Shredded Chicken and Roasted Chile Casserole - Easy Dinner

How often have you come home from work and wished that there was something easy, fast and tasty for dinner?  Every day for me.

For years I had a bad image in my mind regarding casseroles, all I could think of was some weird mixture of food topped with canned cream of mushroom soup.  Ugh!  That was until I tasted some more modern recipes, now I'm and occasional convert.

The dish I'll be discussing today is just such a meal.  In fact I often will make this one while I am preparing another dinner to kill two birds with one stone, or at least have something that makes tomorrow a little easier.  This one can also be made on the weekend to take some of the pressure of mid week a little.  It can also be frozen for later if you want, the final product can suffer a little from the freezing, but with an extra step or two during prep this can be minimized.  I'll show the process for shredded chicken in a few days.

This casserole also makes great leftovers which is a good thing.  You can also make this one vegetarian if you wish by substituting grilled chayote squash for the chicken.

Here is the recipe:

Shredded chicken meat from one 4-5 lb bird

10-12 corn tortillas + 6 tortillas set aside for the top

8-10 Roasted Anaheim peppers (good quality canned roasted peppers make this a fast meal)

2 Anaheim peppers, rough chopped

3 C Good quality cheddar cheese, grated

1 pint Green chili enchilada sauce (home made or if you have access to a high quality   prepared one you can use that as well to save time)

1 medium yellow onion, diced

1 T New Mexico chili powder

6 oz Cotija cheese crumbled

3 C shredded cheddar (6 oz or so)

Kosher salt

Advance preparation:

Cut a whole chicken into legs (no need to separate the thighs and legs for this) and breasts.  I save the wings in the freezer for a wings night.  Remove the skin and place on top of diced onion in a glass or other non-reactive baking dish.  Add rough chopped Anaheim peppers.  Cover tightly with plastic wrap and foil.  Bake at 250F for about two hours.

Let cool and shred the meat.

Put all of the onions, peppers and accumulated liquid into a sauce pan and bring to a boil.  If the volume is less than a pint, add a little chicken stock or water.  Add a pinch of kosher salt and purée.

Pour about 1/2" oil (extra virgin olive oil blend or canola) into a 10-12 inch sauté pan and turn on the heat to high.  Cut your corn tortillas into thirds.  

Fry the tortilla pieces until they are crisp.  I have a little trouble keeping myself from eating these as I pull them from the oil.  Not ALL of them, but I need to do a couple of extras because fresh, hot tortilla chips whatever their size is a weakness of mine.

Once you have fried all of the tortillas, it is time to start the construction, ladle some of your green chili sauce into the bottom of the casserole dish.  

Lay some tortilla dips down to cover the bottom.

Spread out one half of the chicken, add some cotija and cheddar.  Season with a little bit of kosher salt and some chile powder to add a little zing.  

Remember that the cheese is going to "dumb down" any heat that the chicken may have picked up in the baking process, which is unlikely to be much by the way.

Layer some of your roasted peppers over the chicken.

Add another layer of the giant tortilla chips and repeat the process.

Put a little oil into a sauté pan or flat cast iron pan and sauté the last six tortillas for the top.

Lay down the final layer of tortillas, ladle some more of the sauce over the top.  At this time it is important to make sure that you have added enough sauce to keep the final product moist when it is done in the oven.

Finally a layer of cotija and cheddar.  

Pop the pan into the oven at 375F for 45 minutes to an hour.  When the top is beginning to brown and it is bubbling slightly, it's done.

Time for dinner.  Serve with a classic Mexican salad such as Caesar, some guacamole and sour cream.  Good eating.