Enchiladas

Enchiladas are corn tortillas rolled around a filling and baked under red or green chile sauce and melted cheese. They are Mexico's everyday way to use up last night's roast chicken or beans, and the sauce is the whole point — the filling is almost secondary.

What it actually is

Corn tortillas are lightly fried to soften them, then rolled around a filling — most often shredded chicken, though cheese, beans or beef all appear — and laid seam-down in a baking dish. A red sauce (dried chiles, tomato) or a green sauce (tomatillo, fresh chile) is poured over, topped with cheese and baked just long enough to melt it and warm the rolls through.

The sauce colour is the first thing a cook decides, and it changes the whole dish: red enchiladas are deeper and smokier from dried chiles, green ones are brighter and more acidic from tomatillo. Neither is more "correct" — they're different traditions from different regions.

How it's served

• Straight from the baking dish, sauce still bubbling at the edges.
• Topped with crema, sliced onion and crumbled cheese, added after baking, not before.
• Three or four to a plate, with rice and beans alongside — it's a full meal, not a snack.

Writing it on a menu

• Say red or green; regulars will ask, and it's the single detail that tells them what they're getting.
• Note the dairy from the cheese and crema.
• Corn tortillas make this naturally gluten-free — but only if the kitchen hasn't swapped in flour tortillas, so verify before the claim.
• Mention the filling plainly: chicken, cheese-only, or bean — it changes who orders it.