Cheesy Enchilada

This is the third recipe of my 5 recipes for a 2-course Mexican Dinner. If you haven’t read the other recipes, here they are.

• 2/4/2020 – Fundido Sauce
• 2/6/2020 – Big Batch Taco Seasoning
• 2/11/2020 – Cheesy Enchilada
• 2/13/2020 – Enchisagna
• 2/18/2020 – Cheesy Cream Corn

Story Time with The Chronically ill Chef

I have major texture issues with food. I love the taste of onions, but I cannot stand the texture. And it goes beyond hating it because when I bite into an onion, my body decides that it is going to dry heave. Even if I focus all of my energy on not dry heaving and just enjoying the onion, dry heaves.

I get that way with whole tomatoes as well. I love the flavor of tomatoes, but the texture is an absolute no-no. So, now that I am an adult and have recognized and accepted that those issues are a reality that I can’t get past, I have figured out hacks to still have the food by either using a distracting texture or change the texture of the thing.

For example, I can have whole diced tomatoes as long as I have a big enough cracker that keeps its crispiness. But if it starts getting soggy and the tomatoes are not mushed up enough by my teeth, dry heaving. I also use a mortar and pestle on onions because then I have the flavor from the oil in the onions with only a little bit of onion chunks, not enough to cause a problem.

So, that’s all well and good, but who cares. What does that have to do with cheesy enchilada. So, when I was in 11th grade, I hadn’t figured out the ways of hacking the dry heave. So, for an entire year, I ate nothing but hamburger helper cheesy enchilada for every meal. I knew that I liked it, I knew that I could handle the consistency, and I knew that it was delicious. So, I had it for every meal.

I did Post-Secondary Enrollment Options (PSEO) in my last two years of high school, which meant that I went to college classes at the local community college and the state paid for it. So, I wasn’t eating school lunches, it was only cheesy enchilada for lunch and dinner (I didn’t do breakfasts, still don’t really, now I’m supposed to graze because of gastroparesis).

After a year, I started branching out and having some other things. But I always loved cheesy enchilada and still love it to this day. When I was diagnosed with celiac disease, I was heartbroken because the cheesy enchilada had wheat in it. I wanted cheesy enchilada, but it wasn’t available anymore.

Well, that was around the time that we found the taco seasoning recipe. I asked my mom what she thought putting rice and cheese into the taco mix would work, thereby making our own cheesy enchilada. She didn’t know if it would work, so we tried it. It was incredibly bland. But I realized that we had put in more ingredients without increasing the taco seasoning.

So, I recommended that we doubled the taco seasoning that we put into it. And, lo and behold, it worked. We have tried this recipe with store-bought taco mix and, in my opinion, it isn’t as good. It’s a little more bland than this one.

So, without further ado, here it is.

Ingredients

• 1 pound ground beef
• 2 taco seasoning mixes
  • 1/2 cup + 4 teaspoons if using the big batch taco seasoning
• 2 cups uncooked rice
• 3 cups water
• 3/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Directions

1. Brown hamburger in a pot.
2. Put in all ingredients except cheese.
3. Let cook for 15 – 20 minutes.
4. Pour in cheese and cook until cheese is melted.