Encacahuatadas!

Mission accomplished.

I’m just back from my week teaching classes at Rancho La Puerta, and I’m happy to report that my “Eat More Beans” sermon fell on receptive ears, and after giving it last Sunday afternoon, I heard the same thing over and over again throughout the week. At meals, on hikes, in yoga class, at a storytelling workshop: “I’m eating more beans because of you!”

People’s excited reaction to the lecture also caused my classes to fill right up — and for a farm-to-table dinner I worked on with chef Vivian Mercado and her great team at La Cocina que Canta (the spa’s cooking school) to sell out, too.

Table of Contents

• My next Zoom cooking class: BLACK BEANS!

• I break for animals: Hank

• Recipe: Encacahuatadas (Peanut Sauce Enchiladas)

• More favorite enchilada recipes

I loved working on the dinner, because it gave me the chance to feature some recipes that might be a bit too involved for the classes — but that I adore. My part of the menu: Lablabi, a Tunisian chickpea stew from “Cool Beans,” for an early course; chocolate lime olive oil cake with mango curd for dessert; and in between, for the main course, one of my absolute favorite recipes from “Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking.”

It’s something I worked on with Dora Ramirez, who has her own lovely cookbook out recently, “Comida Casera.” When Dora and I talked about what we might cook up to showcase plant-based Mexican cooking in a way that might be surprising to readers, talk turned to enchiladas, and I told Dora how fascinated I was by the fact that enchiladas are part of an ecosystem of filled, rolled and sauced tortilla dishes that deserve to be so much more popular among American cooks than they are.

My first exposure to this ecosystem had been enfrijoladas, which use a bean sauce instead of a chile sauce to enrobe those glorious tubes. But then we talked about enmoladas (mole sauce) and entomatadas (tomato sauce) and encacahuatadas (peanut sauce), and I knew what we’d do: Present them all together, with recipes for each sauce that could be mixed and matched with various fillings.

I adore them all, truly, but the star, IMHO, are the encacahuatadas. A spicy peanut sauce? I have just one word: Wow!

So when Vivian asked me about recipes for the dinner, a new addition to my Rancho La Puerta schedule and duties, I knew encacahuatadas would be among them. We filled them with a combination of Swiss chard (from the Tres Estrellas farm on the property, overseen by the charming Salvador Tinajero), mushrooms and hominy, made the sauce extra-smooth, and garnished with shredded lettuce, crema, cotija cheese, thinly sliced radishes and onions.

These are among the dishes in “Mastering” that I give the “Weekend” label for the time the various elements require. But you can split them up over a couple of days to make things go even more smoothly when you make them for a dinner party.

You will make them for a dinner party, won’t you? Just promise me this: When you do, put on the “Lion King” soundtrack at some point and just see if anyone — anyone! — is able to resist belting out “En-ca-ca-hua-tadas!” to the tune of, well, I bet you know the song. I was the one who couldn’t resist during the dinner at La Cocina que Canta, such an appropriate location given that its name, for all us non-Spanish-speakers, means “The kitchen that sings.”

My next Zoom cooking class: Black beans!

When I asked the students at my most recent Zoom cooking class, devoted to lentils, what they wanted next, the consensus was articulated by one of them: “You can never have too many beans.” Well, I couldn’t have said it better myself!

So on Sunday, May 3, from noon to 2 p.m. Eastern, we’ll be doing what I did with pinto beans a couple months back, and learning three recipes to make with a single pot of black beans — along with all my tips on how to make them taste their best (hint: no soaking!).

As always, you get 25 percent off a ticket to the class as a subscriber to this newsletter; just use the promo code “eatatjoes”! And don’t worry; if you just want to watch and not cook along, you’re welcome to do that. And if you can’t make it live but want to watch later, your ticket gets you access to a recording.

I break for animals:
Hank

Having Instagram-loading troubles again, so here’s the manual link!

Recipe: Encacahuatadas (Peanut Sauce Enchiladas)

Time: Weekend // Make ahead: prepare the sauce and filling the day before; assemble and cook right before serving. // Storage: Leftover sauce and filling keep separately refrigerated for up to 5 days.

Serves 10

For the encacahuatada (peanut) sauce:

• 40 small dried guajillo chiles (275g total), stemmed and seeded

• 1½ pounds Roma tomatoes

• 5 cups unsalted roasted peanuts

• 5–7 canned chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (use 6 for medium heat)

• 10 garlic cloves, peeled but whole

• ½ teaspoon ground cloves

• 1 tablespoon + 2 teaspoons fine sea salt, plus more to taste

• 1¼ teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

• 2½ tablespoons avocado oil (for frying the sauce)

For the greens and hominy filling:

• 1¼ pounds Swiss chard

• 2½ teaspoons avocado oil

• 2½ pounds oyster mushrooms, trimmed and torn into bite-size pieces

• 1¼ cups vegetable stock or broth

• 7 garlic cloves, finely grated or pressed

• 3 cans (15 oz each) white hominy, drained and rinsed (or 4½ cups cooked hominy)

• 2½ teaspoons fine sea salt, plus more to taste

• ½ teaspoon + pinch freshly ground black pepper

For assembly:

• 20 corn tortillas

• 2½ cups dairy or non-dairy feta, cotija or queso fresco, crumbled

• 1¼ cups dairy or non-dairy sour cream or crema

• ⅔ cup thinly sliced white onion

• ⅔ cup thinly sliced radishes

• 5 cups shredded romaine lettuce

Make the sauce: Heat a large cast-iron skillet over medium heat until it starts to smoke. Working in batches, add the guajillo chiles in a single layer and toast for about 30 seconds per side, until pliable and fragrant. Transfer the toasted chiles to a large saucepan and add water to cover by 1 inch. Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat, reduce the heat slightly, and simmer gently until the chiles are soft, about 10 minutes. Reserve the soaking water, then drain through a fine-mesh sieve. Transfer chiles to a blender. Add 5 cups of the soaking water (add plain water if you don't quite have enough).

In the same cast-iron skillet, cook the whole tomatoes over medium-high heat, turning, until slightly blackened on all sides, about 6 minutes. Transfer to the blender with the chiles.

Add the peanuts, chipotle peppers, garlic, ground cloves, salt, and black pepper to the blender. Puree until completely smooth. Taste and season with more salt as needed. For an extra-smooth texture, strain through a fine-mesh sieve.

In a large skillet, heat the 2½ tablespoons avocado oil over medium heat until it shimmers. Pour in the sauce and cook, stirring, until it thickens slightly and the color dulls, about 6 minutes. Keep warm.

Make the filling: Remove the Swiss chard leaves from the stems. Thinly slice the stems; roughly chop the leaves. Keep them separate.

In a very large skillet (or work in two batches), heat the avocado oil over medium-high heat until it shimmers. Add the oyster mushrooms and Swiss chard stems and sauté until the mushrooms are golden brown, 5–6 minutes.

Reduce the heat to medium-low. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Stir in the Swiss chard leaves and vegetable broth. Cover and cook until the chard fully wilts, 2–3 minutes.

Stir in the hominy, salt, and pepper. Taste and season with more salt as needed. Keep warm.

To assemble: Reheat the peanut sauce and filling (separately) if needed.

Heat the tortillas until soft and pliable: on a comal or dry skillet over medium-high heat for 30 seconds per side, or in the microwave in batches of 4 on high for 30–60 seconds each.

Use tongs to dip each tortilla in the warm peanut sauce, letting any excess drip off. Transfer to a plate and place about 2 tbsp of filling in the center. Roll the tortilla tightly around the filling. Set 2 rolled encacahuatadas on each plate, spoon more sauce over the top, and finish with almond crema, queso fresco, and any optional toppings.

Recipe from “Mastering the Art of Plant-Based Cooking” (2024, Ten Speed Press), copyright Joe Yonan.

More favorite enchilada recipes

These are gift links to the recipes at the Post. Note that they require you to register but not subscribe. Gift links are free to access for 2 weeks, so if you want to come back to any of these recipes but don’t subscribe or want to subscribe, I suggest you find a way to save them!

Enfrijoladas With Egg, Onion and Avocado

Squash and Corn Enchiladas

Cauliflower Enchiladas