can grow in your garden but are not available in stores), have even more intense flavor compounds. Researchers at the University of Florida found that the intensity of flavors link to twelve different chemical compounds in heirloom varieties, which is much more than other tomato varieties. The tomatoes shown above are from my garden and are all heirlooms. The flavor is absolutely more tangy and sweet - and you can really tell in my homemade blender enchilada sauce.
Change It Up
Feel free to substitute beef broth for the chicken broth if you prefer. You can also use vegetable broth if you want it to be vegan.
And even though I'm a obviously a big fan of fresh garden tomatoes, remember you can definitely use canned tomatoes and it will still taste great.
Flavor Enhancers 🌶️
Depending on your personal spice level feel free to add in any chili peppers you like. Chipotle peppers, chipotle powder, dried peppers or fresh peppers could all be a great addition.
These are just a few different ways you can take this simple recipe and turn it into an amazing spicy sauce.
How to Store
This recipe does make a lot of sauce. You can make a double batch of enchiladas and freeze the leftovers for an easy future dinner.
You can also store the extra sauce in an airtight container or a quart sized mason jar in the fridge.
You can also freeze the sauce in freezer containers, bags or even ice cube trays.
I think this easy enchilada sauce recipe would be an excellent candidate for pressure canning. When I develop the recipe and instructions, I'll update this post with all the details.
If you want to be notified when I have new recipes, videos, and special info (for subscribers only), I'd love to have you sign up to be on my email list. You can get a free PDF, Gluten Free Baking for Beginners for your trouble 🙂
Blender Enchilada Sauce
- Prep Time: 5-10 minutes
- Total Time: 0 hours
- Yield: 8 cups od sauce 1x
- Category: sauces, dressings, seasonings
- Method: blender
- Diet: Low Calorie
Ingredients
- 1.5 pounds of fresh tomatoes, or 1 can of whole tomatoes, 28 oz.
- 2 cups chicken broth
- 1 can tomato paste, 6 oz.
- 2 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
- 3 tablespoons chili powder
- 2 teaspoon cumin
- 1 teaspoon oregano, dried or ground
- 1 ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 medium cloves garlic, or 1 large clove
Instructions
- Wash tomatoes and peel garlic.
- Add all ingredients to a blender
- Process on high speed until smooth.
- Use right away if you'll be making enchiladas, since the sauce will be baked.
- If you plan to store it in the fridge for a while before using it, bring it to a boil on the stove or in the microwave, then cover it and store it in the fridge until you need it.
- It should keep well if chilled, for 3-4 days.
Notes
*Notes: The sauce may be a little too thick, depending on how juicy your tomatoes are. If needed you can add more chicken broth to thin it out until it's the texture that you like.
